Weekly Goals Update – 26 February 2012

I initially thought of skipping last week’s update, since I was out of town for most of the week, and my daily schedules were all haywire. But then I didn’t feel like breaking the routine and anyway, holidaying is no excuse to let go of your goals. So here goes!!

1. Walked quite a bit while on holiday and did a lot of house cleaning when I got back, since our househelp was on leave.

2. Kept my water intake consistent.

3. Tried my best to calm Cub during his public tantrums and refrained from nagging hubs.

4. Didn’t go overboard shopping.

5. Started reading a new book - 'A Calendar Too Crowded' by Sagarika Chakraborty

1. Did just one proper workout this week.

2. Fruit intake was really low.

3. Prayers were kind of irregular

That’s all for now!! Hope everyone’s having a great start to the new week!!

Weekend Getaway – Kochi Part II

Presenting Part II of my Kochi travelogue. I know, I can hardly call this a travelogue, considering most of the focus is on food and shopping. The thing is, whenever we go somewhere on holiday, my first question is about the shopping venues and Mr. Tiger is solely concerned about where and what we’ll eat. Seriously, he plans where we’ll have our breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks well before we even book our tickets. Yes, I’m married to a man who is married to his food. Sigh!!

Jew Town, Princess Street, Bazaar Road are some of the good places to shop in Fort Kochi. You get a lot of touristy stuff here, and some useful things too. Mainly known for their curios, antiques and travel-related books, you can also find lots of cotton tunics/kurtas and plain maxi dresses hanging outside the little stores. Also available are stone jewelry, scarves, Tshirts, perfume and massage oils, and several other knick knacks.

Here is Cub enjoying a Kinder egg in front of one of the colorful street shops at Jew Town.

I found a charming little pocket watch neck piece for which I've been looking all over!

I was so happy that I put it on instantly! You press the little button on the top to make it open:

And also, this cute fridge magnet with a houseboat on it:

There are many stores on M.G. Road, many of them dealing with sarees and of course, gold. This is Kerala, after all! We didn’t get much time here so I didn’t buy anything.

The malls have most mall-y stores. However, the usuals are missing – Pantaloons, Westside, Lifestyle. There was a real cute Ayesha store in Nucleus Mall; though I've heard a lot about it, this was the first time I actually visited a store. I personally found the prices a little above the usual, but the pieces are really unique. I’m kicking myself now for not getting anything :-(.

Another good place to visit is Mantra at Oberon mall. They have really nice cotton kurtas with quite a wide variety. The basic kurtas start at 1050.00, which is a bit steep compared to fabindia and the rest, but they are really well made. The quality seems very good, they are very comfortable and the fit is amazing. 

Speaking of fabindia, you are bound to bump into a store wherever you go in Kochi. I spotted one at Fort Kochi, a second standalone store somewhere else nearer to town, and one in each of the three malls we visited. It is no wonder that my Kochi shopping is almost exclusively from fab :-).

They’ve got a new collection called ‘Rang Barse’ for spring/summer. I got two kurtas to add to my summer wardrobe. (I’m kidding, I don’t buy new clothes every season)

This one is actually kind of olive green, and not as light as it appears in the picture:

This one’s got a nice floral summery print on it.

Typical fabindia stuff, I know, but both of them are really comfy and soft.

Then I got this necklace with multi colored janglers (which don't really jangle):

And a pair of bright multi colored earrings:

This bangle-neckpiece set was part of their old collection and was on sale. I got it for just 60 rupees!!!

And a little travel soap bar (No, I'm not leaving anything out :-))

We also did some book shopping:

Cub’s book and CD Haul:

Yea, that’s about it. I didn’t have any shopping list to begin with, so I was careful not to go overboard. But I’m quite happy with my little haul, though my fav has to be the watch neckpiece :-). What about you guys? Do you guys shop a lot while holidaying?

Weekend Getaway - Kochi Part I

Hello ladies!!! Guess why I wasn’t around this week? Go on, ask me!! Yes, I had an extended weekend with a trip to Kochi!! Weekend started on Sunday and ended on Wednesday :-D. Aaaaahhhhh, bliss!!!!

For those who aren’t aware, Kochi is a city sort of in the middle of Kerala which, for the unaware again, is a southern state of India. Now, if you don’t know where India is, then, err....I'm not sure if this blog is what you should be reading right now :-).

We had a fun time in all, the climate was a bit humid, but okay. We checked out some malls, went on a sunset cruise, went to Fort Kochi, roamed the old streets, Synagogue and of course had loads of seafood!!

The problem with the food was that, we went to the wrong place. You see, almost all places advertise ‘Authentic Kerala cuisine’ but most of them have watered down the spice quotient to make it more acceptable to palates with a low spice tolerance. To make up for the low spice, they add relatively ‘foreign’ agents like tomato puree and onion pastes and stuff which completely alters the taste. For example, one of the must haves are ‘Karimeen Pollichathu’ (Pearl Spot Fish cooked in Banana Leaves) which looks like this:

I know it looks yum, but the taste was hugely disappointing. But to make up for it, we had some yum desserts from this place called Cocoa Tree. Here is the Mississippi Mud Pie I ordered:

And here is hubby’s Cheesecake:

They were really good!! There’s also this really quaint little café right outside the Synagogue with little shops selling books, clothes and antiques inside it. The ambience is lovely and makes you want to just sit there sipping some hot chocolate and going through a nice book. It is a bit ‘touristy’, so be prepared for a slightly overpriced cappuccino. Unfortunately, they didn’t allow photography.

And now for some random snaps in and around Kochi:

This is probably paradise for ginger lovers:

Ginger Tea? Heard of. Ginger Chicken? Yes. Ginger Ice cream and ginger lassi? I don’t think so :-).

A nice Jewish gentleman on a street in Jew Town. Can you get a feel of the old streets from that photo?

Some interesting offers on display :-)

That’s Cub rolling in the ball pit, having the time of his life. We had to literally drag him away from there.

The view during our sunset cruise which set sail from Marine Drive.

The malls are all well maintained and have mostly branded stuff, but are located a bit away from the main town area. And, the auto drivers will totally rip you off, and there isn’t much use bargaining with them; they’ve got their own overpriced rates for every location, so swapping your auto is not going to do much good.

I did do a spot of shopping, but I’ll leave that for another post. Bye till then!!

Weekly Goals Update – 19 February 2012

This week was average, though better than last week.

1. Worked out 3 days for 45 minutes and had a brisk walk on the fourth day.

2. Prayers were regular

3. Started reading a book – ‘The Average Indian Male’ by Cyrus Broacha

4. Had 2 servings of fruit everyday.

5. Upped my water intake

1. Behind on my blog schedule

2. Household cleaning was also behind schedule

3. And as always – overeating at dinner

The scale is simply not budging. I even got my thyroid levels checked, thinking something was wrong. It has got to be my diet, specially dinner. Can’t help it, I just settle down at the end of the day and get to eating. Also brek and dinner are the only meals where all of us are present, and dinner is the comparatively relaxed meal. Sigh!!

Hanshika Motwani New Cool Pics

Hanshika Cute Picture

New Hanshika Motwani Wall papers

Actress Wall papers

Hanshika New Stills

Chit Chat!

Got nothing specific to blog..so I thought I’d do a little chit chat with you guys. Nothing like some girl-talk to boost our feel good hormones, is there? Of course, being one-sided it’s only half the fun, but when did that ever stop me from yakking away? :-)

Hope everyone had a great Valentine’s Day, that is, if you are amongst the celebrators. I’m not, so didn’t do anything much. I did however try out a new recipe the day before, from Ria Jobin’s amazing blog ‘Ria’s Collection’. Her recipes are wonderful and the pictures on her blog – mouthwatering!!!! I tried out her Jam Filled Cookies recipe, but avoided the jam part. Here’re some pics.

Cookies cut out from dough and ready to go into the oven:

Fresh out of the oven, mmm!!!

Nutella Love :-)

I tried doing Ria’s jam thing too:

I followed her recipe to the word; only I would suggest chilling the dough for a couple of hours before cutting out the cookies, so that the dough binds better.

While we’re chatting, I might as well share an outfit that’s been in the drafts for quite a while. It’s what I wore for the Republic Day celebration at Cub’s playschool, yup, been a while. Nothing spectacular or anything, just a simple, yet extremely comfortable printed cotton kurta from Westside and white bottom accessorized with a gift from my brother-in-law in the U.S. – a red bag that is so spacious, I could actually fit a little kitchen sink in it!! I've been wanting to try the blue-white-red theme for a while, so here is the desi version!

Kurta: Westside

Bag: Gift

Pendant: Globus

Earrings: Commercial Street, Bangalore

Bangles: Streets of Hyderabad

Shoes: Lifestyle

This is my second outfit post this year! My goal was two outfit posts per month, so going by that, not very good. Hmm, gotta come up with more!!!

Workout wise, I’ve been doing Tae Bo Cardio for a while now and I’ve just got a hold of Tae Bo Extreme. It’s one hour of cardio (including a step) and weights. I’m really enjoying Tae Bo; Billy Blanks (the guy behind it) is very encouraging and you can feel the enthusiasm of a real class. He tells you to push yourself and not give up, even if you have to pause to catch your breath. Good stuff.

Well, that’s all for now, catch you girls later!!

Weekly Goals Update – 12 February 2012

I’ve been really bad this week. Terrible, actually.

1. Read a book – ‘The Monk who sold his Ferrari’ by Robin Sharma. Please don’t gasp, I’ve had this book for long but finally got around to reading it.

2. Prayers were regular about 90% of the time.

3. Read the paper at least 4 days and checked the internet for news on the others.

4. Sat down and played with the Cub.

5. Tried out Zumba for the first time.

1. Worked out only 3 days this week, for 45 minutes.

2. Overate for dinner thrice.

3. Fruit and water intake was quite low except for the weekend.

4. Yelled at the Cub three times.

Ugh, I’m disgusted with myself. I don’t even have a good enough excuse for skipping my workouts and overeating. (Does PMS count?)

Anyway, what’s done is done. I’ve really got to pull up my game starting….NOW.

By the way, did you guys see today’s date: 12 – 2 – 12. Interesting, huh? See you guys next week!

Priyanka Chopra New Stills

 

Cute Priyanka Chopra

 

Cute Priyanka Chopra

 

Cute and beautiful Priyanka Chopra

 

Priyanka Chopra  in Don

 

Don Movie Stills

 

Don Movie Stills

 

Priyanka at Movie Launch

Lust List - February

It’s been a while since I did a lust list (December), so this is the first list of the year! Now, being Feb and all, you’ll obviously be expecting a riot of pink hearts – but I’m going to break away from all that headache inducing red and pink and bring you something completely different. It’s not that I’m a Valentine-grinch or anything; I don’t celebrate it myself though I like seeing how everyone else is doing it :-).

1. Printed Sumana Dress

 Image Courtesy: Anthropologie

A pretty, breezy dress from Anthropologie. I especially love the tassels hanging down front, I’d probably leave them untied :-). It just looks so perfect for humid Indian summers. Bonus: Would flatter all body types.

2. Blue High Heeled Peeptoes with Bow

 Image Courtesy: H&M

How cute are these H&M lovelies? I love the color and the bow. These booties also somehow look like they would be quite comfortable to walk around in, don’t they?

3. Striped T Shirt

 Image Courtesy: ASOS

Of course you’ve seen a lot of striped T shirts, but I like the asymmetry in the pattern of the sleeves in this ASOS version. I don’t particularly care for the hat and the skirt worn by the model, but this does seem to be a real versatile piece.

4. Leaf Ring

 Image Courtesy: Etsy

This ring is love at first sight. It’s so elegant and pretty and ladylike and all sorts of things! It is available on Etsy, in case you've fallen for it's charms too :-).

5. Vera Wang Lovestruck Perfume

 Image Courtesy: luxpresso

This deviates a bit from my No-Valentine-theme I mentioned, but I really liked the look of the bottle as well as of the ad. It features Gossip Girl ‘Leighton Meester’ in a beautiful strapless gown. The perfume is supposed to be ‘a floral scent that incorporates a pink guava and mandarin, followed by a mix of tuberose and lotus blossom. Precious woods and seductive musk make for the base notes’.  Sounds like a real man-magnet!!

6. Adorable Teddy

 Image Courtesy: links2love

Ok fine, I’ll put in something for the mush-hearts amongst you guys. Is this guy kiss-worthy or what? Just look at his boxers!! Yes, the Santa hat does make him a bit Christmassy, but the boxers are perfect for this season :-). And of course, the message on his little vest. Did I mention how cute his boxers are?

So, what do you guys think of this month’s lust list? Are you disappointed there aren’t any Valentine specials? Comment away!!