DIY Ganesha (Elephant God) Clay Idol!!

Ganesha Chaturthi, one of my favorite festival, also known as ‘Vinayak Chaturthi’ or ‘Vinayaka Chavithi’ is celebrated by Hindus around the world as the birthday of Lord Ganesha (Elephant God). Ganesha is widely revered as the remover of obstacles.

The story behind elephant head has many versions. The most common of these stories is that Ganesha was created by Parvati (Mother of Ganesha) using clay to protect her and Shiva(Father of Ganesha) unknowingly beheaded him when Ganesha came between Shiva and Parvathi. Shiva then replaced Ganesha’s original head with that of an elephant.

He is also called as Ekadanta (One Tusked), referring to his single whole tusk, the other being broken. You will notice it in all of the ganesha idols and pictures.

So, it is our 4th year of pooja, post our wedding. The first year I got a pure clay idol(Singapore) and added some colors. And last 2 years I was attending “Make your own Ganesha” workshop conducted by Mahaganapti Temple of Arizona.

This year I was very excited to make an idol. There are many videos on youtube. My sister and I did it together(virtually on Skype) and thought it would be easy to share the video we followed. We have chosen a theme and she did a ganesha on Veena (Indian musical instrument) and I did mine with tablas(indian musical instruments). Since it is in regional Indian language(Telugu) sharing couple of other versions too.

Video I followed – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZgSH_kp-cQ

The other videos – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cV-A6ID5OLA

And this is our Ganesha look 🙂

In India you don’t have to worry about clay, and if you are in US, you have couple of options of clay to use. I used Das Terracota Air dry modeling clay. However, you can also use Mexican pottery clay available @ craft stores like HobbyLobby n Michaels.

Hope you make a cute Ganesha idol and have a happy Ganesh Pooja in advance.

Thank you.

Published by Nima

Hi, I am very delighted that you stopped by! Welcome to Creative ME!!! I 'm a wife to an amazing hubby and recently mother to an adorable little munchkin :-), an Asian(Indian) native, nomad for a while and now currently @Portland, Oregan. Recently relocated from The Grand Canyon State and still adjusting to the gloomy weather here... When we first we moved to US(2012) ,our first 2 months of accommodation was in a hotel and that's when everything started. You must be wondering HOW? I was introduced to HGTV and started reading craft blogs. Ohh yes, PINTERST toooo and that is my fav! Well, inspired from these places, I started to DIY on budget and decorate our home. Whenever I posted pics of my projects on Facebook, everyone loved and gave many positive comments. Some of them also said I should not look for a job, instead start a blog or sell some of my projects ;) They thought I was doing something very cool!! That was a great motivation and I decided to tickle my creative senses to tame the stress monster ;-) And then, one day here is my blog , where I share my ideas and projects with friends, family and all other aspiring DIY-er's :) And if you like my blog, please come back and also don't forget to tell your friends :) Lastly, if you have a fun and functional craft or project or even a simple recipe I want to hear….please let me know and I can feature, down the line we will make Creative ME to WE..;) View more posts

3 thoughts on “DIY Ganesha (Elephant God) Clay Idol!!”

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Hello mam….
This is yaksh….
I loved your project on paper leis….very useful to me….as I am a great crafty person….
Thank you so. Much….just one small query, where did you get the “streamers” from?.
.

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Nima says:

March 1, 2016 at 12:38 pm

Thanks Yaksh! Glad you like the project. I got the paper streamers from local dollar store! I am sure you should be able to find it in any party stores.

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