Devotion

Lately, I have been finding these kind of love notes everywhere in the house. Inside her school bag, my closet, on her table, and in my workspace.

Last weekend, I moved around systematically from room to room, gathering up these bits of paper to store them safely in one place. Later, I complained to S - "Gosh, there are sooo many notes Y has written for me...I had to find a folder to cram them into!"

My husband gave me a strange look. Part annoyance, part jealousy. He said - "Do you know I have only ONE such note. Even that has Amma crossed and replaced with Appa!"

So I am #1. This is exhilarating. Cheap, I know...but exhilarating :) Sanjay calls her "Jalra". Sour grapes, I say.

Though I will be the first to admit that I can take no credit. That's just the way my little girl is. Devoted and affectionate. Every single day, I fail in my own eyes as a mom. Everyday I go to sleep thinking I need to do better. But in her eyes, it seems I am already perfect. Thank you for keeping me up on that pedestal, Y! I won't grow all proud and haughty because your brother will always ensure I come down to earth with a big crash!

But sometimes, even I feel she can take it too far. One day, she asked me what the word "react" meant. I explained - "Suppose I annoy you and you get angry with me. That means your reaction was anger. " She looked horrified. "But amma, I can NEVER get angry with you!!"

Only about Y#1

The school bus driver has been complaining about Y. Apparently she does not sit quietly in her seat when the bus is in motion, especially on the way back from school,  but keeps running up and down for some reason or the other. Whenever the bus stops to drop off a child at his/her stop, Y gets up and "escorts" the kid upto the bus door. I've heard this from the driver multiple times, multiple versions. When we task Y, she gets all teary and claims she has been getting up for a legitimate purpose - I wanted water. My friend asked me to get the toffee from my bag. I needed some hand sanitizer, and so on. When my disbelief is apparent, her parting shot is always - Amma, you always say bad things about me! Which, by the way, is completely untrue because I am her biggest fan :) Anyway she is quite the chhupa-rustam so I tend to believe the bus driver and not her!

She has been learning Bharatanatyam for the last few weeks (a little young, I am told) but the teacher's really nice and Y seemed to enjoy the first few trial classes so we went ahead. Never having learnt the dance form myself, I was quite taken aback to see how hard it was and how much of a strain it puts on the knees and back. Well, my knees and back for sure when I tried some of the steps...I assume kids are more flexible!

(Can you tell this is an easy week at work? I got my blogging mojo back :) Better I think to do short quick posts whenever I have a free minute than aim for longer well-thought out and well-written posts....not that my long ones were particularly scintillating to read...just saying :))

Kiddisms #2

It's been a while since I blogged, and I don't know quite where to begin. It's fair to say we have all been so busy with our routines and with living life, so to speak, that writing about it and recording memories have had to fall by the wayside. Being up at 5 am to get ready for a hectic day and falling into bed exhausted at 10 pm does not an active blogger make!

But it's all good -- we are fast approaching the end of yet another school year. How times flies! Ads will go to 4th grade this year and will turn 9 in just a few months. Y will still be in kindergarten :) But she is going to have an extended day come June, so changes in store for her. My parents have settled in well and we have established a daily routine that pivots around the children's needs. I am loving my job and while the commute is still killing, I have been working a couple of days a week from home which makes it easier.

But enough of that. The kids have been cracking me up with their usual antics. Jotting down a few here lest I forget!

Advaith has now taken to wearing shirts instead of t-shirts, all buttoned up till the neck (a la Dev Anand). When we step out, he likes to wear jeans/trousers (no shorts), belt, socks and shoes (floaters? what are those?). I am his biggest irritant because I'm constantly trying to make him dress down. The other day, I pleaded with him to unbutton the collar button. His response? A roll of the eyes and "Amma, I am NOT a Hindi film hero!" He dislikes seeing people with their shirts unbuttoned all the way down displaying their macho chests :)

His major mania is "neating". Apparently our apartment looks like a pigsty. I am so offended especially as I've spent most of my life being accused of being too neat and tidy. He spends every spare minute obsessively tidying up the flat, plumping cushions and keeping slippers lined up in ramrod-straight lines :) The Virgo streak is more than apparent, along with the OCD-like behaviour that marks many of us. One of my friends told me the other day that Virgo women are quite nice but Virgo men can be insufferable and I am beginning to appreciate those wise words :(

He still hates the camera and is a little relieved that "Amma does not click many photos nowadays." Glad somebody noticed! I asked him "Am I the best mom?". Ok I know, kinda silly question but I had just come away from an awwww moment of Y telling me "Amma you are not a good mom........you are the BEST mom!"

Ads sighed. "Amma, if I was Yashas, then Chitra aunty (Yashas' mom) would be the best mom. And if I  was X then X's mom would be the best mom."

I persisted. So what are you saying, do you think I'm the best mom or not?

Silence and a LOOK which seemed to say - Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies!

That's my boy - my harshest critic and the Raja Harishchandra of this family - he gives it like it is! Between him and S, I can rest assured I will never suffer from an inflated ego!

Y on the other hand, is the one that signs off each night with a solicitous - "Amma, are you going to do some work? Don't strain yourself, ok? Go to bed soon!"

Things I learnt about my son in school

 1. His nickname in class is "Encyclopaedia". Go figure - it shouldn't be difficult :)

2. His pasta is of course very popular among classmates. There's another boy in class whose mom makes great cakes, so I have been asked to out-do her and send a cake for snack tomorrow. Apparently my chocolate chip muffins and banana bread aren't good enough :)

3. He's a lot more assertive and outgoing than I thought he would be. It was quite a surprise! I could hear his voice overriding some others while we were conducting the spelling bee, and once he started arguing with another girl and the teacher had to shush him.

4. Apparently he passes the time by cleaning the classroom floor with a ruler, and plays goofball by falling onto the floor and rolling around whenever they have no teacher supervising. YUCK!!  

The things one learns!

On another note, this is the complete list of all the birds we saw in Bharatpur :)

 

Princess-servants

I was sitting on the lawns, chatting with my friends, with one eye on Y, who was playing with another girl 'S', who is the same age. They were under the temporary supervision of ‘N’ didi, a cheerful 8-year old who loves to play with the younger kids – Teacher-teacher, house-house and passing the parcel are some of the names of the games that Y faithfully reports to me every evening.

Today, apparently, was a game called "Princess and Palace". Y tells me that she and the other preschooler S, have both got separate rooms in the palace. I asked her “Oh, so you and S are princesses?” Y says “ No, amma, N akka is the princess. We are servants!”

I couldn’t help it. Laughter came bursting out of me. Y obviously thought servants were something like princesses. Before I could stop myself, I said “Oh, so you are N akka’s maids.”

Y stomped her foot (she hates people laughing at her) - “NOO. We are servants. Not maids!”

I tried to make amends by saying "Never mind, darling. I would love to have servants as cute as you and S."

But she is still furious with me and went off to bed without the usual goodnight hug and kiss :(

Oh, and a couple of days ago, she told me - "Amma, I want a sister. Not a boy-sister. I want a girl-sister." 

:))

Lest I forget - the kids are growing up!

I was trying to change some of the tags on old posts and came across this post, written almost 2 years ago. This is one of the reasons I blog, to jog memories that can put life back in perspective :) We've come a long way since then!

The parent's revenge

I was watching them, secretly (as always); and Ads shouted at Y in sheer frustration: "Will you please stop talking for ONE SECOND?!!!"

I almost fell off the sofa, I was laughing so hard and Ads was so mad at me. It wasn't the first time this had happened, and every time it does, I react in the same way. With delight. That Ads is being paid back in spades for all the incessant talking that he plagued us with for four years.

In fact, he's now a lot quieter than Y who talks non-stop. To me, S, Ads, the maids, and to the walls and imaginary conversations on the phone when no one is listening (which is most of the time!). But most of the time, she talks to her brother, and expects a response and that drives him nuts especially when he is concentrating on his drawing. I know how it feels when someone talks so much that you can't hear yourself think. Ads is going through that now.

I'd spare some sympathy for him, if I wasn't so busy gloating.....

Sweet revenge. It feels good.

Huddle and Cuddle

Last weekend, we stayed the night at a relative's place and they were astonished how all four of us fitted into their queen-size bed, and woke up fresh as daisies the next morning, carrying no aches and pains from the uncomfortable sleeping positions the night before. I don't think we can carry it on for much more than a year though, not on a queen bed for sure. The only reason we can do it now is because it's winter and it's actually much nicer to have the kids in bed with us. S says it's like having an extra layer of blankets! Body warmth and all that.

All this co-sleeping is spoiling my kids silly. They can't go to sleep without a cuddling session. A few minutes after I am awake, Y gets up, sensing the lack of body warmth next to her. Come to think of it, it's spoiling me and S too, so accustomed as we are to having warm little bodies nestled inside ours, little arms around our necks and drool staining our clothes the next morning (the gross things parents find cute!).
I'm sure I am going to start finding all this cute stuff pretty annoying once the Delhi summer arrives in another couple of months. Body warmth in April and May - I think NOT!

To cover all contingencies

I asked Ads why he was carrying 2 hankerchiefs and he said "One is for my nose and one is for my tears". Ufff....too much! It sounds so tragic, doesn't it? The melodramatic fellow!

Well, atleast no one can say I didn't allow my boy to express his feelings clearly. Nobody shall accuse me of curtailing his emotional growth or ignoring the emotional quotient in his personality.

To set the record straight, he'd been going through a weepy phase and just felt the need to be prepared :)

Not my post

My kids' maami, blogged about her discussions with Ads, here and here. It makes for an interesting read; and, as always, I gain a fresh perspective on how my child thinks (or indeed, how many kids may think, but of course I retain the right of believing my child is absolutely unique!).

Thanks, Yuvika!

Rituals and fetishes

How important routine is to a child, was evident even when Ads was a baby. At the age of almost-5, he still continues to relish order and predictability in his everyday life. For example, he has a breakfast routine. He finishes breakfast and then orders me - "Wash my hands, wipe my face, give me water, then juice." There is no way I can change the order of any of these tasks. He gets very agitated if I do. Most days, he washes his hands by himself, fetches his own water, pours his own juice; but some days, he is plain lazy or just wants mommy to pamper him, and I oblige :)

Another one is to always ask me whether he is wearing his shoes on the correct foot. Before inserting his feet into them, he places them on the floor, and asks "Is this the correct leg?" Every single day. I don't think he has made the slightest effort to figure out or understand which is the correct foot; he just wants someone else to give the answer every time.

A new fetish is to ensure that he gets more kisses than Y. The fellow really has the sharpest ears -- anytime he hears me kiss Y (which I do very often), pat comes his cry "Did you give Yukta a kissee? Give me a kissee RIGHT NOW!"

Not to be outdone, Y, the attention-seeking Scorpio that she is, likes for her audience to clap enthusiastically every time she does something clever. Nowadays, that signifies anytime that she speaks a new word. She looks around, starts clapping her hands and in case someone is being so boring as to not clap, she will cry out their name "Anna?", "Appa?", "Amma?" as the case may be.

What next? I'm waiting.

Some fun ways of spending hot summer days

Cleaning the verandah with lots of water; pillow fights; and playing dress up!

Ads' update (2 of ?)

Ads' obsession with drawing and Buzz Lightyear continues. He got to hear about the Power Rangers from somewhere and asked me what they were. I pulled up some videos on Youtube but they were violent and not something I wanted him to see. He didn't insist on watching them but seemed to understand that they were some variety of superheroes, and therefore, legitimate fodder for his over-active imagination. As I write this, he is jumping about on the couch simulating some Power Ranger moves!
He still goes to school for 6 hours (9 am to 3 pm) and seems to be the better for it. Sheets of phonics are regularly brought back home. They have been learning about the Americas in school (Montessori has a strong emphasis on geography) and he stumped me the other day by telling me he knew where French Guyana was. The only other place where I have heard this country mentioned is in the pages of The Economist! The day before that, we were talking about fruits and how they could be grown someplace else and consumed someplace else. I picked up the clementines we had bought that week and told him "Now, see, these oranges come from a country called Ecuador. Ecuador is in..." and he completed the sentence for me - South America!! IMPRESSED :)

The other habit he has picked up of late is to chide me when I repeat something a tad too often. "Amma, I already KNOW that!" he will whine. And sometimes add "Can you please not say that again and again?" It has conveniently escaped his notice that he never does anything if told only once, and that it requires sustained nagging to get him to perform any task!
He is mostly very good with little sister too, including her in a lot of his games and reading voluntarily to her. His biggest irritant is that she makes fun of him (yes, it's true -- the 4-year old is upset because the 1-year old teases him!) by mimicking his crying bouts. Whenever he is even a little bit whiny or cranky, off she goes, parodying his whining tone. Instantly he retaliates "STOP THAT!! I am NOT crying!" The more he protests, the more delighted Y gets, setting in chain a vicious cycle of protests and more whining. I have asked him to ignore her when she does this, but not giving his sibling the gratification of annoying him is a concept he is unable to grasp.

I have been very lax in getting him to speak Tamil at home. I used to be very diligent about this earlier but for the last several months, I have slipped; and it shows. Where he used to be very fluent in Tamil, increasingly English is the only tongue he speaks. I console myself with the thought that the next couple of months in Chennai and onward to Delhi will remedy this situation and soon he will be speaking Hindi as well as Tamil and English.

Naughtiness thy name is Yukta

Highlights from a typical day of dealing with Y's naughtiness -

8 am: Y methodically plucks sundry keys from S's laptop keyboard. Rare yelling session by S occurs.

9.30 am: Y drops S's cellphone into a mug of hot tea, which I was holding in my hand. Another yelling session by S.

11.30 am: Ads is watching TV and she keeps fiddling with the DVD player. Manages to pull open DVD tray and Ads is in tears when the cartoon stops playing.

3.00 pm: Bites Ads in his stomach, leaving behind red puncture marks. Poor Ads reels and cries from the unexpected pain.

5.00 pm: I find the trash can in the bathroom emptied all over the floor (WHICH FOOL LEFT THE LOO DOOR OPEN??? Oops it was me!)

Every 5-10 minutes: Climb onto dining table chair and bang on my laptop keyboard randomly. I'm surprised it's still working.

She needs a contructive outlet for all that energy. Oh for the rains to stop and sunny park-weather days to be here again!

Snapshot - 30 minutes in the life of Ms Y

Climb on dining room chair, and from chair onto dining table. Methodically throw down on floor all of Anna's crayons and assorted drawing tools, also his precious artwork. Climb down to carpet, start chewing crayons, markers and bits of paper until Amma stops her.

Toddle over to bookshelf and bring back a book for Amma to read. Amma tells her it is Anna's book. Throw down that book in disgust. Toddle back to bookshelf and bring back more age-appropriate book.

Sit down on Amma's lap. Read book. Go get another. Read that one.

Amma says " Please play with your toys for a few minutes, Y, while I finish cooking". Toys = paper cups, paper plates and plastic cutlery in a cupboard right under Amma's feet. Start throwing plates and cups all over kitchen floor. Amma silently cursing Appa for not installing child locks on kitchen cupboards inspite of being reminded 10,000 times. When alumninum foil starts being chewed on, Amma picks up Y and deposits her near the toy basket.

Looks at 122 toys the basket and decides that none of them are worth playing with. A couple are worth chewing though. Mmmmm.

Horribly bored. Stands next to amma and whines until Amma picks her up.

Kiss amma. Practice saying "amma, appa, anna, bow bow, quack quack."

After 10 seconds, get bored of being held. Push pudgy knees against Amma's chest while simultaneously propelling herself backward by pressing toes against Amma's stomach. Treatment is successful (as usual) - Amma lets go.

Run to couch, leap casually onto it, then climb to the very top, near headrest. Rock back and forth on the recliner, all the while shouting and laughing gleefully.

Climb down from couch, toddle to kitchen, rummage through drawer where extra groceries are stored. Decide that maggi masala packet beongs to the trash can. Throw it in trash can. Decide that popcorn packet should ideally be in laundry basket. Hurtles to laundry basket, open it and throw popcorn packet in. Laundry basket lid falls on top of hand. Wail in distress until Amma retreives hand and soothes ouchie.

Drama queen continues to shed crocodile tears until appropriate amount of fuss has been made, and kisses bestowed.

Kicks amma in belly, demands to be let down.

Amma tries to engage her in some constructive activity, like beading. Beads are examined, licked, (almost) swallowed and finally chucked at various things around the house. Some roll under couch/bed where they will lie in oblivion for several days.

Helps amma unload dryer, carry a few clothes to the bed.

As amma folds the clothes, finger anna's socks. Walk with socks to bathroom, throw socks into the toilet.

Amma is furious, so some tears are shed (again!)

Plonked into the highchair. Lunch time. Blow raspberries at Amma and spatter food all over the high chair tray and Amma.

And so it goes on....

Is NASA worth it?

There is no shortage of sceptics questioning the raison d'etre for NASA. The latest addition to the list appears to be our own Ads. He asked us "If there's nothing in space, then why do rockets go there?"

Errr....

Sydney is a fish town

On a trip to San Diego in late 2007, Ads (then 2 years old) watched the beginning scenes of "Finding Nemo" in our hotel room. He got very agitated when the big bad shark polishes off the mama clown fish and all the eggs, save Nemo.

Fastforward 2 years. When S brought home a video cassette of "Finding Nemo", Ads threw a fit saying " I DON”T want to watch that fish movie!"

We finally convinced him to watch it and he loved it. He watched it a dozen times before we had to return it to the library.

Today he told S that "Sydney is a fish town" (Sydney plays a prominent role in the movie; its the city to which Nemo is taken from his home in the ocean deeps). S explained to him that Sydney is a city just like San Francisco or Bangalore but Ads is adamant that it is a city only for fish and birds!

Ads changes his name

Ads now goes by the name of Dindigul Sarathy Rumplestiltskin. It's his own concoction. It had to happen sometime - he asked me recently why I named him Advaith - apparently he doesn't like the name, instead preferring Jimmy or DSR as above.

And to think we took all that trouble trying to select the perfect name for our first-born.

Bereft of my beloved

Bereft of my beloved brand-new HP laptop for the past few days!

It was the lone casualty of a heated argument and scuffle involving me, Ads and a cup of Ovaltine. You get the picture.

S was livid. Especially since he had repeatedly warned me against this exact scenario, knowing my penchant of dawdling over the computer with a cup of tea on the table in front of me, surfacing now and then to brawl with my son. (Yeah Ads and I fight a LOT!)

The poor milk-soaked laptop has gone to be patched up and I should get it back in a few days. The $$$ damage is something like a third of the cost of the laptop.

Takeways:

1. Liquids and costly electronic equipment don't mix (well I should have known that already)

2. Kids and liquids should stay together (away from aforesaid equipment) and in an enclosed area covered in easy-to-wipe-down plastic.

3. Maturity and a cool temper are critical attributes for 30-something mom. Work on it.

An early birthday celebration

Ads' class held a joint birthday celebration for all the kids whose birthdays fell in the summer months (July and August). There are 13 kids all born in July/August of 2003/4/5/6. Parents could volunteer to prepare a dish and bring it to class to be served as part of the birthday celebration. I brought a fruit salad. M-i-l and Y and I landed up to observe the proceedings. Ads didn't seem too thrilled to see us, as I had suspected. Everytime I smiled at him, he would put a finger to his lips and mouth "Stop". After a few instances of this, I got thoroughly irritated with him and stopped looking in his direction. Notably, he was asked to "do the calendar" - read out the date, day, month and year and before he went up to do this, he looked at me and said "You don't look".
Our resident bully was quiet as a mouse in the classroom. I barely heard his voice. What a transformation!