From Ba ba ba to Blah blah blah... !!!

"Mammmmmmaaaaaaaaaaaa" he reprimands !!! "TIME OUT!!" with his voice escalating!!
"No shouting"!!! ... All because I yelled at his bhaiya for something trivial!!

That didn't take very long I must say ...to go from bababa to blah blah blah!!!

I recollect it was just a few months ago I heard him saying .. ba ba .. ( I think he meant bhaiya ..!!) He would call me mamma but not consistently. I remember complaining to the doctor at his 12 month checkup that he does not call me mamma relevantly.. He said quite a few words by then "gog <=> dog" ,"baba <=> bhaiya", "daydantay <=> dragon tales" etc.. Three days after his 12 month checkup .. he had a vocabulary explosion ... he started addressing me as mamma fittingly and a plethora of other words and even tough ones like "strawberry" "balcony" and such.
I was obviously thrilled to bits... !!

Last week .. he started making full sentences. He even wished the bank clerk "Happy Birthday" when he saw a huge balloon bouquet on her desk. The first complete sentence I heard him make was
"bubu, mamma gave me ducky" , he was telling his dad that I bought him a ducky... I was plainly put super ecstatic ...

He had been stringing words together for a while now...and it is such a joy hearing him say things with such funny pronunciations ... some listed below:

"Branini" for Biryani
"Yayyaan" for Rayaan
"I No talking me" for "not talking to you"
"I wuvvv oooo" for "I love you"
"top it" for "stop it "
"luckkyy kakka" for "yucky kaka" ( when he has had a dirty diaper)
"brokyn" for "broken" anything that does not work according to expectations

The other day I was nursing him in the wee hours of the morning just because I was plain lazy to get out of bed and bring him a bottle of milk. He nursed for a few seconds and then announced "mamma ..its brokyn" :) I was stumped and burst out laughing, chasing away all my sleep...!!

Some words he utters almost border in the zip code of expletives(if you mentally change the language ;) )
"Kaandi" for candy
"Maaki" for Monkey

It's a great relief and a soothing balm for a mother's heart.
Ask a mother who has a late talker how stressful it is. I know how it feels because my older son was not even stringing words together by 2 years. I was at my wit's end. I researched all over the world wide web for information about speech delays. The results would scare me beyond hope. "Autism", "SBS","Hearing loss" ... the causes were endless. I would go to the doctor and express my concerns and he/she would tell me there was nothing to worry about. He had met or exceeded every single milestone except this "speech milestone". It brings tears to my eyes even today when I think about all my fears and the sense of a impending doom that accompanied my thoughts.
Eventually by about 2 and 1/2 years .. he started making sentences. It was such a relief. It took me a speech evaluation from a speech pathologist to finally quell my fears. Now big brother corrects his little brother and says " not like that Rayaan .. say like this .. like bhaiya" :)

So in contrast when Rayaan started talking and expressing himself at such an early age I feel so assuaged. It's like as if god knows how heavy your burden can be and gives you just a tad bit more than you can actually carry. I celebrate every word he utters and every thing he says. Sometimes people find it ridiculous how I go all gaga over a silly new word he uttered. But that really does not stop me from even exaggerating the moment and bringing it to everyone's attention. Well, somehow this is something that I cannot give enough kudos for :)

Check this video out

From Movies

Here's another video of the two brothers dancing and prancing about. (Don't ask me why Ishaan is wearing Rayaan's clothes ... :) it was entirely his choice).

From Exported Videos

An older video .. in Goa with his dear dear masi

From GoaTrip2010

When the cat is away the Picassos go to play

Stunned, Shocked and Infuriated I glared at the walls!!! I didn’t know where to start or how two little boys could lash out their tiny crayons all over the walls. When did this happen and How did this escape my hawk-like eyes? The bedroom wall was covered with orange paint from end to end. The paint abruptly stopped right at their height. Maybe that was just one instance that I was thankful that I didn’t have tall kids. Maybe that was one day my kids saw what a terrible monster their mother could be.

Frankly, I didn’t have the energy or the enthusiasm to wipe out all the crayon marks from the wall. To top it all, we had a home inspection and our rental management agent highlighted that in the ten years of their experience she had never seen the walls that bad … And that literally drove me up the WALL.

This morning I was generally browsing and came across a “howcast” on “How To Clean Crayon Marks Off Of Painted Walls”.

How To Clean Crayon Marks Off Of Painted Walls on Howcast

I didn’t have all the ingredients for success but today I had the main one … the resolve to exonerate my bedroom walls of all the dishonor. And besides there couldn’t be a better time to do this, the perpetrator is on a mid-winter break from school (even though the weather does not spell winter in any direction). So off we went, with 2 sponges and a big bowl of hot water and soap and a few baby-wipes.

Mission “Erase Picasso’s traces” began.

The two brats were excited out of their wits about playing with soap and water. There was bubbles galore and giggling and squealing all along. I let them enjoy their activity. We started off with the smaller wall stains and once we perfected the stain removal process. We went over to the ginormaous wall painting that adorned our bedroom wall.

This was one painting that took more time to destroy than to create. I thought I must let the culprits feel the pain and understand the consequence of their actions. So we scrubbed away till the walls were weeping orange tears ..!!

Finally we have brand new looking wall!!! What peace!!

Happy Birthday Bubu

Bubu is a word that Ishaan coined when he was just little baby. His dad wanted to be called "Abbu". But now he's just stuck with "bubu" because now little Rayaan the little copycat has followed suit too. I think "bubu" has come to love his name too.

The three men have formed their own team now. I have completely been singled out. It neither fair nor funny ... yet it's cute in it's own sort of way. I love the way their eyes twinkle and their little bodies runneth over with joy when they hear the door open in the evening. They love their bubu with all their hearts, after all, it's bubu who rescues them from the wrath of their mother. Bubu never yells at the boys without reason and Bubu always has a calm way when he takes care of them. Bubu almost always gives them anything they ask for even though it mostly ends up with me expressing severe displeasure over candy handed out right before sleep time or cookies or milk given right before mealtimes. If bubu wants to refuse something he always can say "ask mamma" and ofcourse Ishaan has learnt to say "bubu I want you to do it for me". They catch up fast.

Bubu truly has a very unique way of dealing with the boys. He doesn't lose his temper around the kids and he believes in teaching by example. He is kind and gentle and at the same time strong and assuring. Bubu has earned his special place in their lives slowly , quietly but surely.

Today is Bubu's birthday. The boys have made him cards

Ishaan has painted a little froggie ... why a frog?? well because that was the only thing his mother could do a decent job at. But he has painted it quite well.

Rayaan has scribbled out quite a good looking modern art. He quite enjoyed unleashing the inner painter in him.

Both are cards cum wall art.

We also made him a digital card ... I drew the silly looking train and Ishaan painted it. The steam coming out of it is Rayaan's contribution. I had him paint it in a separate page.. then i cut and pasted it on Ishaan's train.

We also made him a little video.

Happy Birthday Salman ...

I don't say it enough ... but you know that you mean the world to me and the kids!!

Long Time No See

I had been dreading this from the time I started out that I would just lose all my motivation to write. And what I dread most almost always seems to come true. When I started with my new blog space here, I had started out with this new zeal and enthusiasm and with a conviction in my heart to change everything that I didn’t like about myself. The main one among them was to stop finding a reason to be unhappy and find happiness in the little things around me. I started small with finding joy in watching my kids grow and keeping things simple and easy. I believed strongly in my heart that if I resolve to be happy, I will be. A friend had warned me not to get disappointed when I slip back to my old ways once the intoxication of the new place and new life dies down. And honestly that’s what happened!!

The last few months have been spent just picking up after myself and everyone that depends on me. I have never felt so low and worthless in my entire life. I have tried to keep myself upbeat and find a reason to celebrate but nothing has sustained my interest. I thought of several topics to write on, but I felt like I would betray my blog. I was not happy inside and it felt just so hypocritical. One of my core values that I strongly try to abide by is not being a hypocrite, which is extremely hard but I try to honor that at least in all the things that matter. So when I am writing this, I’d like to say it upfront that this is an attempt to get over my inhibitions. Honestly, even the words are not flowing today.

I have mentioned several times before on this blog that being a mother is humbling and exalting, disheartening and encouraging at the same time. I am writing this to reach out to all the women who are homemakers, to all the mothers and especially to other mothers like me who have chosen to stay back home after they have had kids. I am not saying that I will do that permanently and truthfully I am not sure how long I might be a stay at home.

Sometimes I wake up in the morning and wish it would be a day when I had to go to work. The nervous excitement of what lies ahead at work really gives you the rush and the energy to hurry through all the insurmountable obstacles and get everything started off on the right note at the beginning of the day. You feel wanted and you feel important. You feel like what you are about to do is something that makes a difference and mainly something that gets APPRECIATION. Yes the key word is appreciation. I have noticed that I could pull 2 or 3 “almost all-nighters” at a stretch at work and still not be frustrated, because at the end of those exhausting work days, I was filled with a sense of ACCOMPLISHMENT. Also at the end of these really long work hours you always got your fair share of appreciation … at least in most cases. Thankfully I never had to deal with my hard work getting completely ignored at work and I am extremely grateful for that. When I came back home from a long day at work, I still had the mental energy to switch roles and take care of everything at home. Of course, physically I was completely depleted, which was the reason why I decided to stay back home after my second kid.

However, my mornings now are never about self importance anymore. Ideally, I know that people who have not been in these shoes will argue that …”hey you can make your day matter”. The truth is .. that YES ..Whatever it is that I do now … does matter MUCH more than what I did at work. Maybe it does not matter to the world, BUT it does matter to MY WORLD. They simply don’t have a way of conveying it to me in a organized “priorities form or a quarterly review form”. They do convey it to me in little little expressions that make me feel like it’s worth it.

So, getting back to my mornings!! Now when I wake up, I am almost filled with a fear of what I will miss doing today that will end up adding to my repertoire of failures. There are days and nights that are spent tending and caring to a sick child but then there is no sense of accomplishment anymore, because there is always a few things that I’d have screwed up which only I will be able to repair and worse still, I’d have to hear at the end of all my hard work that I could have handled all this stress more calmly or in a better way. I find that as a homemaker everything you do matters, getting the kids and the husband ready for school/work/play, Cooking, Cleaning, Organizing, Washing everything matters. The difference is … everything you do right almost never gets noticed or appreciated but if there is a single thing that is amiss or a single thing that you failed to pick up, it glares at everyone and screams for attention. No matter how much you do, it is never never enough!!

Lack of appreciation and the lack of a sense of accomplishment really kill your motivation to do things whole heartedly. I am not saying that I don’t enjoy being a stay at home mother anymore. What I am saying is that I would have enjoyed it more if I didn’t beat myself up about doing everything right and feel so dejected when I eventually don’t meet my goals. I wish I would just stop believing how faulty I am and focus on all the things that I do right. I would have been a lot happier if I didn’t bog myself down with the several criticisms that come my way and just pay attention to all the love and attention my kids shower me with. A cousin’s kid once mentioned to me that my mommy never plays with me, she is always busy doing housework. I tried to explain to her that mommy has a hard job of keeping this house together and if she didn’t finish all her housework it would be impossible to live in the house. I realized that my purpose of staying back home to take care of the kids and be there for them is practically not being fulfilled because I was being hard on myself trying to keep up with all the chores in the house and ignoring my purpose of taking the role of a home maker. I struggle to keep my house looking clean of all the teeming toys that keep multiplying exponentially. I spend my energy cooking and cleaning and forcing my kids to take a bite of all the gourmet food they don’t want to even look at. The truth from whatever I hear from others is, this is the story of almost every mother or homemaker. We all try so hard to build a façade for the world to depict a perfectly well run household. But yet when we see other homes functioning so seemingly perfectly, we choose to ignore the fact that we also work hard to render a similar picture to others who view our homes. I have overlooked the KISS(Keep it simple stupid) rule that I had decided on abiding by. In the end my kids get no more attention from me than I would have given them if I was gone for a long day of work AND in the end I don’t get significantly much more work done that I would perhaps have if I was still working.

I want to put an end to this. I really do. And I really wish if you are a mother or a home maker like me you would too. I have realized that I am not going to get any flowery appreciation from anyone concerned for raising my kids well or keeping my house together. Yet it is my job and I will continue to do it to the best of my abilities. I have concluded that I will henceforth just take care of everything that is really important and things that can wait will wait. I will try to pick my battles more carefully. I will spend my positive energy on things that matter the most and most importantly once again try to be HAPPY about the simple things that I normally enjoy.

Nursery Rhymes Galore

http://picasaweb.google.com/vandanathomas/IshaanNurseryRhymes#

My Little Baby's First!!

Once bitten twice shy - is not something that applies to me usually. As a general rule of thumb, I strive to treat each experience on a fresh new page. Ofcourse, there will be slight leaks from previous experiences that prevent me from using a totally white page, a few scribbles here and there are pretty evident.

I had grand plans for Rayaan's First. I made my invitation cards and got them printed at Kodak gallery. It was supposed to be on farm - with an Old Mac Donald Theme, since he loves animal sounds. I figured the 4th of July weekend would be an ideal day giving a chance for out of towners to come in. But unfortunately, it didn't work out like what I wanted it to be. Plan B was to go on a family vacation and celebrate his birthday on a quite getaway, just the four of us. But that plan got shelved as well because my husband's company never gives him a relief from customer meetings.

But they say, it all happens for the best, so with not much previous planning (which I suck at anyway, read previous post), I did what I do best - an impulsive , spontaneous plan that worked out like magic. I was determined to make Rayaan enjoy his day with his favorite person in this world, his brother .. and his recent favorite friends, our cousins kids. We had an old fashioned picnic at a nearby park, just the mommies and the kids.

It was a bright and sunny day (to begin with) and we decided to meet at the park at noon. As noon appoached, the sun decided to play a joke on me. It just vanished.. it got cloudy and the drizzling rain drops on my car top made it sound like, this would be another doomed attempt. Sometimes they say , if you wish really hard , "all the forces of the universe conspire to make it happen" (borrowed philosophy). So, I just didn't give up hope and my cousin Shehla, goaded me on with undying optimism, urging me to go on. All our positive energies in the car were so strong that by the time we got to the park, my old friend "the sun" decided to stop being a brat. From then on, it was a perfect picnic....

The kids ran around helter skelter and Rayaan followed them around ... and stopped every once in a while to taste the mulch...It was Rayaan's first ever tryst with complete independence to do whatever he wished to (with intermediate "nays" that he completely ignored). He looked helplessly at his brother and cousins indulging in a circuit training of all the stations in the park. He was wise enough to realise that he would not be able to keep up and made his own little circuit, which involved .. running till he went off balance, tasting the mud and the mulch, finding little stones and learning later that its not food,glancing at his running brother, furiously hitting a little table in a bid to make some music and then intermittent pit stops for yummy food and juice. After lunch we all headed to the beach park just across and then all the kids tried in vain to make sand castles and finally Rayaan got the hang of it after a sad realisation that dry sand is not as palatable as it appears. It was hard to get the kids back to the car because they were having too much fun, just like it was meant to be.

When we did head back covered in sand,mommies and kids alike, it felt wonderful deep inside. I felt like going back from school picnics, back in my times as a school girl - returning wet and dirty from an eventful day at the beach, with no change of clothes, yet very happy and gratified!! A mass shower for the kids was in order when we got home and with squeals unlimited that too happened unplanned yet successful.

The men returned home in the evening and we all indulged our senses in some good lebanese food amidst unnerving glares from the restaurant owner, who absolutely hated the squealing galore that accompanied our party. Finally the kids were thrown out of the restaurant and the adults had a peaceful yet grumpy dinner. When we got back home to cut the cake ... OUR little man was already in "sweet dreams land". So we all cut his FIRST birthday cake "while he was sleeping" amidst a birthday boy face painting session that had everyone in fits. "Just you wait" till he grows up and finds out!!!!!!

Blog Vrath :)

A few days have gone by and I've not visited my posting page to express any of my thoughts. It's been a hectic month with the birthdays of my two favorite people in the world. The birthdays themselves have not been as eventful as the thought processes that have accompanied them. The other big reason for the silence is that "summer has finally and officially been here for a month now- Hallelujah". I was too scared to make an announcement about the summer lest the weather gods get aggrieved and revoke their blessings. But the most important reason for intentionally staying away from blogging was that I had decided to take a "blog-vrath" (a silent demonstration) till I fulfilled my son's only birthday wish .... !!

I had to break the blog-vrath just for a day on Rayaan's first birthday to make sure I didn't punish him for my wrong doings.

I was really sad after Ishaan's birthday but I learnt a very valuable lesson, that I wish to share with all my fellow mommies, hoping it will put things into perspective for another mom who might otherwise bite the same dust I did. The kid asked me for only one birthday present in the language he knew and it was as simple as going to Chuck-E-Cheese's. With no sense of priority or planning, I went ahead planned a culinary centric birthday for a kid who does not even enjoy basic food. The whole day was spent in just telling him that he could not mess up the house and intermittent promises of taking him out to Chuck-E-Cheese's. Finally, the poor kid slept and didn't wake up in time for the scheduled "Chuck-E-Cheese's" trip. A point worth mentioning is, I entirely overlooked his sleep time during my doomed planning process. So all that was left for him to look forward to was this supposedly grand dinner that I labored at for two whole days. So much for all the "thought process" I put into his 3rd birthday. Eventually his day was saved because his birthday guests made it a day about him and all his favorite cousins made it a wonderful evening for him.

Moral of the story: Make a child's birthday about the child and not a day to showcase your culinary skills or whatever-other skills.

Guilt driven and utterly disappointed, I tried to make it up to him on his scheduled school birthday party. So right from assembling his party favors to his party at school to park hopping, I tried to let him drive the day. Even though at one point of time I thought I should probably take back control, when he decided that he is going to climb to the top of one those rope climbing maze structures in the park. I made a mental note to never come to this park alone because I just didn't have the guts to get to the top of that structure if he got stuck there.

Albeit late, I learnt my lesson and tried to make it upto him. But it was only today that I finally was able to fulfill his birthday wish of going to Chuck-E-Cheese's. What do you know...?? Better late than Never, Eh??