LO#2 Updates

Haven't been blogging regularly and plan to do so henceforth.

I have been so busy with managing both the kids that it has drained out every bit of energy from me. I am sure most of you (with kids) would understand how that works.

My day starts at 6.30 am, when I snooze the alarm and sleep once again and then wake up at 6.45 am. Have to get ready by 8 - 8.30 am, by which time I leave for work. Meantime its chaos at home. Cooking, getting the kids ready etc., etc., My LO#1 is the one who always take a hell lot of time  to get ready (between all the crying and crankiness of waking up early - she absolutely hates it - she loves her beauty sleep more than anything in the world). I travel around 2 - 2.5 hrs to drop off the kids to school and get to work. Then I try to leave early to pick up the kids on the way back and get them home early. But the traffic in Bangalore is so bad, so we are exhausted by the time we get home and then the usual chaos once again, with feeding the kids, getting them ready to bed etc., etc., In the midst of all this, its tough to find even a minute to myself.

Anyways, less about me, more about lo#2.

Viaan, you are a super hyper active kid now that you are 2 yrs old. Hence the huge gap in blogging until now. You don't sit quiet even for a minute and demand a lot of attention as you are very accident prone. You are super intelligent and can grasp things immediately.

Although you started speaking late, now you are picking up words pretty fast. Your pronunciation is not that clear, but you repeat everything that we say. You hate being disturbed when you are playing. You hate when Chhavi even touches you sometimes. She means well, she loves to hug you and kiss you, but you have to avoid her first. Once we explain to you that she wants to kiss you or hug you, then only you allow her to do so. She always asks us to put you to bed next to her, but even in your sleep, you dont like if she puts her hand on you by accident.

You are a very sensitive sleeper and as always wake up at the slightest sound. You are getting better at your sleep, but if you are sick, you dont sleep very well and wake up atleast 3 - 4 times at night. When me or your pappa are putting you to bed, you always ask for the other one - just to avoid being put to bed I guess.

Some of your favourites:

Food item: Dosa, Paddu

Snack item: Cream Biscuit

Fruit: Papaya

Vegetable: Potato and Carrot (which you also call potato)

Game: Running around and cooking with Akka's cooking range

Toy: Trucks and buses, animal toys

Gadget: Mamma's or pappa's phone

Activity: Taking pics from our phones

Animal: Bow (means dog) and Bullu (means billu - cat)

You love taking rides on the bike - you will go with anyone that asks you. You love to travel outside. You hate being inside the house. You love to spend time with the neighbouring kids. You do not like to be confined inside the house. You always want to be roaming around.

There is a lot more to write, but for now, Ill stop the post here. Ill keep writing more.

So long.

Chhavi's Faves

Chhavi has a set pattern of favorites now.

Earlier she used to be pretty moody when it comes to food. If she likes something today, she doesnt like the same food tomorrow or the day after. It goes something like this: She likes something on day one. On day two, if she is in a good mood, she will like anything given to her. She will love the food she had on day one. But if she's in a bad mood, she will hate anything given to her and she will unwillingly eat what she had on day one. This is just how she is built. LOL. Unlike me, who has a favorite set of foods, and I will have them whatever the situation is. Even if I am completely full, I'll still manage to take a bite or two, just bcoz I love something.

Anyways, here goes nothing:

Favorite Fruits: Grapes and now that its mango season - mangoes.

Favorite Vegetables: Cauliflower / Beans - can you imagine a kid liking beans ?? She not-so-grudgingly eats potatoes too. Oh and she likes raw jack-fruit also.

Favorite Color: Pink (I think) and blue. Sometimes brown - seriously ?? brown ?? What kid loves the color brown ?

Favorite Activity: Swimming classes, Dance classes, and sometimes coloring. Doesn't watch a lot of TV (Thank God for that). She loves to play outside with the neighbor kids.

Favorite TV Show: Animal Planet (She loves to watch and name the animals). Only twice or thrice a week during breakfast or lunch time.

Favorite Snack: Biscuits, Cheeselings

Favorite Dessert: Laddoo, Icecream

Favorite Cartoon: Chota Bheem, Tom and Jerry

She also loves chocolates, candies, fritters, crafts, doodling, painting (and by that I mean smearing paint or water on the paper) etc., but then is there a kid that doesnt love the above stuff ?

6th month milestones

Viaan turned 6 months on the 2nd of Jan. He has become super mobile right now. He has started crawling on his tummy now. He doesn't stay put in one place. The moment I put him on the ground, he rolls over onto his tummy in a jiffy and quickly looks around to see if he finds anything interesting. He then makes a beeline for it, pulling his tummy on the ground and he is at the target in a few secs - super speedy.

Also, he hates to sleep. He was always a light sleeper, but he hates to sleep now. When he gets super sleepy - he's rubbing his eyes madly but the minute I try to pat him, he fights back furiously... flapping his arms and legs and pushing my hands away and opens his eyes wide as though he was never sleepy at all. He hates it when I try to pat him to sleep and it literally takes me around 45 mins to an hour to put him to bed. And all this effort for nothing, he is up and about within the next 5 - 10 mins. Very rarely does he sleep at a stretch of 30 mins and that is heaven for me. (NOT REALLY - not when Chhavi is around).

Another milestone he reached when he cries, he calls out 'amma' or 'mumma'. Its so nice to hear him call me. Although maybe he still doesn't intend to be calling me, but its still pleasant on the ears.

He is in the "tasting" phase now. He puts anything and everything into his mouth. Anything new going into his hands need to be sterilised. Because, the second its in his hand, its in his mouth the very next second. And he ferociously bites on it. I suspect he might be teething although its still too early to tell.

We have started him off on solid foods. Another first for this month was that he stayed alone with his grandparents and aunt for 2 nights when we took a short break and traveled to Kerala. I was so worried about leaving him behind, because he is almost always cranky. Somehow in between my mom and my sis, they managed to take care of his needs. Thanks to both of them. We definitely needed that break. So it was a first for him to stay away from us. Chhavi stayed away from us only at the age of 2.5 yrs.

Gyaani Devi Chhavi - 1

I have actually ceased writing about my convos with my dear daughter... Mainly because of two reasons.
1. I forget a lot of them a few mins after its happened.
2. She makes a lot of witty remarks. Thats another reason for #1.

Chhavi talks a lot. Anyone who knows her would second me on this. And lot means a LOT. She talks even when she is eating or when she's playing, she talks to herself. Hell, I thought she was silent only when asleep, until the other day I heard her talk in her sleep too LOL.

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One day, both of us were having our morning drink, she a glass of milk and me a glass of light jaggery coffee (yum !!) And when both of us were done, I stacked my glass in hers and asked her to drop them in the sink.

Turns out my glass was a bit bigger and taller than hers and it didn't sit in the other one far enff. So she re-stacks them in the opposite way and then goes ahead to give me some gyaan.

Amma, if you stack them like this, this glass wont go inside this one. So see you should stack it like this, now this glass will go inside this... you understand ?? (All the time, demonstrating me how it should and should not be done) - sigh... when did she become a granny and skip all those beautiful baby talking years in between !!

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The other day, there was some lunch at the temple near our house and we all decided to go there in 2 shifts. We did not wanna take lo#2, because it was his nap time. So me, mom and Chhavi decided to go first and just as we were leaving, she looks at my dad (who was staying back) and says... Ajja, look after Viaan well. Ill go to the temple, have lunch and come back and then she repeats the whole thing again.

The temple is like at the end of the road from our house. So while almost ending lunch, casually mom told me to give a ring to dad and ask him to start from the house (since baby is sleeping) and to meet us halfway to hand over the keys. This girl starts screaming in the middle of the conversation... So he will leave baby alone in the house and come is it ? (with an angry undertone)

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Everytime she goes to the bathroom to pee, she either advices whoever is taking her to stand outside the bathroom and lock the door from the outside and not to let anyone inside !!! Goodness, YOU are just 2.5 yrs old as of yet.... Who would wanna come n peek at you :)

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There is a boy next door who attends the same play home as her. The first few days when he joined, his mom sat with him the whole time as he was unwilling to stay back. After watching them a couple of days, my daughter decides to do some baby sitting. She goes and tells the boy's mom. Aunty, you go home. I am here with your son. Don't worry, he wont cry. You can go home now. That lady was shocked and she came home and told me about their conversation. I couldn't stop smiling.

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Basically she repeats most of the things we say to her but she actually fires it back at us at the appropriate time.

Roll Over, Roll Over

Its like the rhyme.

There were 10 on the bed and the little one said - roll over, roll over. 

So they all rolled over and one fell down... 

So my lo#2 rolled over onto his side today, except that no one fell down.