To Empathize...and to care...

I feel we are in such a fast paced life that it looks like there really isn't anytime to sit back and relax, to enjoy the moment, to have a listening ear, TO EMPATHIZE...and TO CARE..

As a parent I always feel its my responsibility to teach kulli all of the above. I do not want to be a parent that just talks about these things but also follows it so that kulli can actually see and learn. I do not know how far I have been successful. But I am a very proud mother when I see the little one empathizing and caring for others. To me its extremely important to emapthize with others cos I feel that's how everything else will fall in place. That's how one can imbibe good values, one can understand the difference between good and bad, once can make the right choices. You get the drift right.

Now the reason for this post is, I definitely wanted to put few incidents here that shows how kulli empathizes and cares for others, so that kulli can read them years from now and feel good about it.

Kulli goes to a park nearby everyday and has quite a few friends there. Once day one of her friends (lets call her S), came to the park and was quite sad with her eyes still wet from all the crying at home.
Kulli and her friends observed this and they checked on her (These kids are all 5 and 6 year olds). S happened to tell them what had happened. After hearing the story kulli runs to S's grandmom and this was she told her "Paati, please dont scold my friend, I dont like it when she is sad and crying. If you scold her I will be very upset."

Second instance, there is a one year old kid that comes with his grandfather to the park. This kid was playing on the swing and the grandfather was pushing it gently. The kid asked for water and the grandfather left the kid on the swing to get water. Kulli runs to this grandfather and tells him "uncle please don't leave the kid alone on the swing, if he falls down he will get hurt".

Hearing this I was gleaming with pride. Even now while I am writing this, it brings a smile on my face. I want to remind myself that kulli by nature is a very caring child and I should make sure that I encourage and appreciate this more often.

I want to be me

"I want to be me" such a simple sentence and yet has such a strong message, isnt it?

The other day my SIL took kulli out to get icecream. She happened to ask Kulli whether she wants to be Kulli Shonapa (kulli's real name with my husband's name as surname) or Kulli Amma(kulli's real name with my name as surname). Looks like kulli thought for a while and blurted "I want to be me".
When my SIL told me this, I was like woaahhhh wait did she say that.

I am not sure kulli understands what she has said. But to me it meant a lot. All I want to say to her is this,  I get the message kulli, I know you want to be you and I also wish to let you be.

P.S. FYI, when I asked her the same thing she said she wants to be Kulli Amma (yayyy....even if its just to please me..:))

Little Mediator

The other day Shonapa and I had our usual fight "you did not do this, you come late from office blah blah". you get the drift right? No, we don't fight a lot and our fights are usually silly. So we did have one such fight and I went off to sleep after being vocal(read: scream) about my anger.

Kulli wanted me to play with her and I was in mood to do so. This is how our conversation went:

Kulli: Amma, what happened Amma?
Amma: Appa is useless Adi (this is where you guys should not advice me on how you should not bias the kids, I can be very mean when I am angry.)
Kulli: Thinks for a while, its ok Amma come lets play (ahh she has her priorities set ..)
Amma: No Kulli, I am upset I dont want to play
Kulli: What happened Amma?
Amma: I told you Appa does not help Amma and Kulli (see how I am making her a partner :))
Kulli: Thinks again and runs to Shonapa and yells Appa!
Appa: Come Kulli leave Amma alone, I'll play with you (good try Shonapa)
Kulli: No Appa! and she yells on top of her voice "Why are you not helping us Appa?"

I start laughing loud after this and all 3 of us end up playing with Kulli until midnight

See I have my own little mediator and a soldier.

Do you have one too?

"Manager will hit you with the rolling pin..."

I know I've disowned the blog for sometime now. I take the blame, too lazy extremely hectic settling down in a new place, I can bore you with quite a lot of reasons, but nope that's not the intention of this post.

I really had to post this incident. Everytime I am on call with my manager kulli somehow manages to distract/disturb me. I keep telling her that my manager will hit me with rolling pin if I didn't work. The other day I was on call with my manager and kulli as usual tried to disturb me, I was in no mood to entertain her since the call was pretty serious and one where I had to do the talking. Kulli understood that I can get really angry if she distracted me. So she ran into her room maybe to plot her next move. She came back after 20 mins forcefully planted a kiss on my lips for nearly 5 mins and then mocked at me " now your manager will hit you with the rolling pin :)"

Hoping to keep posting such incidents more and more.

Patience...is what motherhood taught me or not?

I think I have never been patient in my life for anything like when others are talking, you should patiently listen and then respond (I would cut them short and start talking ..rude i know) or like wait in a line patiently (long queue in movie theatres chuck it..buy it in black even if I could get the tickets had I waited patiently in line) the list goes on, but you get the point right?

Things changed completely after Kulli was born. If someone asks me what changed after motherhood? I immediately without blinking an eye tell them "I ve learnt to be Patient". I think it is true to a great extent. For example, nowadays when I am talking to someone Kulli screams at the top of her lungs and when asked what happened she goes "He no talk to (the person that has my attention currently)", I stop talking immediately and just keep listening to the other person. When I am waiting to board the flight in line Kulli screams again (like mom like daughter you see) so to make sure I dont have the attention of all those boarding the flight, I start entertaining Kulli and forget that I am actually waiting patiently in line. And I have already told you how we go to movies nowadays.

If you still dont believe me let me tell you another incidence that will prove to you that I am extremely patient and have mastered the art of being so. Last week we were in Chicago to visit Shonapa's friend and his wife. We stayed at their place for 4 days. Kulli got a gift as soon as we entered the house. Kulli has never paid any attention to the toys we have got her so far, she will play with the toy for 5 mins and forgets completely about it. But this one toy got her attention for 4 full days. Shonapa played with her the first time and after the cups were all stacked up to a tower all of us applauded the little one. This got her more interested with the toy and she kept building the tower for one full day. Every single time she finished building it, she would look at all of us and we had to duly applaud for "Her Highness". The first day madam built the tower approximately atleast 60-80 times. Each time her mother had to make sure that everyone claps for her (so I had to be patient to do so :)). Also, if she wasnt able to place the cup correctly she would tell me "Amma dont be frustrated, try it again". She told me this atleast a 100 times in one day. At the end I kept telling her "Kulli am getting frustrated cos you are asking me not to so often :)".

Now tell me,  am I not patient?

Mommy Guilt...will it ever go away?

Imagine this: your heart is ripped out, you are still alive and your heart is shook in front of you with such vigour that you feel the pain in your chest. Sorry for describing it like this, I dont mean to be a sadist, but thats the amount of pain I endured this past week when my child had a simple febrile seizure. She has had it twice earlier when she was nearly a year old and the pain was exactly the same.

I have been explained in detail by reputed doctors that simple febrile seizures are harmless especially the ones that has lasted for less than 2 minutes but still when as a mother I see her go throught it, my heart breaks and the guilt demon makes way so deep in me that I cant get rid of it.

Worst is when at the back of your mind the demon keeps telling you ways of how you could have avoided it "you should have given her the acetominophen even if her temperature was normal, you should have done this, you could have done that grrrrrrrr"

Life is much better now (thank god), with the kid doing great and back to normal. Atleast now I am saner, I still panic but at the same time I do respond wisely to such situations.

With all said, my next task is to get rid of this guilt demon. Any ideas how that can be done? What do you do to be a saner, wiser mother?

Love thyself

Isnt it true that we should love ourselves first? Its a great lesson I learnt from my dad and my husband. I always keep reminding myself that I should teach this to Kulli when she grows a little older and understands this. Little did I know that Kulli already loves herself and does not need to be taught :). If you dont agree to this, please read further.

Shonapa keeps telling Kulli "Appa loves you", "Amma loves you" (he actually screams this and its like a game wherein when shonapa screams "Appa loves you", Kulli goes "Kulli loves you"). He then asked her "You Love?" and she said "You", Shonapa was elated but then thought about it for a while and realised she would say the same thing ("You") if anyone asked her "You Love?", thats when he taught her to say "You Love Appa". Kulli learnt this very well cos whenever I asked her "You love?" she would happily yell "Appa", this made me go red in anger, envy and I counted to 10 made sure I was calm and then taught Kulli to say "You Love Amma", I repeated this like 100 times and made sure even if I asked her in sleep she should say "You Love Amma" :) .

So when Shonapa acme home from office, I took Kulli to him and asked her "Amma Loves?", she goes "You", "Appa Loves?" she goes "You" and finally to make my point to Shonapa I ask her "You Love?" and she goes "Kulli" sigh :(

Please Thankyou Appa

This morning Kulli got up and came to me half sleepy (have you noticed their eyes when they walk after sleep, half closed soooooo cute :)) and asks me "Amma phone". I told her Kulli first wish me good morning and then you can ask for the phone and she goes Ammagudamingphone all in one breadth. By then Shonapa wakes up and takes his phone from the table. Seeing this Kulli runs to him and goes Appa giveeeeeeeeeeee...Appa give ittome....Appa giveeeeeeeeeee phone.....I ask her to say "Appa please give phone". She knows the only way she can get is to do as I say and she goes Appa please give. Shonapa melts at this and gives it to her. I then asked Kulli to say Appa Thankyou, she looks at us for a while and goes Appa Please Thankyou (all together so we dont bombard her with more knowledge etiquette while she is browsing youtube :))

Life of Pi

No no..dont go away..this isnt a movie review,relax.

Shonapa and I love to watch movies together..he likes good movies (read it as intelligent movies that tortures your brains for no reason) and I love the mushy, romantic always happy ending movies. Nevertherless we love to go see movies together. I still remember seeing Inception together and discussing (arguing, fighting) about the movie and what it meant and how many levels of dreams etc etc all night long, and we love doing this.

However since Kulli arrived this wish of ours had taken a back seat. And no, we did not stop seeing movies, but we stopped seeing it together so that babysitting becomes easy.
Last sunday I really wanted to see Life of Pi and that too with Shonapa so that we can have one such intellectual discussions/fights regarding God, philosophy etc etc. So we made a plan to put Kulli to sleep and go watch the movie. Kulli naps for exactly 2 hours and so we had to time her nap so that she falls asleep 10 minutes before the movie starts to watch it uninterrupted. Kulli falls asleep when we drive long distance and so the plan was to head out driving till madam falls asleep and then buy tickets for the movie.

Once in the car madam wanted us to play her rhymes CD, we obliged and she goes "stop Kukkaburra stop..." shaking her head, legs enjoying the songs. Whenever I tried patting her, she started singing louder. Did she know our plot? Murphy's law we thought and kept driving praying all the while that she falls asleep. The movie was to start at 3:40pm and we were still on the roads at 3:30pm driving for more than 40 minutes for kulli to go into the zzzzzzzland and give us our movie time. Finally madam went to sleep at 3:40, we run to check if the tickets were available and didnt I say I love happy endings :), we got the tickets watched the movie un-interrupted for 2 full hours all the while Kulli sleeping on my lap.

We come out and discuss the movie, pat our backs at the successful planning, laugh about it.

And yes like the old lady waiting for the car said "we saved on baby sitting too" ;)

Loved the movie (had a happy ending you see :))

Blessed to have a daughter

Yesterday Shonapa and I had a fight. Yours truly is known to lose temper and is the monster/witch in the family. A worse one when really tired and has lots of household chores to be done. So you get the point right, we did have one such fights last night when Kulli was playing some game on the iPad.

She left the iPad, came running to me cos I was screaming and said Amma, Amma.. I did not look at her and was upset at the fight. She climbed up the couch, hugged me (call me a mean mom, but I still didnt calm down). She realised I was still upset and my lil angel kissed me on my cheeks, gave me butterfly kisses, started making cute faces and eventually made the hard rock of a heart in me melt.

Now tell me am I not blessed :)

When does it strike you that your kid has grown..

--> When on forcing to finish the milk she looks at you in your eyes and with a stern, firm voice says "Enough".

--> When she starts helping you in the kitchen like putting milk cans in the trash, getting you onions from where its stored

--> When she hates you for scolding her in front of others

--> When she goes to a corner, makes a long face and stays there making sure you are looking at her to prove that she is upset

--> When she addresses you by your name

-->When she wants to eat on her own with a spoon and does not want you to feed her

-->When she starts humming the songs along with you (not the rhymes but the bollywood songs!)

--> When she pats you to sleep and sings a lullaby too

And all this at 2 years !!

Terrific ....oh wait Terrible Twos

Its amazing to see Kulli grow so fast...the memory of holding her in just my palm is etched in my mind and is still so fresh that my mind is reluctant to believe that she is 2. Sigh. Kids do grow very fast.

On her birthday Kulli was sick with severe cough and cold. I had an important task to finish up at work and hence with a really heavy heart left Kulli in the daycare. I quickly finished work took the rest of the day off and reached Kulli as fast as I could. On reaching the school I realised she doesnt even know or understand that its her birthday and madam was all happy to be with her friends playing. I took her home and made pop corns for her (her favourite these days!). In an hour I felt her body go warm and she was heading for a fever. Thus, our plans of celebratng her birthday(just her, me and Shonapa) was cancelled. The only thing possible was going to the temple and doing an Archanai on her name.

Her birthday was on a weekday and so Shonapa and I planned to have her birthday party in the weekend. Kulli loves outdoors, she loves to run, slide, pull the grass, collect woodchips etc and hence we planned to have the party in a nearby park (also we had invited around 30 guests and couldnt have accomadated all of them at home). The party was to start at noon, I got up that day praying that Kulli feels better and that she enjoys the party (whats the fun if the kiddo isnt doing well and we have the party for the heck of it, uh?). Kulli was all happy and gay to see a lot of our friends at home and quite a lot of activities happening around. It got her all pumped up and excited. The day however started with rains and it was way too cold. That oneday I wished that it should stop raining and that the sun should shine nice and bright (you see I dont like it when its too hot and always keep wishing that it rains and pours.).

At noon, the sun was shining bright and it was an amazing weather. Wow, for once my wish had come true (may be it was because of Kulli's lucky stars :) ) and the day was just perfect. I did lose my temper a little when the brat didnt want to wear a beautiful dress(before you judge, the fabric was made of a very comfortable material mind you!) that my friend had got her for the occasion. She is more comfortable with a tee and a cotton pant. I took her to the park and she forgot all about the dress and was all glee when everyone around started giving her the attention. The party was an awesome fun, the kids had great fun running around in the open park, playing with the balloons, breaking the pinata, collecting the choclates. Kulli was having her own gala time going wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee on the slide. She must have played on the slide for like 60-80 times and without getting tired.

We cut the cake which was ordered to be made in the form of alphabet A, since Kulli loves the alphabets and that her name starts with this letter. She danced (visualise a tiny tot shaking her hips beating Kat's hip movement in Sheela ki Jawani ;)) and sang abcdefg...twinkle twinkle, she looked so cute. For me this was the highlight of the party and I was very glad all my friends attended the party to wish and bless the child.

There was one card that Kulli received from a friend of mine which I am sure to save had the below message:

"
Hi A,

When you are old enough to read this message, just remember that the day started with rains and it was all gloomy but when it was time the sun came out and it was warm and bright.

"

It was an amazing message with loads of meaning for Kulli.

Updates so far....

I know its been so long since I updated anything about Kulli. Call it a mom's laziness or a busy mom or a mom trying to be a supermom (i personally choose this one)...

Anyways the updates so far are:

-> Went on a road trip to Montreal, Canada in May with Kulli. Doesnt that sound like an achievement in itself? I was super skeptic about this trip but one that couldn't be avoided. I was paranoid as usual and started planning for the trip 3 weeks in advance. As a mom, the only planning was around Kulli, her food, her clothes, her diapers etc etc. Booked hotels with kitchen, stuffed the luggage with rice, moong dal. curd, goldfish crackers, 2 big cartons of bottled water, toys, books, loads of clothes for Kulli. I kept wondering if Kulli will do fine sitting tied to a car seat for 6-8 hours continuously. The trip started, we kept playing Kulli's favorite songs/rhymes and madam was all the more happy in her seat and went off to snooze-land for more than half the journey(I am so used to her rhymes that when I open my mouth to sing all I can think of is twinkle twinkle or now i know my ABCs or do you know the muffin man). She was amazing during the trip, loved the new places kept observing all the new people. The trip was awesome fun.

-> Started a proper daycare for Kulli in June, if you have read my previous experience about Kulli and daycare you should know that the over obsessive, over possessive mom in me appears from nowhere and creates havoc in the household. Well it sure was getting there before Kulli realized that daycare is a saner place to stay and play, than the mad mom in the house. She cried on and off the first day, loved her daycare and loved the teachers from the second day.  With that I bid farewell to the possessive mama in me and the saner/wiser mom appeared and I guess is still there around. This daycare i awesome, even though Kulli does not eat much there, she has loads of fun with quite a lot of activities. Her teachers tell me she is very smart (dancing on the cloud, common guys this is my first one don't I deserve a dance on the cloud for just a few seconds :)) and I very politely tell them that kids these days sure are.

->Kulli has grown taller and thinner (isnt it weird when she is given all the fat food and yet she grows thinner while all I eat is fat free food and run around her all the time and yet my waistline just keeps increasing.?.sigh...). she is obsessed with ipad, iphone to the extent where I think she dreams of these electronics and wakes up screaming at 2 in the night asking for a phone or an ipad...(I love steve jobs...but didnt really think that my love for him will be transferred to an obsession in my child ).

-> Her vocab is growing everyday and she now forms 2-3 word sentences.
to record a few here:
Take a look
What is this?
Amma poduma (Amma thats enough for milk)

-> Kulli loves to mock-fight with Shonapa. This is their everynight routine. I put her to sleep and when she is half way there, shonapa comes running and pulls her leg, she immediately runs back to me, hugs me tightly and hides under the comforter. He pulls her back and she hits him...the effort in putting her to sleep goes down the drain here..although I must admit its great fun to see the two fight :)

Marriage Proposal Gone wild in youtube

Wow..I loved it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5_v7QrIW0zY

Look at the support he got from all his family and friends...amazing

Random things about Kulli

Kulli is a big talkative...she loves to keep blabbering all the time. She has started forming  2-word sentences like

Amma yengi (wheres amma?)

cipp yengi, cipp edu (wheres the clip? take out the clip)

appa killi (appa pinched me)

amma saavi kuduuuuuu (amma give me the key)

amma phone

amma emote(amma remote)

amma saacket (for chocolate)

Amma eyeceam (for icecream)

Amma keeyons tha (Amma give Crayons)

Amma kannu (if something goes into her eyes)

She says:

A for aapi

B for Baaalu

C for Cat

D for Dog

E for Elephant

F for Fisss

G for Gollellaa (Gorilla) my fav

H for hat

I for Iggaloo (Igloo)

J for juich (Juice)

K for kannanu (Kangaroo) my fav

L for ayan (Lion)

M for monkey

N for Nose

O for Octtaapuss (Octapus) 

P for Pig

Q for qwason (Question) my fav

R for aabbit (Rabbit)

S for Sun

T for Umbella (if I say thats not right she immediately says tain for train)

U for Umbella

V for Van

W for Watch

X for Box

Y for ello (yellow)

Z for Zeeby (Zebra)

She can recognize alphabets thanks to her dad for getting the Mellisa & Doug Wooden Alphabet toy

She can say 1 to 20 and recognize the number 1 to 10 due to the same toy as above for numbers

she looks at her panda (that she calls deddy (for teddy)) and goes "I michchu  schoo massh" and "no cying (for no crying) or dont cy (dont cry)"

In the playground madam, loves to slide, swing but above all she loves to play with the mud, sand, stones. Loves to pick sand in her hands and drop it in someplace safe.

She loves to dance for all the songs with beats (do I see Vidya Balan in the making :)).

She loves to read and loves more when being read to.

She loves Straberries, Apples, Grapes, Pears for fruits and Biscuits, Chips, Cherios, Roasted Channa dal (Putani) for snacks.

She stands in front of the fan and goes "issa haa issu haa"

Finally she says amma aayi (stools), I say appo mukka (force it out) and she goes mmmmmmmmmmmm :)

Drrrrrrrrrrrrr Drrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

This morning I was in a hurry and hence made Kulli stand in the Car below the car seat instead of putting her on her car seat and buckling her while dropping her at the home daycare (ok before you judge me, the homedaycare is 4 buildings away from mine and within the community, also i was driving at maybe 2mph).

Kulli climbs up on the carseat, hits me on the shoulder, holds the steering wheel and goes Drrrrrrrrrrrrrr Drrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Should I start driving lessons for her?

I can sing too...

This morning in our household.....

Amma sings : You are my chamak challo oho...

Appa sings: Chikani Chameli....

Kulli Sings: A B C D E F G.....

19 months and already independent

I remember my sister working really hard to teach my nephew when he was 19 months old to do quite a lot of stuff on his own like
--> eating on his own from his plate
-->potty training
-->playing on his own with the toys and give her some time off.

I kept thinking for a long time that I should start training Kulli too now that she is old enough. But guess what? Kulli has started doing almost everything on her own (except the potty training part)

--> she loves to eat on her own (ofcourse with more than half the food on the floor)
--> loves to play on her own with the toys
-->loves to play games on the phone
--> loves to run alone when we are outside and she continues to run even if she does not find me anywhere near her

As much as am glad that she is trying to be independent am also sad that she is growing up too soon, its true that girls grow up really fast. But hey she still holds my shawl or shirts when I am not around or she keeps saying "amma office". She hasnt grown that big and independent afterall :)

Blessing is when ...

-.> I pretend to cry and kulli runs up to me, gives me a tight hug and starts crying herself if I dont stop.
-> Shonapa pretends to hit me and Kulli stares at him and says "Chup' (meaning shutup)
-> Kulli wakes me up in the morning with a beautiful smile
-> Kulli for no reason comes to me and gives me a peck on my cheek
-> Kulli wakes up in the middle of the night crawls out of her crib climbs over shonapa to find me and snuggles
    next me.
->Kulli holds me tight when something startles her
->Kulli brings a book, climbs up the sofa, sits on my lap, opens the book and points at the book to let me know
    that I need to read to her.

HomeDayCare

Homedaycare is turning out to be a good decision for Kulli....she likes the new place....she likes her new friend who is a year older than her....

there are quite a few postiives I have observed with this setting...here goes

-> Kulli gets another child to play with and she is learning to share stuff

->the other child G, wouldnt eat Ragi before..but seeing Kulli eat hers, he has started it too

->G loves to keep snacking and Kulli has picked it up...she now eats fruits, nuts, biscuits etc

->they keep running around the house the whole day and are tired by 9 in the night...that is a win win for both me and S (who takes care of Kulli now) cos both the kids are off to bed by 10 (you may say this is still very late for kids bedtime...but wait Kulli's standard bedtime before this was 12:30 a.m.)

-->Kulli gets to eat homemade food and is fed well before I pick her up in the evening

I guess the only negative so far has been Kulli gets to watch a lot of television. But S and I are fine with it till the time Kulli gets settled and gets used to the new environment.

On the whole am glad.. I ve found a good place for her for now.