You tell them stuff, but who knows what they are thinking..

Just a few minutes ago, Appu shows me a drawing he made and tells me it's me - and by the way, he did that because Rohan yesterday had made a picture of me, and he wanted to measure up :)

Anyway, back to the story. Appu says:

- Mamma, it's you!

- It's me?

(maybe I sounded doubtful)

- Yes, when you were very small.

- When I was small?

- Yes, when you were inside *my* tummy..

The great potato rainfall of 2011

Uhm, che cosa ci fanno tutte queste patate per terra??

Hey, what happened here?

What are all these potatoes doing on the floor??

Maybe this is a clue..

and here is another..

..AHA! Mystery solved :)

But wait, why is Rajiv wearing socks on his hands now?!?

It's so exciting!

Appu is taking part in his first concert in two weeks. His group will get to play a simple rhythm on a single string to open the spring concert of the Suzuki school. It will be him with the cello and his two little friends from class - another cello and a violin.

To be honest, so far every attempt to get them to play this thing *together* has failed miserably, but it doesn't matter because they are going to be so cute that nobody will mind :)

I just went to buy a pair of black sweatpants and a white t-shirt for next week's dress rehearsal, so I thought I would share..

One day - soon - people will be asking for his autograph :)

Rajiv improvvisa una canzone alla chitarra.

Rajiv improvises a song on the guitar.. The best part was before I started filming it but, alas, isn't that always the case?

Photo Album - Rohan and Rajiv in India

Cliccando su "Read more" piu' in basso potrete vedere le pagine di un libro ricordo del nostro recente viaggio in India. Per ingrandire ogni pagina basta cliccarci sopra, pero' purtroppo per caricare le immagini sul blog ho dovuto ridurre la qualita', quindi le foto non sono nitidissime. Sono graditi commenti! E chissa' se riuscite a scovare nel muchio le foto scattate da Rajiv?

Maybe you have been wondering when I was going to start posting some photos from our recent stay in India. And probably you kind of expected me to start my usual 37 part series of "Pics you have missed" posts. I admit such a thing was on my mind, but then it occurred to me that I could save myself some work (this somehow ended up being a wrong estimate..) and you some pain by showing you the book I have made for Rajiv to share with his friends here in Canada.

Below the fold you will find all the pages of the book in individual jpg files. You can click on the picture to make it bigger. The book was made using iPhoto with one of the standard templates. Even so, it did take a long time to make; and converting each page to jpg format and uploading them on blogger was another epic enterprise. Just to say, I hope you appreciate my efforts :)

Some final notes and disclaimers (see how professional I'm getting?):

Please consider the target audience for the book are Rajiv's teachers, friends and some of my friends here in Canada. If you are a family member you will find some of the captions unnecessary and if you are Indian you might find that I have oversimplified some things or maybe made some plain mistakes - in that case please forgive me and then let me know..

I really like some of the photos. Some other ones are of poor quality, but the purpose was to collect some nice memories and to give a more or less full coverage of the whole trip, so quality was not a very important factor. I have also included a couple of photos taken by Rajiv: I wonder if you can spot them? Let me know in the comments and the winner will get a hard copy of the book or a signed hand print from Rajiv, you choose :)

It was a dark and stormy night

Non so perche' giocare con questa lampada piaccia tanto ai bimbi..

I am not sure why they like playing with this lamp so much..

The Big Brother

Rajiv has decided that it is his duty - and a lot of fun - to take care of his little brother.

He helps him put on his socks and he warns me when his brother is "making a mess again!". Like taking noodles out of his plate and dropping them one by one on the chair and on the floor, while mamma unsuspecting keeps filling the plate thinking he has a great appetite... :)

Yesterday night Rohan had "cacca", like we say in our family instead of "poo", which makes us sound very elegant to most people, except of course Italians who would probably just find us gross. Anyway, back to the story. Rohan had cacca and I took off his diaper and went upstairs to dispose of it in the bathroom. Then I hear Rajiv screaming "Mamma, quick, there is a little bit of cacca!!". I go down - I don't rush because it takes more than that to scare me at this point.

When I arrive I find Rohan lying down on the floor on his back with his legs up in diaper changing pose and Appu holding a diaper, pointing and saying "we need wipes!". So I helped Rajiv help Rohan with the whole process and both brothers were delighted. I think the plan is that soon they will be fully self sufficient and then they will take control of the house.

Later they decided to play with blocks and that of course involved throwing them on each other's heads, which really hurts, but then today morning Rohan was trying to make a tower and he hurt his finger with a block. He cried a little, until Appu told him "do you need a kiss?" and he kissed his finger and made it all better.