Sunday morning: bike and flip flops

Yesterday morning Rajiv woke up and, as we have recently agreed to do, went to the next room to wear his daytime clothes before requesting me to get out of bed. This time however, he found an unexpected treasure. Mamma had carelessly left the new flip flops - intended for a later use - buried under a bunch of other stuff, still wrapped up in the package they came in. None of this could stop Appu, of course.

So I hear: "My flip flops! They were lost! But I found them!". Indeed. I slowly get out of bed and ask Rajiv to please be quiet so that Rohan can sleep a bit more. He is usually quite good at that, but not when there are such exciting news to share.

Rohan was initially on board with trying out the new footwear, until he realized there was no way to wear them without having something between his toes. He suffered it for a while out of respect for his older brother, but it's just not for him. Anyway, before a knew it - and before I could change into my daytime clothes myself - Rajiv was out of the front door.

So here is how it happened that we were out on the street before 8 AM on a warm but overcast Sunday morning.



Not much later, we met our Chinese neighbours who recently moved in. I wish I knew how to write the name of the little boy, so I wouldn't have to call him The Chinese Neighbour. He still only knows very few words in English, but my kids don't care one bit, as long as he shares his dinosaurs with them.

Matisse

It's been a while since I last wrote and I have so many things I need to post about - like Rohan's birthday, that just went by! - that I don't know where to start.To get out of this negative loop, let me break the ice by sharing a couple of random pieces of information about my boys:

• Rajiv can recognize "The Goldfish" painting if he sees it and knows it is by Matisse. He also knows it is called "The Goldfish". But he always tells me it is a picture of a hat. Can you see why?
  
• I told Rajiv that I was born in Italy and so was he, whereas Rohan was born in Canada. Since then Rohan keeps saying "me too, meee tooo! I born Italy toooooo!"
  
• We tried to grow beans in a cup. We got two cups, one for Rohan and one for Rajiv, then we filled them with soil and put some beans inside. Rajiv's beans sprouted and grew really fast, so we transplanted them into a pot outside and they are surviving so far. Rohan's beans never sprouted. For a while I gained time telling him that they were hiding, but secretely I dug them up and they look just like when they were put in there, no change at all. Sigh..
  
• It's summer. Appu likes to wear big explorer's hats. Rohan tolerates the hat - sometimes - but what he really wants is sunglasses, because the sun hurts his eyes. Appu prefers to wear long sleeve shirts, even when it is so hot that most people would rather not wear anything at all. Rohan doesn't mind wearing shirts of whatever kind (but if they have a firetruck or a frog it is obviously much better), however he really doesn't like wearing pants or underwear or anything that might cover his lower bum. Mamma thought insists on the pants - at least outside.
  

No, grazie

Mamma is cutting pizza into small pieces that will cool faster and places them on the plates in front of two little boys who are sitting at the table chewing like there's no tomorrow. Mamma keeps cutting, kids keep chewing.

BUZZZZZZZZZ! BuZZ! BUZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ!

Rajiv- There'a bee in the house!!!
Mamma- No, Appu, it's just a big fly.
Rajiv- Oh. It will not sting. It will just bother us.
Mamma- That's right it won't sting us, just bother us a little.
Rajiv- Yes! It will think we are food, but we will say "no", and the fly will say "o-k"..

Mamma opens the window and pushes the fly out, just in case.

******* 4! *******

Today is Appu's birthday. In case you missed the dragon reminder on the sidebar, I just thought I'd put it here too. He is four! He is a big big boy who can talk and argue, has his own ideas and can correct his mamma's English pronunciation. He likes numbers - yesterday I could lure him away from the tv by saying "Hey, I'm going to read a new math book, anybody interested?. He likes seeds and flowers and can recognize daffodils, tulips and dandelions.

He loves maps. He knows where to find North and South America on a map, where Canada and India are and he can find Australia too. He knows some places are very far away and you need to take two planes to go from India to Canada: the first is a "sleeping" plane and everybody is quiet - this was my stroke of genius, I admit - the next is a "waking" plane, where we have fun (you can imagine how much fun..). He also knows that when here it is night in India it is morning time. Now how many four year old kids can grasp that?!?

(Did I mention that bragging is not only allowed but required in birthday posts?)

He likes new clothes, as in clothes he hasn't seen before, they don't really have to be new. He likes to choose what pajamas he is going to wear and we now have a pretty large collection for him to mix and match. Some favorites are the very soft one, which is still too big but he can wear it if he doesn't run in it (or he'll trip), the Thomas one, the monster pajamas and his purple ones that say "Little Brothers Are Awesome" - not really for what it says, but because purple is his favorite color.
He used to love his super dog pajamas and the spiderman ones, but now they have become short and it's ok for Rohan to wear them because Appu is growing. He is four!

He is learning to read all by himself, by which I mean that I don't even try to teach him, but he is the one who asks how to read a word or stops while speaking to see if he can figure out what sounds are in a certain word. He likes to have books read to him too and is now ready for some longer stories, but sometimes what he thinks the book is about would leave you speechless.

He is not afraid of being in a dark room, but he doesn't like to enter the room if the light is not on. Smart, I say.

He can get dressed by himself, but he still has some trouble with zippers and buttons and sometimes socks can get tricky, but he always has the tag on the back. He also can help Rohan and he does a remarkably good job, if Rohan lets him.

He can pee standing up! And he loves to pee outside on the grass, by the way, laughing like a silly appu while I tell him "Careful! Not on the shooooooes!".

He can climb like a monkey and go fast on his tricycle.

He likes all sort of music and makes up his own songs too. If I show him a video of some musicians he wants to know their names. He told me that the CD we played last week in the car has the same song (one of Bach's cello suites) that we heard from a video in the computer. He likes to play music but is not a very disciplined student.. :) He has a nice bow hold and likes his cello but we don't practice much - my fault. However, maybe that's why he still likes it, because there is no pressure whatsoever - see? How to turn any parenting shortcomings into great insights.

You probably already know that he likes trains and the only reason why I didn't make this the first item in my list is that there is going to be a special train post soon. But I like how he plays with his little Thomas trains making up stories as he goes. I also must be the only mom (or not?) who has to sleep with several trains in my bed: the little puppies are allowed to bring two trains or cars each to bed and sometimes we still have yesterday's trains too.

He can fit inside his new carry-on luggage.

He can eat without making too big a mess, unless he wants too :) And he can carry a bowl without spilling the content. Sometimes he likes to blow on his own pasta, sometimes he doesn't and he needs mamma's help. He prefers English words and really would like to know how you say "rotini" in  English, but apparently mamma is part of a big Italian conspiracy and just won't tell him.

He likes to do work, like mamma and papa', with paper and pencil. When he grows up - like, now? - he would like to work at mamma's "ufficio".

I'm sure I left out some really important stuff, but I am also sure that by now you couldn't care less and your eyes are already crossing, so let's just conclude with a picture. Not the best or my favorite, just the most recent mostly in focus photo in my hard drive.

Happy birthday Big Piccolo Rajiv!

Momma is 4 and has blue hair

When I picked up Rajiv at his preschool on the day of the concert, they gave me a little paper bag with some Mother's Day things and a plastic cup with three small seedlings growing in a little bit of soil.



Now the seedlings are only two and something must be done urgently before they die off. I don't even know what they are supposed to grow into, but a couple of clues lead me to suspect them of being sunflowers. Yikes! What am I supposed to do? I guess moving them out of the plastic cup should be a priority... On the other hand, if these little plants survive life under my "care" they will be surely ready for the big world outside, just like my children :)



Anyway, let me move on to the real subject of this post. Because we were going to the concert when I received all these things - plus a little bit of drama with Appu who seemed to have had his hand smashed by a door but then at a closer inspection was in fact ok - I just put it all in the car and I was very proud of myself when I remembered to take the seedlings in the house, but I didn't think twice of the bag.



Then a couple days ago I opened it. It contained a candle in a glass cup, all decorated with glitter by Rajiv himself, and then the real treat:

Now, first of all I would like to point out that the teacher who wrote down Rajiv's answers should have written "mamma" with an "a", because that's how I spell my name. It's incredible. I always get my name spelled wrong abroad and now even my mommy name has to suffer the same insult.. :)



I don't need to comment on the rest, except for the last line. Within myself I am debating whether this means that I am spoiling my children with too much shopping activity - for them and not. But leaving that question aside, it is funny that Rajiv should rate our shopping outings so highly.



What do you think our shopping looks like:

Like this?

Or maybe like this?

I will let you guess.



No, ok, I'll tell you: It's a little bit of both.

Friendly Mosquitos

Today I was going to write a post about all the nice conversations that I am having with Rajiv these days.

We talk about how he is going to play a bigger cello when he grows up and he tells me, with a dreaming expression on his face, that his cello is going to grow too.

He asks me why I am putting the melon in the organic trash bin and I say that it has gone bad. So he says, "Yeah, he was pushing the vegetables, that's not nice!". That's right.

He asks why he can't watch a lot of videos. I tell him that watching too many videos hurts our eyes. Surprisingly, he seems to agree immediately. He says the videos bite our eyes, just like mosquitoes. But the mosquitoes don't bite our eyes, only our body. I remind him that if he stays under the blanket the mosquitoes won't be able to bite him.
He agrees and adds: "And Rohan is going to catch them!"
Me: "And papa'?"
Rajiv: "Papa' will zap them!"
Me: "That's right, we don't want mosquitoes!"
This must sound too harsh to him, because he says that maybe they can stay, if they are nice. No biting. And maybe they are hungry and they need something to eat. How about noodles? But really small ones, which we don't have - so they can't sit at the table next to Appu - but they have small noodles at their home and really small bowls too, so they can eat there, or maybe bring them over. They can't eat apples though, because there are no really small apples: that would be silly. There are no small trees, because birds live in them and they are not small..

I wish I could remember the rest, but right now I don't unfortunately. We had a rough night with Rohan being sick and I was not even sure I would feel like writing about something nice. But maybe there aren't many other things you can do when you have only slept a couple of hours.

Rohan was really cute and affectionate today morning, by the way. I hope he is feeling better. I'll check with Meaghan soon and maybe I'll just go back home and stay with him today. Or maybe I'll try to work a little when I still can, we'll see.

Mother Day weekend

We are not doing anything special, in case anyone is wondering. We are just having a quiet weekend of playing, cleaning, jumping around, doing loads and loads of laundry, having tea parties with a ghost that lives out of our window - and is not scary - and doesn't know how to sit but, if asked, can lie down on the couch - if we move the toys first.

Now I'm sorry but I have to go, we are off to fish in the attic.

It's all about timing

Today I told S how to take a "photo" through Skype by using the Grab utility on his Mac.

It just so happens that a few rare events had also just taken place: I had managed to sneak away - almost unnoticed - to take a shower and wash my hair without causing an uprising; the kitchen table had been almost cleared and more or less cleaned to make space for the ritual opening of the chocolate eggs (more about that later); broken down by accumulated guilt I had cooked some proper food for lunch.

As a result of all this, when papa' took the following "snaps", we looked like a regular family having a normal Sunday lunch in a reasonably clean and pleasant environment. It's all about timing :)

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?!?

Through Rajiv's eyes

Or lens.. :)

Una foto originale di Rajiv: mamma prepara la cena e Rohan guarda con ammirazione il suo fratellone.

There is no sunshine (literally) when papa' is gone...

.. but we do our best to cheer up!

Big snowfall last weekend. We got knee high snow overnight.


This is the house across from us. Somewhere in the middle should be the road.


And here we come to the heart of the matter: someone has to shovel it, this snow. So mamma did it, with Rohan in the backpack carrier.


And just for completeness, this is our backyard.



Cozy indoor for most of the time, we had a few photo sessions. The kids were enthusiastic, as you can see.














A future in modeling? :)

Bed time is a tough time

The most dreaded part of being alone with the two little angels is putting them to sleep. When S was here we shared the task equally: I put Rohan to bed and slept with him, S put Rajiv to bed and slept with him - in a nice big boy bed with a star canopy :).

Rajiv is not ready yet to be in a room all by himself, especially now that he seems to be so easily upset, probably as a consequence of his father's absence. So I decided that for this month the three of us would sleep together in the Big Bed.

At first I was doing my usual goodnight thing with Rohan, while Appu watched some cartoons so that he would stay quiet. Rohan loves our bedtime routine: we read lots of books and he gets to choose which ones, so often we read the same book several times in a row. It is our special time together.

Unfortunately, with this method Rajiv would stay up very late. Sometimes he didn't want to leave the couch at all and one day he had a huge tantrum that resulted in us going to sleep after 1 AM, because I couldn't risk waking up Rohan by taking his screaming brother to bed before he had fully calmed down. Then Rajiv was very tired in the morning and wanted me to stay in bed with him, so I was never out of the house before 10AM.

The new routine, that has been in place for a few days, consists in us going to sleep together. Rohan doesn't like it, because sometimes we read books chosen by Rajiv and he just can't accept it - so he screams or grab the book, but we are working on it. This way it seems to take forever to make them sleep, so I always end up falling asleep too. Which means I don't get time to tidy up the kitchen or do anything else unless I do it before bedtime, which I don't always want or can do.

Of course one also has to account for The Unexpected. This could take the form of both children deciding they are hungry just when I was about to put off the light. The result is that we end up having a picnic with cookies and yogurt on the bed, while singing (not me), jumping around (not me) and reading books (me). Not very good for oral hygiene, because at that point there is no way I can make them brush their teeth again, but fun overall.

The Unexpected though could also take the form of Appu deciding to get up a 3AM and go downstairs to sleep on the couch while mamma puts her body all around him so he is "like in a cage". This is not so much fun. These days Appu is always busy making nests and houses and - since yesterday night - cages to hide into. Fortunately so far I have managed to convince him that the best nest is in our bed, where he gets to arrange his two current favorite blankets and the pillows just in the right way. Otherwise, sleeping with his head on my knees and his feet on my face seems to work too.

Long weekend

Rohan is still very sick and of course it always happens on a holiday or on a Sunday - or both :) like this time.

Appu was very sad in the morning as well, because his sleep was again interrupted by Rohan throwing up (which he calls "spitting" and thinks that Rohan does it on purpose) and also because mamma neglected him in favor of his "silly" brother. Fortunately Kalena and her mom invited Appu to go for a walk and although Rohan and I missed him a lot while he was gone, he came back a new happy boy.

Rajiv didn't eat much today though and I am hoping he is not going to be sick like his brother. We spent the day watching cartoons, mostly, and eating microscopic portions of very plain food. Mamma too, because you never know.

In spite of all this though, we still managed to have some fun. The kids played with the Aqua Doodle (a mat on which you paint with water) and after fighting over the who is going to use the brush and who the pen they moved on to pouring full cups of water directly on the mat - just to see what happens, I guess. What happens is that the mat turn completely blue, then puddles form and finally the water starts rolling off onto the wooden floor of the living room.

The cutest moment was when I decided that Rohan needed a little reward for how bravely he was facing his troubles and so I opened a doll that I had purchased at some point by mistake and had kept in storage ever since. Look how cute he is with his "baby"...



To distract Rajiv from watching "George: a very monkey Christmas" for the third time, I decided to put away our small and beaten Christmas tree. The kids helped me to take the few surviving decorations off the tree and then we put them in a small box, that we proceeded to decorate with stickers. At first Rohan was having trouble and Rajiv was putting all the stickers, then Rohan got it and became an unstoppable sticking machine, while Appu moved on to posing for silly pictures with the tree.







Since the boys wanted to attack the Aqua Doodle again, which hadn't recovered yet from the earlier play, I redirected them towards a different water game instead. We put a plastic mat on the floor, filled some tupperware with water and played with a bunch of car- and truck-shaped sponges. They got all wet and that was a good excuse to move upstairs for pajama time.

Certain days, I think I deserve a mommy medal.

Appu fa le capriole sul letto

E molto altro! E' passato piu' di un mese da quando il blog e' andato in vacanza e naturalmente ne sono successe di cose... I bimbi crescono e fanno passi da gigante. Il nostro piccolo Rajiv parla molto meglio adesso e ha un letto tutto suo in cui dorme con il suo papa' per buona parte della notte - solo verso mattina si trasferisce da mamma e Rohan nel lettone. E' un fan di Michael Jackson e della musica di Bollywood.
Rohan invece e' come un grosso orsacchiotto di pelouche, tutti lo trovano irresistibile. Sa indicare la luna sul suo libro della buonanotte quando mamma glielo chiede e riconosce molte altre parole. La parola "biscotto", in particolare, porta sempre un sorriso sul suo volto. Uno dei suoi passatempi preferiti e' abbracciare bambini a caso in biblioteca e al parco. Sorride quasi sempre e preferisce stare con il suo papa', pero' assomiglia di piu' alla mamma :)

Sunday morning tradition

Appu loves idlys, so we only eat idlys for breakfast, every day. On Sunday, when the lady who comes to cook in the morning takes her deserved day off, we go to have idlys at Murugan Idly Shop in Besant Nagar, near the daycare. We sometimes go during the week as well, for an early dinnerish snack after picking up the kids. It is one of our favorite places in Chennai and surely the cheapest of our favorite places, which helps, but most importantly it is Appu's most favorite restaurant on the planet.

Here is what happens every Sunday morning. We leave the house with a tired and cranky little boy who doesn't know he is very hungry.


Murugan is often full and we wait for a while to get a table. Sometimes Appu just runs around, sometimes he waits in papa's arms, like this time.




Then we sit, Appu gets his own banana leaf of which he is very proud, and we order our idlys. Appu just can't understand while the waiters keep giving idlys to other people and don't come straight to us, by the way; it is a difficult concept I sometimes struggle with myself.






Hooray! Now we need sambaar. And we need mamma to break the first idly into small pieces, because they are very very hot (YUM!).




That's it. Then Appu will eat, all by himself, two or three idlys. Last Sunday a record of almost four! He sits the whole time, carefully dips his idly in the sambaar, asks for more whenever the waiter is around because you never know if you are going to see him again, and every now and then goes to wash his hands, which is a lot of fun.