'Tis the Season!

This is the week of Christmas and I am loving the spirit of festivity. It’s that time of the year when there are Christmas trees and decorations everywhere, and an air of cheer all around. The office wears a deserted look as most people are either working from home or are on vacation. I have an off for the whole of next week :)

Angel had a concert (*gulp*) at her day care where the children from her class performed on Jingle Bells. It was lovely to see the little tots sing the carol song. Yeah, I just got to know that it’s not a carol, it was not even meant for Christmas.

Here is Angel’s version. The link has the audio of her singing the song.

I love the way how the children sing the songs without getting bothered about the lyrics.

Angel got this in the mail. 

This is the first letter we got which is addressed to her! 

I also baked these beautiful (whatever happened to modesty!) candy cane cookies inspired by my friend Bhawna. Mine were the eggless version. Thanks B for the inspiration :)  The four cookies on the left most end were made by Angel, she rolled and twisted it all by herself. I think she did a pretty good job and she got better with every attempt!

Below are the gingerbread cookies decorated by Angel. She loved doing it as "The Gingerbread Man" still remains one of her favorite stories.

And finally, some of the most gorgeous Christmas trees amongst the many many more:

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! :) :)

Different

Last week, while aisle hopping in the supermarket I came across this 

It immediately caught my fancy and this goes in the “Weird Different Exotic Foods I have Tasted” list. We tried it together – J*, me and Angel and we found the chili content in it quite okay – even by Angel's standard who I think was happy to just eat the chocolate without going into the nitty-gritties of it :P We could taste some spice towards the end of the bite.

Will I try it again? Maybe, I am not too eager for that because I like only milk chocolate and to some extent dark chocolate. However, I will let some time (and some chocolates) pass before I decide on that. Who knows, I might get addicted to differently flavored chocolates.

Talking about different food, I loved the paan ice cream and gulkand ice cream which I first tasted in Pune. I am not a very big fan of paan, so just tried it on a whim. I am not, for the life of me, able to recall the name of the ice cream parlor. It was located near my training center. I asked some friends too, but sadly, none of us remember the name. I have had these two versions of ice creams at some other places too, but none could match the Pune ones.

I come from Ahmedabad, a place where alcohol is prohibited and most of the people follow vegetarianism, so it’s not uncommon to find “Pure Vegetarian” restaurants, however when we found something like below, that was different in Toronto :)

It was owned and managed by a Gujarati. They just serve some pre-prepared snacks like samosa, kachori, aaloo tikki, pizza, khaman, jalebi, fafda and some other sweets. We tried everything other than the sweets which did not appeal much to our eyes. The food was strictly okay, but to get something like that here gave us a high :) Apart from that, the place had a lot of Guajarati farsan, Indian spices and condiments, needless to say we bought a lot of stuff. The other items had been devoured before I remembered to click the pics.

They even had multiple copies of Gujariati newspapers like Divya Bhaskar and Swadesh kept at their entrance for people to read and take along. I then got to know that they are the weekly editions that are printed for Gujarati readers abroad

So what's up different with you all ?

Angel Tales!

When Angel was not completely settled in her day care, J* sometimes used to give her a toy right at the time of dropping her so that her mind is drifted from the separation. So once while J* did this, her teacher remarked “You have been to IKEA again”.When J* narrated this to me, I asked what does she mean by 'again' (meaning how does she know that we have been there twice) and Angel comes to my rescue and tells me “Mamma, again matlab phir se”

She sure is picking up a lot of Engilsh, accented at that!

***********
I had to travel to another branch of my office due to some technical issues in my regular branch and I was telling Angel about it. And here is our conversation:

Angel: Is that office far mamma?
Me: Yes baby, its even farther then my regular office (I have a long commute to my office)
Angel: Oh, then you will be so tired mamma, you find a garden on your way and sleep under a tree. And when you get up remove the leaves that will be stuck in your hair (it was autumn then) so wash your hair once you are back.
Me: That’s a good plan
Angel: Mamma, also beware for monkeys on the tree (She was definitely thinking of “nakalchi bandar”)

***********

The public library here is spoiling us. It’s such a delight to be able to borrow more books than you can read. It’s as if the books on the shelves wink at me and say “Me! Pick Me!”

Angel loves it too. In her own words: “Mamma, this library is so much better than Bangalore library as I can take more than one book”

I wish India had public libraries.

***********

She once came to me excitedly and said : Mama this toy is so cool!!
Hiding my surprise (since I had never used the word ‘cool’in that context with her), I asked : Cool matlab thanda? (Does cool mean cold?)
Angel: Nahi, cool matlab achha (No, cool means nice)

This is something she has picked at her day care, so now we have a lot of‘cool’ stuff around :)

***********

Angel loves pretend play and she can carry on with the stuffed toys for the whole day. She loves to talk to them, solve their problems (yes, they do have problems), hug and comfort them. She has names for all of them too.

I was overhearing one such session and she was instructing Ellie (the elephant) to hit bad children. I asked her if hitting is good. She immediately replied that "Spiderman hits others" (She is a huge fan of Spiderman – thanks to the merchandise)
I asked her how does she know as I have never watched Spiderman with her. She said that she had seen it on the TV while we were staying with our friends when we had just landed in Canada. This re-affirmed my belief of no-TV for her as long as I can. I then said that Spiderman doesn’t hit children and she confidently said that Spiderman hits bad people though. She then turned to Ellie and told her (yeah, the genders of the stuffed toys are decided too) to hit bad people.
This was one of the moments of contradiction – where we teach something to our children and they get some entirely opposite view of the same thing by watching their favorite characters – cartoons and people do that.

I then explained to her that it was just a movie and its all unreal and hitting is NOT an answer to any problem. I am not sure how much of the film making part of it she understood but she agreed to me nonetheless!
 

 

The Marriage Bureau for Rich People

 

I picked this book on a whim. I usually go to the library with Angel and she doesn’t want to leave the children’s section even for a minute, so I have to coax her to accompany me to the adult section where she is very impatient and wants to go back to her area of interest (pun intended).

I loved the cover of this book (yeah, I am naïve like that). Reading through the covers, I got to know that it is about weddings and is set in a small town of eastern India named Vizag. I had read a similar book earlier named The Wedding Wallah and had enjoyed it so decided to pick it up. I later did some research came to know that it is in fact a series of books where this is the first book and Wedding Wallah was the third installment of the series.

Coming back to The Marriage Bureau for Rich People, it is about Mr. Ali who is retired and interfering with her wife’s daily routine and needless to say, irritating her. He decided to make use of his time and started a marriage bureau with the name of The Marriage Bureau for Rich People which forms the title of the book. We get to meet various characters who happen to be the clients of the marriage bureau. There are two subplots – Aruna, the efficient assistant of Mr. Ali and Rehman, the son of Mr. Ali. Aruna is the girl next door very likeable character, her friendly relationship with her sister, how her father does not want to get her married as she is the sole bread earner of the family, how her love story with Ramanujam (the client of the marriage bureau) unfolds and how they overcome the family and caste barriers. Rehman is the maverick son of the old couple who cannot stand injustice. Even though he has an engineering degree, he doesn’t have a full time job and he is more into protests for the rights of the farmers much to the dismay of the couple.

The author has touched some social causes which are prevalent in the Indian society like –

  -Divorce
  -Divorcee remarriage
  -Dowry
  -Inter caste marriage

The story is quite simple and written in a simple, lucid style. The characters are very realistic. I loved the character of Mrs. Ali who is very motherly, grounded, witty and kind. The book has an old world charm to it which even made me nostalgic. There are some places where the author has written detailed recipes which run into paragraphs. There is an Andhra wedding sequence described in detail, so those who are aware of the ceremony will enjoy it.

All in all, it was an enjoyable, nice and sweet read. I will definitely read the other parts of the series.

PS- A book review after a long time it was! I loved doing it. I plan to write about each and every book I read in the future, just to keep a tab of the books I read and keep this blog going!

A Musing

So I have joined work here and Angel is almost settled in her new day care. The settling took four weeks and still counting. It was a big change for her. Back home she used to go to school only for 2.5 hours and here she complained that “home time” comes after so much time. At one point she even said that I don’t like schools in Canada, let’s go back to Bangalore to my old school and it broke my heart to a thousand pieces. As I have mentioned earlier, I felt bad for her even before we moved, as she HAD to tag along with us wherever we went and we do whatever we feel is best for all of us. Gradually, with every passing day, she is getting there. She now tells me the new songs that she has learnt, the activities she did, the names of her new friends, who does what and so on.

I can watch her from anywhere, thanks to the technology. I sometimes see another child snatching a toy that she is playing with. She tries to save it, and when she couldn’t do it anymore, she gives up and without getting bothered starts playing with something else. Similarly, the other day she told me that J pushed me twice during the outdoor time. I asked her did you push him too and she replied that I don’t push anyone as it’s not right. I patted her back and then told her to tell J not to push you and she defended him and gave me three reasons – 1. He just pushed me lightly 2. I was okay after that 3. He is my friend and he was just being silly. I leave her at that to fight her own battles. At the same time, I also wonder if it’s okay to be this forgiving or am I missing something to teach her. What do you think?

First Impressions

I have been meaning to write this post ever since we landed, anyways, better late than never.

Ø  Home sickness has not hit me. Not yet.

Ø  The weather now is pretty Bangalore-ish, while they say that it goes down till -40 in winters which I am dreading and yet waiting to experience as I have never seen snowfall. So I have a feeling that I might enjoy it. Let’s see how it goes.

Ø  We are staying with our friends K and Z these days who are a lovely couple and I got to know them more, I like them even more now. Angel has become so friendly with them which is a delight for me as she is shy by nature and needs time to open up in front of people and we definitely are spending a lot of time with them.

Ø  They live in a lovely neighbourhood and have  beautiful green apple and cherry trees in their backyard. I love to look at the houses here, their trees and gardens.  While we will be staying in apartment building, I think we are getting spoilt by living here

Ø  It reminds me that how much spoilt we are in India, by the maids. Yes, I now appreciate them much much more

Ø  We will be moving to our own place from the 1^st of next month

Ø  I am in love with the maple trees, they are so beautiful and they remind of one of my favourite SRK film Mohabattien every time I see them. I am hopeless I know :P I am wondering what will happen to me in autumn which is just round the corner (Anyone who remembers the movie will know what I am saying)

Ø  The people are way too helpful here. If I ask them something, they will make sure that I get it, which is very unlike India where we don’t give a second glance

Ø  It’s a very colourful country with very stylish people and I love it

Ø  There is no traffic and no honking which is such a relief, I used to wait for 20 minutes at hope farm signal back home

Ø  We also have to start studying for the driving licence exam. There is a written test and a driving test which apparently most of the Asians fail to clear in the first attempt and only then we can get a car. Phew. Some things are much simpler back home

Ø  The switches turn on in the opposite direction, the cars are driven on the other side, the steering wheel is also on the other side, there is still a lot to get used to

Ø  While looking for apartments, we came across some buildings which had problems like bed bugs and cockroaches. Yeah, shocking.

Ø  For a country like Canada, the day cares are very few and mostly full. One of them has a waiting period of one year and the schools start from 4 years, so Angel will be going to school from next September, till then, the search for a good day care is on. Once she is settled there, I can start looking for my job.

Ø  I love the public libraries here. We are yet to get a membership as it requires an address proof which we are yet to receive. Can’t wait.

Ø  Angel was very amused as we drink water directly from tap

And that is how our life has begun here, a long way to go!

Transition

I am quite busy these days as next week we are moving to Canada. So we are pretty much tied up in packing and shuffling and repacking and discarding the stuff.

Angel is excited too, but she was not very happy when we told her that not all her toys will be moving with us. I let her decide which toys she wants to take along and I must say she made her choices well. We made three stacks, one that we will be taking with us, two that will remain with the grand parents and the final one was to be given away to friends and charity. Initially, she also thought that her teachers, friends and school are moving along with us. She loves her school and I am planning to send her till the last day. Gradually she accepted this fact.

To prep her up I told her a lot of exciting things about the new place and or conversations led to snow, Christmas and Santa. The thing is, she does not like Santa Claus. Gasp. There I said it. Actually, last Christmas there was a man who had put on a pretty weird mask of Santa in a restaurant and since then she is suspicious of Santa. She confirmed a number of times that there will be no Santa Claus in the place where we are going. I hope this Christmas her fears are gone for good.

It broke my heart when I saw her giving a tight hug to one of her soft toys that we are leaving and saying good bye to it. Sometimes, I feel sorry for her. Children, they have to tag along wherever the parents take them without much say and we parents do what we feel is best for their future!

Love

Ever since Angel was young, we play this game. I sternly take her name and when she acknowledges, I say I love you and we have a hearty laugh after that. And she does the same, shouts and calls me from another room and when I go, she says I love you mamma!

It’s quite a westernized concept saying I love you aloud to your children and I love it. I don't remember my parents saying it aloud to us, it is like air. Just like the way we know that it exists, we know that they love us. But good words never hurt and it’s always pleasing to the ears.

So one day while doing the same, I asked her “why do you think I love you, baby?”  Her exact words were “kyunki main good behavior karti hu”. I was shocked as I never wanted to give that message to her. Maybe I said I love you to her only when she was behaving nicely. So we sat I explained to her that I love you because you are my child and no matter what happens, I love you. Even if you behave badly, nicely, naughtily, I always love you. I want her to understand that she can come to us no matter what the situation is. I want her to know that there is one place in the whole world where she will always be wanted and loved.

Now we have started saying “I love you, no matter what” to each other and at times we revise the meaning of this phrase. Gradually, we have got a hang of it. So a few days back when I was scolding her, she stopped me and asked, “Do you still love me, while you are scolding me?” When I replied in affirmative, there was a wide grin on her face and she said, “ok, continue scolding.” :P

Again after a few days, I asked her, why do I love you and she replied, “Because I am your baby.”

Mission accomplished!

Three (-lled)

Angel turned three yesterday!!

Dearest Angel,

I am writing this letter to the angel of future, some 15, 20 or 25 years down the line. I wonder what you are now. A writer, a pilot, an astronaut? An artist, a singer , a dancer? A scientist,  a teacher, an architect? I hope you love and enjoy what you do.

There are certain commendable qualities (amongst the many more) that I wish you retain throughout your life.

The first being your curiosity and inquisitiveness. You want to know everything about everything right from the intellectual (If milk has calcium and curd is made from milk then does curd also have calcium) to trite (what nutrients does potty have) to more thoughtful(If my friend A’s mama has become a teacher now, who will take care of A)

When I tell you that I don’t know the answer to something, you tell me to open my laptop and google it. I hope you still want to find your answers.

The second is your sense of humour and more importantly your ability to laugh on yourself. You crack jokes and are in splits thereafter. Like once P aunty asked you whether you liked corn(which I had told her earlier) and you thought for a moment and replied, “No. I like unicorn.” And laughed like anything.

And if you do a mistake, you simply admit it and say, Oh Mama, I forgot it, how silly of me! And we have a laugh on it and carry on. I hope you leave your baggage behind, as that my dear, is a key to live happily.

There is one quality you have about which I am undecided yet. I sometimes think you are too soft. While reading and watching ‘The Lion King’, you cried. Multiple times. I had to actually forward the scene where Mufasa dies. In the end, when Simba kills Scar, you have your own version that Scar is asking for an address and Simba tells him, so Scar goes and never returns. I sometimes think that how you will face the big bad world out there, but your belief in goodness makes me want to want to believe it.

We love you Angel, and will always do. Thank you for you .

Love

Mamma

****

You didn’t think I will not tell you the details of your actual 3rd birthday, did you?!

Well, this time we planted 3 saplings to mark your 3rd birthday.

I made a train cake and also ordered a Thomas cake(to be in a safe side :P) You actually wanted a blue teddy cake(blue being your favorite color) and I thought that it must be a common one and went to order at the last moment. Apparently, its not that common, so had to settle for a blue Thomas cake.

I also made this with inputs from you.

There was a party in the evening in the club house and you had helped in preparing the guest list. You loved being the center of attraction and receiving so many gifts. The next day, the moment you opened your eyes, your first words were “Chalo gifts open karte hai" :)

So it was a great start to another wonderful year! Stay Blessed!!

My Musical Munchkin

I am thrilled. Angel is showing keen interest in Hindi songs! We are singing songs all day if not talking. So apart from the hundreds of rhymes, we also sing Bollywood songs and she seems to remember the lyrics J

Sample a few :

This is her current favorite these days. She knows that Shah Rukh Khan is my favorite and she recognizes him!

Here is another one. I love when she adds her own little words like ‘arre’ at 0:21 J

We had seen PK in movie hall with her and now she loves all the PK songs.

And this song had her in splits for a full day!!

Baking - II

Continuing the baking spree, I would like to share a few more pics of outputs of my baking, again for visual pleasure ;)

When Angel was less than one year old, we used to celebrate her birthday on every 14th, now we do it every quarter :) I tried to blur the names but couldn't get satisfactory results so I have pasted some stickers to protect the identities ;)

I usually make ragi or wheat flour cake for Angel, so this is ragi cake iced with chocolate ganache

Few cupcakes

Zebra cake before going to the oven, the end result was horrendous, haven't tried it again. I will try it the next time I am in a mood to bake

This was for my sister-in-law's birthday

I always look out for healthier options in cake, so these are apple and oats muffins

Sweet Corn Crunch Cake

Chocolate-cinnamon cookies, they were yummy

Wheat flour banana cupcakes for MN, when we visited them

This was for Angel's 2nd birthday, details here

Chocolate cake for Angle's 2.5 birthday

The trials with fondant :)

This was again for my sister-in-law. Its vanilla with choco-chips

Honey comb cake for Angel's 2 and 3 quarters

Pineapple and coconut cookies, were very hard, yet to try them again. Since I put in a lot of some effort, I always make sure that its eaten. Luckily the taste is always good, its just the texture which needs (a lot of) improvement.

Spinach and cheese parcels, yummy and healthy too :)

Do tell me what do you think about these Recipes on demand ;) Happy Baking!!!

My Two Cents!

Now that Angel is almost three, well 2 more months to go, but looking at my frequency of posting, I might as well write this post now since it has come to my mind rather than umm never!

Twos, more popularly known as the terrible twos, which is that developmental stage of toddlers which involves refusals and temper tantrums. I have seen my friend’s son literally lying on the floor and demanding cold drink, and not just any other cold drink, but a specific cola brand.

It is unavoidable or so we thought, after all, parenting is also about experimenting and adapting the things which suit you the best, however Angel’s two’s are not terrible at all. They are terrific to say the least. While J* and I do believe that we got lucky, but there are also certain things which we have been doing and we feel that we have done it right. So this post is to share my wisdom tips which made our lives easier and which might help the other first time parents too.

Its not that Angel never throws tantrums, but whenever she does, I always give her a benefit of doubt, that is, I ask myself whether she is hungry/sleepy/tired. If the answer to that is yes, I try to address that first.

Then there were those 15 dreadful initial days at playschool. It was the time that she took to settle down. She used to cry in the morning while going to school. Although I sat in the common area at her school for a week, my being there made her crankier, so I left her on her own and then J* started to drop her to school instead of me. At home, the story was no different. She used to cry at the drop of the hat. She used to get up from her sleep at the middle of the night and start howling. The teachers at the play school were very supportive. It was separation anxiety for her. My usually well behaved baby had turned into a crying, wailing monster. We used to counsel her at home that when we were young, we used to go to school and her cousins go to school and blah blah blah, I believe that the teachers did the same and one fine day she woke up and was ready to go to school. Now she loves her school so much that she wishes to go to school even on the weekends. Sometimes after her afternoon naps, she asks whether she has to go to school now. Eventually, she was back to her cheerful self.

When she asks for something, I have learnt to attend her as soon as possible, the sooner the better. For example, when she wants to explore the jaltarang while I am cooking in the morning, I keep aside my cooking for a while and arrange the apparatus for her. Now she gets really busy for the next 15 minutes and I get some precious trouble free morning cooking minutes. Moms with toddlers would know its importance. If I tell her to wait until my cooking is finished, she would come to me after every 2 minutes which would be frustrating for both of us. So this technique is for my sanity as well. If at all I cannot leave what I am working on, I turn to J* and make sure that what she want to discover is provided to her. Here the good old distraction technique will not work as it’s very difficult to distract a 2 year old. She gets distracted for a while but comes back to the initial point, so it beats the whole purpose of distraction and I am back to square one.

There are certain rules which are to be followed, no exceptions. Like we have clean up the room before we go to the park. She now gets stars on her hands from school which she proudly shows off as she helps the teachers clean up the classroom. I was told about it in the parents-teachers meeting too. Once when she was not in the mood and refused to tidy up, we actually didn’t go to the park that evening. So yes I am wicked, which reminds me that I have been told the same in a not so subtle manner by people when I tell them that she has not tasted chocolates yet or she doesn’t watch TV. I have seen children as young as 6 months being fed chocolates. When I go to my mom’s place I have to actually fight with my relatives for not feeding her chocolates. Well, my point is chocolates are empty calories and I don't feel that she is deprived of anything. Then they ask me that when I will start giving her chocolates. Angel knows about chocolates and she holds them and loves the colorful wrappers, but she has never demanded to eat them so I have never really thought about it and I will prolong it as much as I can. That may be because she doesn’t like eating – anything. Coming to TV, research has proved that TV switches off the brain and the exposure to TV before 2 years should be zero. I would rather that she watches and runs after the butterflies in the park than seeing about butterflies on TV. Moreover, this is the time for her to be out and about as she has her whole adult life to be glued to screen(I hope not though) Well, she does watch rhymes and other videos on YouTube and it does come as a boon when while feeding her when nothing else works. And I will have to admit that I make her watch this series while drinking milk these days and its down in 5 minutes which would otherwise take more than 30 minutes.

She loves to talk, in fact, just today my neighbor was telling me that she loves Angel’s voice and how can someone that small talk so much :D I believe that is because we have talked to her – A LOT, since the time I got pregnant. So at 1 year she was able to recognize at least 10 of her body parts and by 18 months she could say around 120 words which she actually understood apart from the other ones that she just repeated. I describe everything around her in minute detail and I try to answer all her questions as age appropriately as I can. So now when she sees a crow, she doesn’t just say a crow, she actually talks to the crow and makes both sides of the conversations and sometimes when I pitch in, she is ready with her version to counter me. We are also trying to make her multi lingual. We used to speak to her in our mother tongue while she started talking and now we have switched to Hindi as we felt it was important for her to convey her needs in school and overall survive in our country, while the grandparents stick to the mother tongue. She is picking up English as well at her school.

Angel loves books. We have read to her and shown her the books ever since she was very young and I could see that she was fascinated with all the colors and pictures. We have joined a library and we try to go there regularly. She insists to accompany me and she loves to pick her own books. Books open a different, magical world altogether. It also boosts the imagination which I feel is very important for the young ones. She is still not ready to listen to stories which are not perfect, that is, when someone is troubled she gets very upset. I have never killed anyone in her stories yet. For stories like ‘Lion King’ and ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’,  I have to coax her a lot to let me go till the end as there is a happy ending in waiting!

Two magical words which she learnt quite early was ‘aape’ which meant ‘apne aap’ or on my own and ‘try’. She loves to try everything and we let her as long as its harmless and she is proud of that. So our brushing time is fun as she loves to brush her teeth on her own. Our play time is fun. Our park time is no fuss at all. (Let me not go to the eating thing) As a result, I was told by her teachers that she is very independent for her age. She knows how to open her bottle and snack box unlike other children who wait for the teachers to help them. She uses the loo, flushes the toilet, washes her hands and wipes them all by herself. Surprisingly, she doesn’t like to be fed in school and wants to do that on her own. When I tell her that a particular thing is not possible, like fitting a bigger cap in smaller one, she persuades me to ‘try’

And finally its never too early to teach them manners and to respect the others, books and toys.

So here were a few things that helped us sail through this time. I am no expert and I have learnt all this after a lot of trial and error and reading. Meanwhile, we are preparing for an even more challenging thing – tantrum three’s or threenage it is called!