Kindle your passion

So people who know me know my love for reading and my husband knows it way too well. He used to gift me books of 400 pages or so and would write inside "Hoping to keep you entertained for a while" but then at the end of three or so days I would say I have nothing to read :-). All done with that one? yes, all done with that one.Thats our usual conversation around my reading habit. But lately, I am getting too engrossed in "Being a mom" role and all I am doing is planning activities for our preschooler or doing those activities with her. So Husband dear asked me few nights back how come he doesn't see me reading much these days.You used o read so much , you love books so much, I love it that you read but now it ain't happening much. I read! Like what? Parenting magazine and ummmm I have a book half way through, Unaccustomed Earth and yes it is a great book but I am not getting around it.
So anyways darling, my birthday is coming up and I was thinking , and I am thinking ok by bringing up my love of books he was trying to make a case for something that he wants me to gift him on his birthday. Ok mister, I got ya. Spill it. What is it that you want, I would have given it even if you didn't embarrass me by telling that my reading id dying!!Hunh, so much for love these days!

Kindle, I want Kindle on my birthday. Its a cool new electronic reading device by Amazon. Now I understand that every guy out there loves electronics the way girls love handbags. They want the best and the latest. But I am preplexed here becuase he doesn't even read paper so why is this on his wishlist? Hey, you don't read, incase you missed that part! I am not gifting you a $400 electronic thingy just to brag about! Now see there comes the love that I could not see. No, I want it for you to have it on my birthday!!!! It would give me so much pleasure that my wifey is using the latest technology all the while "kindling" her passion of reading. Its techinically for me coz I want latest tech in my house but you will use it coz you are a reader. Serves both of us.

I should have said no coz its his birthday and he should gt a present but I should give my husband what he asks for atleast on his birthday, call it greed justfied and we ordered it and its arriving today. Oh by the way, his birthday is still two months away!!

I love to be loved so much!!

Any of you out there is a Kindle User?

I am bloated today

Oh yes, bloated as in like a big fat balloon but I am not looking for a remedy. Bloating makes me happy, very happy coz I am bloated with pride. Past saturday, I was in the New England Aquarium with Saumya. We cruised our way through the sharks, sea urchins, blue frogs, electric eels. By the way, this aquarium happens to house the biggest turtles I have ever seen, they are called Sea Turtles. Like a good , ifnormation sharing guide, I was telling my 3 and a half year old daughter that they are called "Sea Turtles", now keeping in mind her age and the "why" phase she is going through, I was expecting the questions she came up. "why are they "See Turtles"?" Ahem.....but before I say because they live in the sea , she said oh because we can SEE them!! Well after spending 2 hours walking through the dark giant rooms I was not in the mood to explain a difference of SEA and SEE right then. So like a polite audiance I soaked in the joke and laughed and laughed my way out the aquarium :-)
Now we were in the store trying to find something nice. We picked up a puzzle with a minimum age of 5 coz I didn't find anything else which was meaningful to spend $15 on.
Saumya was very excited about the puzzle and wanted to do it the moment we reached back home. We were all so exhausted and were trying to look for excuses but hey a moment later I heard her "Mamma I got it, I am already doing it" !!!!! Hello its a puzzle for a kid who is more then 5 years old and you are 3 and a half. I went to watch her and then I just kept on watching the progress.
Its a mosaic puzzle with very tiny faom squares cut in the squares. They need to be pasted on a picture which has squares on it and the faom colors are number coded. Squares with number one will have red pieces, number 2 orange, 3 yellow, 4 blue, 5 green, 6 purple and 7 black. No one explained her all this. She opened the box, figured all the pieces and turned the box a few time which had the color chart and got going!





The workstation.




Very Busy




Fish, one part done. She spent one whole Sunday doing this. Love the dedication. It still needed the water part around the fish but it was time for bed.



Monday morning, first thing after the bath. The fish needs water or it will die :-)

Proud Girl!!

Oh My, Its a Duck!!

This post is coming after a long break! We were in our homeland for a month and had the best time with family. Saumya grew up a lot there. Of course she is growing up anywhere she is but being surrounded by extended family for days at length made her feel important all the while going through a learning roller coaster.

These days she is showing interest in drawing. with no plan on what to make, she picks up a crayon and goes on making and commenting on the go "Hunh, oh it needs eyes, oh my how will it walk without legs let me give you legs, they will be orange, nice and bright, hey I made a duck"!!!!

We are lovers!

Its not a pretty sight when a 3 year old is coping with an earache and her body is blazing hot at 102.6 . It calls for a day off from preschool and certainly day off from work! Last afternoon I was helping my daughter go through the rough phase of terrible ear infection along with other parts of the package deal a.k.a runny nose, high fever and watery eyes. And all this turns an otherwise loveable adorable darling child into the most grumpy one. Well, since she was unable to sleep, I was lying with her in my bed and was kind of trying to distract her from the illness. I kept on talking about her bad she must be feeling, how yucky is nose right now, how angry she must be getting when her ear hurts, I just went on and on and on. And my daughter just grabbed my cheek with both her blazing hot feverish hands and gave me the best kiss ever and said, " Mamma, don't worry, I am so much better now".

All her mamma did was acknowledge what she was going through, gave words to her pain and it became the best medicine. Well I smiled back and gave her a kiss and then she went on to give me tight hug and said, "Mamma we are lovers"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I was amazed at the choice of words and asked her to elaborate. I mean I said, " Really you feel like that?" and she said , "yeah, you love me so much that it makes me feel better all the time and I love you a lot too(with a stress of "oooo":-)), so we are lovers you see". I said you bet we are lovers!

When I become big........

Every preschooler's mom knows how diifcult it is to bring the active, never tired and never hungry kid to the table for meal times and have them talk about something other than their Doras and mickeys! Last night husband dear was working till late so I used the opportunity to have some grown up conversation with my 3 year old. Now to get her out of the make beleive world of toys and characters, I served her food in the regular dinner plate which we grown ups use and yes they are breakable and sat down with my own plate, same plate and same food. I thought what the heck, I will risk a plate for a beautiful conversation! And boy did it work! "Wow mamma, my plate matches with yours" "Yeah, you are growing and see how far you have come" Now I did want to start this "how far" from the point when she didn't even know how to suck breast milk but I did let it go. "so much funt o grow up" "yeah mamma, when I grow up what else can I do?" "you tell me" and the list is ......

• I will be able to open the spools container
• I will be able to open the door and go out when I want
• I will be able to eat spicy food like you
• I will be able to drive a car
• I will be able to make tea for you (this one melted me to the core!!)
• I will be able to take a bath all by myself
• I will be able to sit in the car with no help( tying the seat belt on her booster seat)

Her eyes lit up at every "I will be able to" and I was thinking how restricted a child must feel asking for help for so many times a day. I am learning my way to give them some more credit for being reasonable and allowing more room to make her feel that she can do much already!

Oh Saumya, I love you.

Saumya, our love.

new 3 years old around the block. Thank you all for the wishes, Saumya turned 3 on December 15, 2007. her latest interests are:

• latest craze : Mickey Mouse
• latest hobbie: chatting and more chatting. The girl just goes on and on!
• latest attention seeking strategy :I want to drink water!
• latest love: Mom a.k.a me. It gets too much for me and dad does feel left out.
• latest avoiding strategy : saying "I don't know" for every question asked.
• latest vehicle craze : Airplane that she is going to make and fly, a red one with red interiors and dark green fold away trays for food.
• latest color: Turquoise Blue. Has asked her nanima to make a sweater in that shade of blue.
• latest food: Peanut butter sandwich made with jam.
• latest food in hate list: Rice
• latest clothing in hate list : Jeans.
• latest activity with hours of pleasure: Washing hands
• latest snack which makes her drool: Popsicle
• latest declaration about self : I am a helpful girl
• latest nick name given by her teacher: Happy!

Freezing.....

Boston is in deep freeze......its so cold that it hurts! I am not a snow lover but my daughter keeps wishing for more and more of it and the snow God is on her side this winter! In fact , looks like there are multiple snow Gods, when one gets tired of spilling , the other one takes over.It is just not letting up. Well, I can officially declare now that I hate snow.....I haven't ever disliked anything that I start hating it. Oh well!
Times like this remind me of Delhi winters. Sitting outside in the sun eating peanuts and revari and oranges. Mom bringing hot steaming mooli paranthas and we all fighting over who takes the next one and then the "little sister" as in me , getting the priority......oh I miss home!

My Beautiful daughter......oh the purity of that smile.