Chronicle of my life, times, this n that

Been a few days  since he turned 15 months old, I do not usually do monthly posts and just pen down things about him as and when I feel like. Though I did quarterly updates in his first year.

Little V’s very social nature is at its best these days. We have been having many visitors at home, and they’ve spent certainly more than a week with us and all have been welcomed by him with such warmth. He treats them with all his antics – breaking into impromptu dances and doing all sorts of cute actions and gestures to floor them.  I think he loves all the attention and loves it when people go awwwwww and clap for him.

Now Little V has a sharp memory. I know most kids do, but I certainly feel he’s special. When Little V was about 9 months old, his dad went on a business trip and was away for 3 weeks. When little V saw him at the end of those 3 weeks, he had just remembered him completely and didn’t take even 2 seconds to recognise him. My sis-in-law used to visit us once a week, but many many months ago she could only manage once in 3-4 weeks and that must have happened while he was 6-8 months old and never once did he not recognise her.

He loves music and will break into a jig on his favorite numbers – currently being dil bole hadippa, dance pe chance marle. Some of his favorites he can recognise on the car radio, radio at home and of course on tv, even if it plays in the background of some program. He can remember the beats and the tune and will come running to the tv room to spot the song, if he hears it in the house.

Little V, can say a lot of words now chu(for susu), po (for potty), papa, mumma, teddy, di, bua, bye, jai, shaiki(for cycle), motah(for motorcycle), car, fa (for fan) , tee(for tv), baar(for bahar), maa(for water) and gol. I have taught him this cute action where in when I ask him ‘fan kaise chalta hai’ and he goes ‘gol gol gol’ and moves his finger in a circular motion, its really really cute!

Little V walks now and on soft surfaces like grass he will almost run! and I am so scared sometimes that he might fall and well he’s had some bad falls too, but I guess thats all a part of his learning now.

Little V has become so very protective of his mommy, he wouldn’t let anyone come close to me! The maid is not allowed to oil my hair. Hubby is not allowed to help me wear a saree or tie me neckpieces, forget holding hands etc. This weekend I took him to my tailor and he wouldn’t let the tailor take my measurements. If me and hubby happen to be a bit close to each other, Little V breaks into a cry until we are away from each other or else if we ignore his cries for even a bit, he just turns his back at us and starts going in the opposite direction, sulking and shedding these very big tears and sobbing until I go lift him. I am actually secretly enjoying all this protective behavior and this breaking into a scream when someone touches me and I don’t know how long it lasts.

Little V loves his lego pieces and is very engrossed in joining or disjoining them, initially he would just pick up the container, empty it out and run away. He was gifted this lego by his grandparents when he was less than a year old . Gradually I managed to teach him to understand ‘daalo’ and I would allow him the thrill of emptying all the contents and then say ‘daalo’ and he would put all of them back in. He could do this trick many times a day. Since many weeks now, he’s been making an attempt to join them and doesn’t throw them all out. I have seen him try to join together about 3-4 of them at a time and I am so happy to see him play constructively with these.

Of all the books that he has, he’s memorized them beautifully and knows the contents of the books from its pictures on the cover. And sometimes when he and I go through the books I keep asking him ‘yeh kya’ (whats this) and then he would tell me whatever it is. What this has led to is that any other book Little V lays his hands on or any object that he sees at home – he comes to me and asks ‘ye ka’ and I am so glad to see his curious spirit. And he’s satisfied by what I name it and gives a brief sigh!

Little V’s dad is again away for a few weeks on work and we have been video chatting over skype, and whenever little V sees his dad, he has an expression of deep surprise on his face, it seems he cant reconcile as to how his dad is appearing on a computer screen and talking from it. Its appears to be very unbelievable to him! and he follows daddy’s directions when dad says, ball leke aao, or something but he appears to be very confused.

Now little V’s dad has a habit of doing these official calls from home. And of course I have some of my own phone time at home. The result is that Little V now picks up our handsets or anything that looks like a cellphone(could be a tv remote) and puts it to his ear and has these very long conversations on the phone, with lots of gesticulations and talks very very animatedly, it’s hilarious. And this conversation goes on and on and he walks around the house with the phone next to his ear. It never tires him! and it’s all gibberish! only yesterday I heard him say ‘ya ya’ to a tv remote on his ear Once he actually lifted a landline (which was removed from its port) and was walking around in the house having a conversation while dragging the instrument along with him!

 These are such lovely moments of his growing up and he’s becoming this adorable little boy now!

–Little V is so fascinated by toy cars these days. It is clearly his favorite toy and favorite activity to crawl around with them. Pushing them along and then running after them on his four. Every morning when he wakes up the first thing he says is ‘cah’ ..mama ‘cah’ ..’cah’ kha? which means car kahan? I say you can make him play with just one toy car all day and not give him anything else to play with and you will have a happy child!

–’Ba’ which means ball. Balls of all colors, shapes and sizes. And he has also learnt how to throw a tantrum to make us buy him one at any toy shop he can spot when we are out.

–’kaiki’ which means cycle or his tricycle. Loves to ride on it anytime of the time. Will even push it around for ya, the only pity is, the cycle isn’t capable of holding anyone’s weight except his own.

Son, you turn a year old today. From what the baby centre website described you as a poppy seed you are now, as your daddy calls you, with much pride, our baby elephant. For months I carried you in my womb and careful of what was going on in me, and I remember your tiny fingers and toes I counted in the ultrasound room and your body parts I scrolled over on the screen and how your dad sat through for hours glaring at your ultrasound photos, wondering who it was and what our baby looked like. Your each kick, each twirl on the ultrasound made my heart skip a beat and made me marvel at what I was creating. On your birth son, a mother was born in me. I never knew what motherhood was, until I had you. I never knew the kind of joy, that special feeling that you have now brought to my life, to each of my days. The feeling of having given birth, of creating life, realization of the fact that you came from me. I never knew so much happiness could emanate from someone so small :) . In this first year my life revolved around you. We became parents and we reveled in all the responsibility and the joy it brought us. Every new thing you did thrilled us. When you smiled, we felt so touched with its purity. When you recognized us, we felt rewarded. When you rolled over we celebrated. When you ate solids we gasped and felt overjoyed. When you crawled we marveled.

In our lives we do so many things unconscious of the fact that all along we are making memories, for ourselves or for someone else. Like they say, every day looks the same and yet after some days everything is different. With you every day is a new day and so much is different and every moment is a memory we create. Son, as I see you grow and do new things, I can see how I am creating memories for life for myself. Of this new person I created and of this new person you made me into. I never felt about time being so effervescent. Of how fast this baby is growing up. Sometimes I feel like pausing the moments and replaying and reliving them!

That little person you are son, you are just so perfect. That innocence in your eyes. Your affectionate ways. Your faith in us. Your lavish smiles. Your coolness factor! It makes us wonder about your genetic influence! You are the best of both of us and even more. Our world seems to wrap around you and we are so excited to see you grow up and do new things every day. You do not stop to amaze us.

Son, we love you. May you always find happiness and success in all that you do. And may God always bless you!

We have planned a birthday party for you and we hope to give you a rocking time!

Love and blessings, Mum

in the middle of June my baby will be a year old. Gasp! and I will be a mother of a one year old. I don’t seem to swallow that yet.  Time flies by so quickly. And now I really want to hold on to this baby of mine.

About 15 days ago, Little V started to crawl. We were thrilled to see him crawl on his four. Shaking that little bum of his and going over all the place. Opening drawers, exploring door stoppers and enjoying being on the hard surface. I guess my baby is a little late to crawl. But I decided never to push him to crawl or worry about it. Every child has his own development scale and they all do things at their own pace. We must never push them. But of course they must have enough opportunity and exposure to take that initiative themselves and we must try not to sweat over it.  He’s all over the place these days. At first, no matter where we left him in the room he would crawl upto me like a  battery operated toy that always returns to the same destination, no matter where you left it. To say the least, it was flattering. He kept coming back to mamma for no particular reason

Little V also recently started to sway to some of our own favorite music. When one of our most heard music is on tv, he pauses for a minute from his play to look up to the tv screen and starts to sway to that music. Have you ever seen a 10.5month old sway to bollywood music like ‘massakali’ or ‘kabhi kabhi aditi’, its particularly delightful! Otherwise, he is not particularly fond of the tv and doesn’t watch continously for more than 5 minutes at a go, hence we have the liberty to watch sometimes at a stretch. Usually we hardly switch on tv when we are at home. Sometimes, the entire working week goes by without us even switching it on. Weekends too we settle for some pre decided tv watching which comprises of mostly news and current affairs or music related shows that we are already aware of.  These days Little V’s items of greatest interest are steel utensils of all shapes and sorts, his books and opening and closing cupboards. Steel utensils I think because of the different kind of sounds they can make when banged on different surfaces. With steel utensils he is also practising to use them the way we use them.

These days when I go to pick him up from his daycare, he leaves everything and crawls upto to me in no time and then explains his day’s happenings in his baby language – aaaee, ooo, taaa, itaaaa, ayyyy, aaata, naaah. He also points his fingers at random objects while saying all this. It almost feels like a conversation I am having with him and I am mostly nodding and making sentences about the things he points to. On our way back to home, I think he misses dad badly and keeps saying papapapapa all the time.

He’s also making effort to speak. He says the following words clearly and also knows what they mean – mamma, papa, dede, naeee(for no) and flabur(for flower) and tedi (for teddy) and says bye(instead of waving) to visitors when they leave. He also says kyahe (as in ‘kya hai’ meaning ‘what is it’), but he doesn’t know what kya hai means. And by the way he knows and remembers exactly where the plants and flowers are in the house and points to them from anywhere with ease. Oh little baby, we love you so much

..with lots of baby poop. If poopy tales make you uneasy, quit reading right now.

I was going about my usual umpteen morning tasks of getting ready, sterilizing baby bottles, preparing baby food, and getting baby clothes organised, besides getting the breakfast and lunch packed and ready for me and hubbie. ( I am trying not to start off on my rant with all this..). There was a time when Little V would wake up with the two of us and mornings meant doing all of the above and also keeping him occupied. Then there was a phase when Little V slept through most of our morning rush and we would wake him up just 15 minutes before we had to leave, get him ready and then finally leave for work. Since the past few days, little V has backtracked, he chooses to wake up the moment I am out of the bed and won’t go back to sleep. He would then need one of us by his side, to keep him entertained, so the two of us take turns in getting ready. This morning, I was just out of shower and wore one of my favorite clothes for work. Andd…while I was getting ready, I saw bits of poop sprouting out from the back of little V’s diaper. Greeny, squishy poop. I was combing my hair and thinking of what perfume to wear. And then I saw, little V fall backwards and splish splash a bit of poop on the bed, I couldn’t have stopped him with that bottle of perfume in my hand. And suddenly, Little V does his twist and turn on the bed and gets the poop lying on the bed on his tshirt near his right shoulder.  Meanwhile hubbie walked out of the bathroom, smelling all fresh and clean and hair all fresh and spiky.  I donned a nightie over my officewear (thats my tip for messy poop situations which have a knack of arriving the moment I am dressed in something nice) and you could mistake me for a doc at an operation. And an operation it was, poop cleaning operation! Hubbie and I got down to the task. The poop on Little V’s shirt fell to hubbie’s clothes and since hubbie was the one who carried Little V to the basin, his fingers looked like he had dipped them in mustard sauce.  I got down to the task of cleaning the baby, and there was bits of poop all over the white basin and just everywhere. I decided to give Little V a bath which he really enjoys now. At the end of it, I had a fresh bedcover, neatly laid out and a  baby smelling so yummy, wearing a white tshirt and white pyjamas, giving him the perfect baby look and while I was combing his hair, I had forgotten all about office. And right now I can smell something…mustardy…about…my perfume..sssssshhhhhhhhh!

( I knew you wont resist reading the entire post, now don’t blame me for it, I warned you!)

…little V would have spent exactly the same number of days out of the womb as he spent inside. I was thinking of doing a 9 month post after 2-3 days, and suddenly this bit of mathematics struck me. This calculation is based on the date the gynae would consider as the first day of your pregnancy rather than the date of conception. Mommies out there will know of this!

I can’t begin to describe how I am feeling. Before I even start off on my melancholic trip, I’ll end the post here and chuck it to do a 9 month update post soon!