High Chair Musical

You may know that Amiya is, like many wee ones her age, 99% obsessed with the movie "High School Musical." Kev presents the adapted version "High Chair Musical" for the toddler crowd. All theatrics performed by Kev himself.

*Please note that the stills are in the order that they are actually occur in during the production.

I want that. I need that. Tears. Tears work a lot.

A bit stunned. That didn't work. Quick. Need new plan.

That's right. Kickin' it up a notch.
Bring it down a bit, maybe I overplayed that last one.
Nope, back up to full force.

Shit. She's not even paying attention.

I'm outta tears. Let me see if I can squeeze one out.

I give up. I've met my match.

How cute is this?

He's TWO!

When did that happen? How did that happen?

Vinay and I were just talking about the 8 pound bundle of sweetness that used to grunt everytime we turned off the lights at bedtime and how all of a sudden he's a 24 pound bundle of energy who hogs the bed and chatters all the time.

We had Kev's birthday party yesterday and it was a great day! Thank you to everyone who called to wish him a happy day - he doesn't necessarily know you called, but he knows he's loved and that makes him smile.

Kev's party was a circus theme because he's all into animals lately - especially elephants - and because, frankly, all these kids over for a party makes for a bit of a circus atmosphere. And so it was.

Amiya and her friend Aubrey colored clown faces, Amiya made a poster, we ordered all sorts of circus-y things for goody bags, etc.

We had planned to have it outside, but the weather made it impossible. So we set-up inside. Rainbow stripes and polka dots everywhere. In a stroke of crazy luck, we found mini corn-dogs at the store and how easy are those and tator tots for two year olds? Fabulous!

Not so fabulous? Camera batteries dying during the festivities! So thank you to my friends Sue and Steph for the pictures!

Because I know my Mom will want to see it, I'll include one picture of the "set up." Lots of popcorn boxes and balloons everywhere, along with foods set up to look like rainbows (strawberries, mandarin oranges, bananas, grapes, blueberries, etc.)


The excitement was too much for Kev:

This is his standard response when a situation is too much for him. He lays down and stays down until someone rescues him with a hug to distract him from the chaos. He did this many, many times during the party - it was just too exciting!

We had a bubble show at the party and Kev wasn't sure what to make of it. It was worthy of many lay-down moments for Kev. He's (sort of) smiling here because everyone was telling him to, but you can see he isn't really sure he wants to be bubbled.

Much better. It's cool to be bubbled!

The big sister, on the other hand, loved being bubbled! She's been having some jealousy issues this weekend with all the attention and toys Kev has gotten, but she's trying hard to deal with it.
She's alternately extremely loving with Kev and extremely annoyed when he won't share a new toy.

After bubbles we had cake - the kids were in love with this table. Sugar, sugar and more sugar. If you notice in the background - it was pouring. 15 kids + parents = mayhem. But, we've got a good group of friends and the house wasn't too terrible when all was said and done.

Here's a close up of the cake. Everything is edible except the wood sticks and the twine that the flags are flying on. I am really proud of this one - it took a long time, but I planned it out and worked ahead on things that I could. The design is based on another CakeCentral cake, so I can't take credit for that. Maybe the best part is that Kev and Amiya really, really loved it. Amiya kept asking to look at it in the fridge and Kev kept running to it during the party to point out the elephant, lion and seal.

Some of the little clowns. Probably as many are missing. This was the end of the party when we pushed them out the door hopped up on sugar. Mwa ha ha ha ha.

The day after. In a new shirt and laying in and on new toys! What a birthday!

And what a boy. Vinay remarks all the time that Kev really completes our family and it's so true. He's the quiet to Amiya's crazy. He's the adventurous to Amiya's trepidation. And as much as he's the yin to her yang, he's also just Kev. A tyke of his own. And we couldn't love him any more than we already do.

Happy Birthday Monkey!!!

Picassos and Pirates

It's a good day today in Florida. I'm jinxing myself, probably, but it's been nice! The weather is sunshine and 60 degrees - we rarely ever get cool and sunny, so I'm soaking it up!

Kev had a playdate at a friend's house this morning and Amiya and I picked up a bit for the cleaning lady who is here now doing a deep clean. It's an occasional splurge that makes me smile! Expensive salon highlights, nope not on our budget. Cleaning lady every few months - heck yeah!

The kids played on the lanai for a while, each one painting on one side of the easel.

Amiya is (finally) getting to a stage where she will take her time with an art project. Before it used to be all mishmash with no plan, no goal. Now she is starting to color/paint/draw objects that look like what she had intended. It's been a real struggle to get her to color within the lines or to care about how certain things look. Her homework, for example, she colors a whole page red - solid red - sky, Abraham Lincoln, horse, train, you name it. All red. It used to make me crazy because I wanted her to color neatly, but I bit my tongue and let her do her own thing - it's her project, not mine. But, we've been drawing the line at homework. That has to be done according to the directions. So, it seems that we've hit on a good set of parameters for Amiya. She knows she's free to do what she wants when it's her own thing, but when it is destined to turned in, she had best do it well!

This cake (and cupcakes below) are for a little boy's second birthday tomorrow. The cake is Italian Cream with Italian Meringue Buttercream flavored with cream cheese. It's supposed to be rough iced so it was especially nice to not have to get it smoooooooooooth. The topper is made of polymer clay, hence the layer of saran between the cake and the topper. Once the cake reaches its' destination, the Mom will sprinkle "sand" on the saran to hide it and pop a couple of shark fins into the water surrounding the island.

The cupcakes were butter cake with caramel Italian Meringue and toffee bits. I got the inspiration from cupcakes at Cake Central, so I take no credit for the design. The faces are fondant. I love them - I think they look just like a little kid would draw a pirate. But I never. ever. ever. want to do them again. Ever.

Ever.

Ever.

Animal Kingdom

We threw the kids in the car last Saturday and told Amiya we were going to run errands - specifically to the "fruit stand." Here's how they looked:
That's right. If Didi's wearing a hat, then Kev has to, too. Never mind that it's pink with embroidered flowers on it. (And please don't tell him I told you, but I think he secretly likes his pink Dora diapers with little flowers better than his manly blue Diego ones.)

Back to the fruit stand. Right. The fruit stand is a farm market kind of place with really fresh produce and really good prices. Our real intent was to head out to Disney, but we thought she'd figure it out when we cruised by the fruit stand exit. But she didn't. And she didn't get it when we rolled into Orlando past the big Mickey Mouse head power grid. But she did get it when we pulled into the gates of Disney. Finally!

We bought 3 Day passes in December. You may remember a post about a magical day with G & G and all of us. Well, 1 day down, 2 to go. We decided we'd better end with another day at Magic Kingdom, so if we were going to do Animal Kingdom, today was the day.

It was a lot of fun - a bit zoo, a bit amusement park. It's sort of a tough time because Kev is too little for 90% of the ride and Amiya is too little for 50%, but we persevered. While Daddy went on one ride, Mommy read chapters from The Rainbow Fairies: Sunny The Yellow Fairy to Amiya. It was a stroke of brilliance on my part to stash that book into the stroller. It took a good 15 minute chunk out of our wait time and made the whole thing bearable! Kev enjoyed it, too:

Kev did not, however, enjoy the character visits much at all. Here we see the Kev "get me the hell outta here" stance:

Poor Rafiki. He gets no Kev love.

In the Asia part of Animal Kingdom there is a fairly extensive area designed to look like India. Vinay and I both thought it looked pretty authentic (in that very squeaky clean Disney sort of way). Amiya offered no opinions until we spotted the above sign. Then it was very "cool." I was instantly reminded that while she may lament never being able to find "Amiya" on a bike license plate or a pack of pencils in the store, she only hast to go to India to see her name plastered here, there and everywhere!

Best of all on the trip were two rides - a train ride and a safari jeep ride - that involved close quarters and lots of cuddling. As much as we enjoyed our trip to Magic Kingdom with G & G, it was nice to be four and spend a day just being the little family that we are.

Teagan's Baptism

Our neighbor is being baptized tomorrow (Lutheran) and I exchanged my cake "services" for free hair highlights. Being a Mom-at-home means that while it's fun and nice to have the perks, $90 on highlights every month isn't a really good use of our money. So, I jumped at the offer to make a cake and get a cute highlight job in exchange!

The bottom tier is banana cake (not bread) with caramel Italian Meringue Buttercream (IMBC). The top tier is triple chocolate with Oreo IMBC. If you've never had IMBC, you're missing out. It's better than just about anything else you could ever put into your mouth.

The design of the cake is based on the invitation. I ((heart)) it very much. My fondant was a bit wonky (probably because I haven't done anything with fondant in months), but the outcome pleased me nonetheless. Everything is handpainted, including sleeping baby Teagan on the top of the cake.


But enough about cake, let's get back to that church thing.

Amiya is dying to go to church. One of her friends talks to her about church with some regularity and that's fine. At some point our little chica is going to have to decide what she believes (if anything) and it might just turn out that she goes for the most conservative religion out there. As long as she's an inherently good person, acting out of respect and care, not dogma, whatever floats her boat works for us.

However, explaining all of this to an almost five year old is much harder. It's hard to imagine answering her questions in a way that isn't tempered with my own feelings toward organized religion. So, I'm reading this book: Parenting Beyond Belief. It's an interesting book about how it's possible to raise children without religion. (Jacki - if you're reading here and you'd like a copy, lemme know and I'll send it to you when I'm done.)

I've also done a bit of reading to see what would be acceptable to me (because I'm still Christy, not just Mommy), should Amiya decide that she would like to be involved in some spiritual community. I took a little quiz here: BeliefNet.com Quiz-O-Matic to see where my thoughts lay and how they line up with some organized community. I am, it would seem, 100% Unitarian Universalist, followed by Liberal Quakers and a type of Judaism that I can't recall. My lowest percentage of agreement lay with (brace yourself Mom!) Roman Catholics. Only 14%. So, in the event that she wants to explore more, hopefully we'll have some idea of where to start!

Clownin' Around

So, little man turns two next Saturday. He's having a circus birthday party because he's too little to have an opinion and even if he does the child only speaks ancient Romanian and we don't know what he's saying. So, circus it is.

I'm having a blast with this party. I think birthday parties for little kids are really for Moms to plan and get some of our creative juices out. The cake is going to be fabulous (I hope), the goody bags have been in the works for a while and while not all that creative, there's some good stuff inside and, there's a bubble show where they will actually put Kev in a bubble*. But, I think these are my favorite so far:



I made eighteen clown magnets - each unique. Some are bedecked with hats, some not, some with mop top curly heads and others just a bit of fuzz above the ears. Each is smiling without scary clown make-up. Amiya likes the guy with the blue bowler hat the best - I think I like the little guy with orange tufts over his ears and one lone orange curl on top of his head.

Anyway, I'm not sure I'm getting rid of a single one. Those goody bags are already full of fun stuff - don't you think eighteen clown magnets should stay on my fridge?


*Sadly bubble is only temporary and Kev will be back to his usual mischief within a few short moments.

What's with this shit?

I am, I think, a somewhat easy going Mom about the gross parts of parenting.

• I've cleaned more feces off walls than the zookeeper on chimp duty.
• I've been puked on enough times that I can break the smell of vomit down into categories: dairy, meat, fruit or veggie. I can tell if that puke is violent cough induced or if it's stomach bug sick.
• I've pulled little fingers out of noses, replete with gooey green things and found the nearest disposable paper to wipe them on. I've watched my "girly-girl" four year old pop a booger in her mouth and tell me it's good.

And yet, I think Kev may have bested me.

Three times in as many days he has shat his diaper. Fine. That's what he does, I'm ok with it. I would happily clean it up. But no, he somehow manages to dislodge his diaper so that it's hanging between his knees while his pants are still up. Therefore, the insides of his thighs become coated in crap, the insides of his pants become coated in crap, pulling his shin/foot out of the pants/diaper/crap ensemble creates more skin covered in crap.

There aren't enough wipes in the world to get him clean before he starts clamoring on me (and we wonder why Mommy has so many shirts in the wash each week?) to get a book, a ball or whatever isn't decorated with body art.

It used to be that Kev would cease all movement and grunt audibly when he pooped. I think I need to feed him more cheese because now it's no big deal - I have no clue when he poops and he somehow pulled off today's surprise while no more than 5 feet from me since waking up.

So anyway, good times. This'll be my second shower in 2 hours because I have the unmistakeable stench about me. And while I may be ok with vomit, poop, boogers in regards to my kids, I'd rather not people wonder if I've messed my own pants.

Brownies, anyone?

Seriously.

I'm not sure if you can really make out the fact that he climbed his little self into the tub while Amiya was taking a bath and he was still diapered and dressed.

I let him out of his high chair and he went straight for the bathtub where his Didi was. I took the scenic route through the kitchen (.478 feet longer than his route) to throw the washcloth into the sink. That .478 foot difference meant one very, very full diaper, one saturated shirt and two children, giggling at the look of resignation on their adoring Mommy's face.

February Things To Do

Freshly back from a weekend away with a handful of friends, I caught up on my favorite blogs and saw this great list of projects that a friend wants to complete in February. It was such a positive list of creative endeavors that I decided to do the same. So, Kev and I sat down to color this morning after dropping Amiya at school and I made my list. And then I decided, since it's going to be hanging on the fridge for the next 25 days, it may as well look good! Here it is, in all it's glory:

Happily, it doesn't include the daily grind - laundry, dishes, cleaning (say what?!?), etc. And that right there is the point! Those things still have to get done, but I'm hoping the happy gesture of coloring a page of projects and seeing them accomplished will keep a very busy month from getting overwhelming!

And speaking of projects, if you look closely you'll see that I've listed "sew an apron." I'm a bit in love with aprons lately and I sewed this little one for a friend's daughter. The fabrics of the apron (floral and green stripe) are absolutely precious together, but I think her little self makes it even more perfect!

Is she not the cutest thing ever?

Four and five/sixths

If you ask her how old she is, that's what she says.

"Four and five sixths."

And yet, this is how she sleeps.

Bristling by day at the slightest hint of being anything but a big girl, she tells us she's only a couple of days away from being a teenager. Talk of college and marriage and houses and all that, yet at night, she curls up tight with Kelly and Elly and we go right back to early days.

Na! Na!

Kev isn't talking a whole lot yet and he doesn't really need to because he's got a sister who talks non-stop and for him. He does, however, know how to communicate that he wants food.

"Na! Na!" means Snack! Snack!

"Eee! Eee!" means Eat! Eat!

Today while I was preparing dinner, Kev was feeling the pangs of hunger and started to help himself to a snack:

Cannelini beans, navy beans, chocolate chunk granola bars and uncooked old-fashioned oats with a chaser of canola oil.

Mmmmmmmmmm.

Ears Lowered, Big Boy Style

Kev got a haircut today as he was starting to look a little scruffy around the edges. I told the "stylist" to take an inch off all over. She took at least 2. She also whipped out the buzzing, electric clippers before I could say, "Whoa!" Kev took it like a champ, but I'm still simpering. We won't be visiting Carmen again, she took my baby and made him look like a school age (dorky) kid.

Amiya doesn't like it like this. Mommy doesn't care for it much either. It's all straight and serious and bleh.

This is better, but still sort of severe. Grow hair, grow!

India! India! India!

The theme of the month at Amiya's school is Asia and Friday of this week was specifically about India! Amiya was marginally healthy enough to go to school - her nose was still letting off flourescent green stuff (see picture of Kev's bed for accurate color sampling) and she still had a pretty big cough, however, she was on antibiotics and frankly, it's not often that this part of Amiya's heritage is going to be celebrated and focused on, so she could have had tuberculosis and I still would have sent her. (Ok, not really, but it would have been a moral debate before I decided which way to go.)

Amiya's teacher had asked me to come in and help the kids cook something Indian, so we decided on samosas. Easy enough to make in school as long as everything was prepped. The kids were icked out by them, until they tasted them. Then it was looooooove. (And frankly, why not? Deep fried potatoes in a crispy shell? Spiced ground beef (more on that later) in a crispy shell? It's like a deep fried Happy Meal!)

We made both aloo mattar samosas (the favorite!) and spiced beef samosas. Amiya's teacher is of Pakistani descent, so she suggested beef for the kids who wouldn't try the potatoes. I know beef samosas aren't authentically Indian, but hey, it's all about Pakistani-Indian cooperation!


We used wonton skins (I know, not authentic!) and stuffed them and then fried them in a portable fryer. Amiya and I also brought in kheer and fresh mango for the kids to try. It was all a big hit!

My favorite part of the day was seeing "Mr. Vinay" talk with the kids. He was very good at containing 10 free spirited 4/5 year olds. He taught them to count to 3, say hello and goodbye (Namaste! for both - it's a 2 for 1 word!) and even showed them some Hindi words on the board. The kids were most excited about the word for cow - guy! They think it's great that you can yell, "There's a guy!" and what you're really saying is "There's a cow!" Vinay also told them about how people in India take baths - this topic is of endless fascination to Amiya - I suspect she imagines a lot more splashing and sploshing of water - but it wasn't so exciting for the kids!
The night before "India Day" was Step into Asia at school. Each classroom was assigned a country and that teacher developed a craft for the kids to do or cooked a recipe from that country. Amiya's room was Pakistan, so the teacher asked me if I would help her do mehndi on the children's hands. We decided to do first initials only and it was a big hit! Her teacher said that the kids were very excited to show off their "henna tattoos" the next day at school!

Big Boy Bed!

Because of Kev's propensity to climb tall things, we've moved from crib to a "big boy bed." It's really just the top bunk of Amiya's old bunk, sans legs, painted bright green. He's in lurv!

To be fair, he has always loved this bed. When it was not painted lime green and in Amiya's room, he still made a beeline for it whenever he could. He likes to sit on it, he loves to read on it and it seems that he even marginally enjoys knocking his lips against the wood when he misjudges distances whilst maneuvering in and out.

Yesterday's nap, marginally successful. He came out three times, but did fall asleep.

Yesterday bedtime, hugely successful. Right to sleep until 7 AM when he woke up and came toddling out with Elmo.

Today's nap, no more putting up with "getting used to it." He got out once and straight into the crib he went. We're hoping he'll learn that if he gets out of bed, he'll have to go to his crib and that'll be the end of that.

What's that you say? Naive? Who us?

But of course.

Why didn't I think of this? Such a practical arrangement of chairs in the kitchen. We can all eat and share germs at the same time. Genius. Something so practical yet so simple, only an (almost) two year old could come up with it.

Over.

And over.

And over again.

Yum.

That's right Folks. This is how the day is beginning.

He toddles about in the playroom, bringing me plastic animals to see or raw rawing at Baby Jaguar, acting as if nothing is amiss. And then I turn a corner and see snot tusks dangling from his nose. He could care less. They get in his way and he licks at them. He would prefer snot accessories to getting his nose wiped, so he runs when he sees me coming with tissue in hand. And then it comes to this stage.

Oh, Kev.

Delusional

Amiya is standing next to me as we speak telling me about how she's such a good helper.

"I help you by playing wiff Kev. Then you can do over stuff. Like cleaning. You love cleaning Mom."

I wonder when it dawned on me that my Mom cleaned all the time not out of a love of cleaning but because if she didn't the chaos would consume all of us. She is and was better at staying on top of things than I am, no doubt, but it would seem we both convey an utter love of cleaning to our children who don't get it at all.

What the h#($?

The Gupta Family Soundtrack

(For maximum effect, please make the sounds, do not read the words.)

Blegh, urp, cough, cough.

Sniffle, snort, urp.

Cough, sniffle, bwah, wah!

Mommy, urp, help!

Cough, snort, snifflesniffle.

Cough, snort, snifflesniffle.

Sniffle, urp, cough, urp!
Tissue, please. Now!
Cough, snort, urp, sniffle.

Blegh, green, wah, Mommy!

Cough, snort, snifflesniffle.
Cough, snort, snifflesniffle.

So we've gone from gimp/limp little Man and almost-meningitised little girl to two kids with runny noses and shallow coughs. Seriously.

Someone please find the bread-winner in this family a job in a very, very cold climate because Florida doesn't get cold, there's mold and germs and all that stuff all year long and I'm going to start pulling my eyelashes out one by one if someone, somewhere doesn't help us have just one week with zero co-pays, zero Tylenol, zero inhalers, zero Vicks and zero runs to the store for yet more kleenex. Kev is almost high right now because of the Vicks (infant formula, tyvm) rubbed onto his chest and Amiya's poor nose is chapping from kleenex use and we use the super soft, extra delicate, fluff from Angel's wings sort of kind.

Short of giving them vitamin C intraveinously and keeping them in a bubble, I'm not sure what to do!

I heard there's a house for sale on a lake in Wisconsin? There's going to be a newly remodeled kitchen and everything. If only V could telecommute to his job from Minocqua!

Nothing slows him down....

So he's still hobblin' about a bit, but you'd never know it by the pace at which he moves. The kid just doesn't ever sloooooooooow down.

Here we see him pretending to be an elephant with an empty paper towel tube. He is in love with the animal sounds that he knows how to make and random growls, howls and moos are emitted from the back seat of the car as we make our way around town. He'll roar and we'll say, "There's a lion in the car? Thank goodness there aren't any monkeys in the car." And then we hear "aaah aaah oooh oooh." And so it goes, on and on. It's absolutely fun and great to be able to play with Kev this way.

One of Kev's favorite Christmas presents is his Aquadoodle. That is, please be aware, only if it's on an elevated surface upon which Kev can also be elevated. It must be on our coffee table (above) or the train table in the playroom. Kev must be able to sprawl out on his tummy and doodle to his heart's content.

Strike!

Amiya went bowling for the first time this weekend at a classmate's birthday party. She was very, very interested in the whole thing until it wsa actually time to bowl. "The ball is so heavy, Mom." "Can you do it
Mom?" "But I just went." "But it's so slow." And that last complaint is fair, it took her ball an average of 3 minutes 36 seconds to get from top of ramp to first pin down the lane.

It was far more fun to play ring around the rosy on the slippery floor with the other girls from school. And eat pizza. And chicken fingers. And quesadillas. (That's a week's worth of junk food in our house!)

All that being said, she still somehow managed to aim the ramp just right and get that ball going fast enough to create enough commotion and get her first ever strike! If you look closely at the screen below, her row is above the row in red - you can just make out the X for the strike.

We're going private again!

Like the new look?

Want to keep reading?

Drop me a comment in the comment box or send me an email - we've decided to go private again, so if you want to be included in the list of "allowed readers" let us know! We'll set the private control again next weekend.

C & V

Running On Empty

Wednesday 2:28 PM

Upon picking Amiya up from school, I am told by her (fabulous) teacher that she isn't feeling well. She had been putting her head down between tasks, asking to go lay down somewhere, generally acting lethargic. Bizarre behavior for Amiya. I am concerned.

Wednesday 2:34 PM

Amiya steps up in to mini-van after walking from classroom to car. Turns. Hugs Mom while crying. Something is definitely not right.

Wednesday 2:36 PM

Amiya retrieves water bottle from lunch box to drink on the way home. I notice everything healthy was eaten, two chocolate chip cookies were left. Further proof that the world has stopped turning.

Wednesday 2:39 PM

Amiya falls asleep on the way home from school. This is unheard of. Has.never.happened.before. Ever.

Wednesday 6:45 PM

Amiya goes to bed with nary a complaint. In our bed. No problem. Temperature at bedtime (several hours after administering drug) 102.

Thursday 3:45 AM

Amiya's temperature through the roof (based on scientifically accurate Mommy's lips on forehead). More drugs.

Thursday 11 AM

All is well. There is nothing that High School Musical can't fix.

Thursday 1:30 PM

Amiya enjoys leisurely bath meant to keep her temperature and body comfortable. Mommy cleaning Kev's room. Kev in crib demonstrates over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over (literally) that he can climb up onto his crib railing. He puts both feet over and hangs his little bottom down, gripping the side with his hands. At this point he doesn't know what to do. Mommy grabs him and puts him back in crib. Up he goes again. Shit.

Thursday 3:45 PM

Temperature back up to 103. Complaining of neck pains. Mommy frantic.

Thursday 6:00 PM

At after hours, not-our-usual pediatrician thinks Mommy is a nut. Viral infection is confirmed. UTI, flu, strep and meningitis ruled out. No new drugs prescribed.

Friday 11:00 AM

Amiya pale while walking 100 yards in mall. Hangs on admirably - we were going to buy her a game, after all!

Friday 4:45 PM

While attempting to keep Kev away from Amiya by playing with him in the playroom, Mommy mounted the gate onto the wall. Kev climbs gate. Gate falls on Kev. Kev screaming in pain, holding his foot.

Friday 4:50 PM

Kev tries to walk. Cannot. Instead sits, scoots on butt like lame puppy.

Friday 4:51 PM

Mommy wilting, says words she shouldn't.

Friday 5:27 PM

Daddy meets the rest of the family at Urgent Care. Kev limping. X-rays. Nothing. Just a sprain.

Friday 6:03 PM

Mommy breathes humongous sigh of relief as Kev + cast = disaster

Saturday 6:30 AM

Mommy woken up with Amiya via tickling of toes. Kev handed to Mommy so Daddy could make mad dash to get garbage out.

Mommy skipping rejuvenating, much needed walk with 3 Day friends to help out around the house. Cranky Amiya, hobbly Kev = too much for any parent to try alone!

Saturday Morning and Early Afternoon

Gupta family on road to, from and at IKEA. Spent huge amounts of money on a new bed as Kev has learned to climb out of his bed. Trying to avoid face plant into floor.

Saturday 4:16 PM

After playing contentedly in a neighbor's playpen for a few hours (seriously! without so much as a peep!), Kev decides he has had enough. Climbs out. Flippin' face plant into floor.

Saturday 8:26 PM

Snail Trail

I have pictures of ginormous slugs from my first stay in France. There they are called les limasses (lay lee-mahs) and that's about it - no one notices them. They are the wallflower first cousin to the coveted escargot. I, however, was fascinated by them. So big - one would stretch from the tip of my index finger to the base of my hand. Not that I ever touched one, but just to give you the idea. I couldn't imagine such a big creature pulling itself across a paved road - did it not have nerves on its' underside? Did it not get scratched? I digress, but to show my point - I really spent a fair amount of time thinking about these slugs. Maybe it was homesickness in the first few months when I couldn't understand or be understood. Maybe it's just that I'm weird. Can't say - I just remember them clearly.

And so I remember the slimy, rubber cement-like trail they leave behind. And when I saw Kev's face during his mid-morning snack while the others were at the football game, I immediately tore around the kitchen trying to find the huge limasse that had left this trail from his nose to his hairline. What I particularly enjoy is that it traveled directly through his eyebrow, plastering those hairs up and all over the little guys temple.



But that is not the only snail trail in our house these past few days. Kev has learned a new trick. It involves the removal of both his pants and his diaper. For the most part, I think it's pretty funny - it's cold in Florida lately and so it's a bit cute to see him with shirt and sweater on and two perfectly formed cheeks peeking from below his sweater. But I did not think it was cute a.t. a.l.l. the first time he pulled this fancy trick. He had pulled off his pants and diaper while sitting on the floor and scooted himself over to show off his new skills. "Scooted himself over" is the important part of that last sentence. Use your imagination.

Snail trails indeed!

Go Badgers!

It seems Wisconsin spirit has invaded our house! My parents, Vinay and a neighbor were planning to head to the Outback Bowl to see the Badgers tromp the Tennesse Vols but the neighbor came down with the flu, so we sent Amiya instead.

Amiya had been begging to see the game ever since we saw the band a few nights ago. We kept telling her no - we didn't have a ticket for her. So, when our neighbor got sick, we decided that Amiya could go, but we wouldn't tell her until she was sitting in the car. She was all hyped up to be wearing red and white, have a big ol' W on her face and then go to the park to play football with me while the grown-ups (love how I'm not a grown-up!!!) were at the game. It was all very anticlimactic when she found out she was actually going - she didn't want to. She said, and I quote, "It'll be more fun at the park."

Anyway, she finally was off and from all accounts she:

1. didn't stop talking for more than 4 consecutive seconds,
2. made up her own cheers when the ones yelled by the crowd didn't adequatly convey her feelings of Badger Pride. Not just, "Go Red!" but "Go R - E - D!"
3. pumped her fist into the air with the best of 'em and
4. in true Bollywood style, sang an emotional tribute to the Wisconsin team.

Amiya and Grandma with matching Ws. They sing a song called "Twin Sisters." Funny, cute and just a little bit weird because clearly, not twins.

The lucky four posing before the game! Go R - E - D!

This man is too sexy for me. I love when he goes all nerdy New Years partygoer on me! Also, please note Amiya with Grandpa's binoculars. Grandpa got to use them for 2 plays in the entire game and then only because Amiya's neck was hurting!

Cheering on her future Alma Mater! Love it!