Happy Birthday Vinay!

It's the month of August and that means it's Vinay's birthday month!

Can I get a whoop whoop?

Normally Vinay shuns all birthday festivities, but we each only turn 40 once and I think it deserves to be celebrated! So, it would seem, does the Rochester Gupta clan as they came to Tampa today for a few days of visiting! We're having a great time, especially the wee-est Guptas who love having a new audience.

And to begin our little stroll down memory lane, I bring you this photo, courtesy of Vinay's niece Rohini who sends it from India. It's the earliest photo that I've ever seen of Vinay and I love it. I'd also love to see him try to sit like this for any length of time again, but I guess loss of flexibility is to be expected when you're as old as he is.

Me Miss Bumpa

"Me miss Bumpa, Ommy. Me miss Bumpa."

That's what I heard the entire length of the drive from USF to our home today. It's not like I was driving from say, Key West to Seattle, but still! It was long enough that I think know that Kev misses Grampa and Grandma (Bumpa in Kevanese).

Amiya and I were trying to see if we could get him distracted and talk him into missing someone else. So, we tried all his old favorites - Mister Cecil, Mister Babu, Brody, Madison, Gabe. He ignored us, repeating his mantra over and over again, "Me miss Bumpa." Until, finally, he got so tocked at us refusing to acknowledge his feelings for the umpteen-millionth time that he hollered at us, "Me miss Bumpa, Ommy!!! Olly Bumpa!" (I miss Grandpa and Grandma!!! Only Grandpa and Grandma!") And he was tocked. And then Amiya and I laughed, wrongly perhaps, but it's hard to take him seriously with his little voice and his little frustration coming out of his little mouth. So cute!

Best Moment of the Day

Yesterday, Amiya came and curled up on my lap while I was doing some housework. She needed me to put her necklace on her so she could continue with her dress-up plans. I told her that I'd have to steal a kiss since she was already on my lap. Instead she gave me a kiss and a big, big cuddle. So sweet. I told her I'd always take her cuddles because someday when she's 13 and a teenage girl she won't want to give Mommy cuddles anymore.

She started crying. Melt my heart. "I don't want to grow up, Mommy, because I want to always want to give you cuddles."

And today, Kev woke up in his room around 6:40 and Vinay went to go get him while I snoozed in bed unaware of all of this. But Kev didn't want Daddy, he wanted Mommy. So he shooed Vinay out of the room, closed his door and went back to rest. Around 7:00 he got tired of waiting for Mommy, so he let himself out of his room and padded into our room. (This is unheard of, he never gets up without someone carrying him out of his room.) He climbed onto our bed, right on over Mommy and woke me up with kisses and "Hi Mommy!" over and over again.

Does it get any better?

So Vinay's going to be mad at me...

...but I'll take it because it's too cute to not put up. For the record, I did NOT put this on him of my own volition, it was at Kev's request. And once it was on, it seemed to be a bit magical and he wouldn't take it off. There were twirls and stomps and dancing all around to make this fabulous, completely synthetic hula skirt flit all about. And, he was proud, beaming, and fabulous.

Yes, Swimming Again

I know, more swimming pictures, but it's really just about all that we do these days. If you look really, really closely you'll see Amiya about to dive into the pool. They're working on dives lately. It took some convincing to get Amiya there - she's a stickler for the rules (except the one about candy before lunch) and didn't want to break the NO DIVING rule tiled every four feet around the perimeter of every single pool she's ever been in.

Here she is with Coach Kelly, getting some suggestions on form. Amiya even got homework last night - practice flutter kicks and the arm movements of the breast stroke while lying on the floor. We totally forgot to do it. Crap. This doesn't bode well for kindergarten!

And here she is, freestyling (formerly known as the crawl) back to the side. She's sporting a swim cap because her long locks are being ruined from the pool despite our best intentions with conditioners, treatments, etc. She has big plans to be Gabriella for Halloween and then shortly thereafter Mommy has big plans to take her to the salon for a cut!

And finally, Gabe and Amiya, together at the end of swimming, age 5:

And Gabe and Amiya after swimming, three years ago, age 2:

Yo, Yoplait

UPDATE: It's high fructose corn syrup. That's what I objected to in this yogurt. Why, please tell me, is there hfcs in yogurt? That's just wrong. Wrong.

So we've kind of been on a yogurt kick around here lately because the kids like it, it's always ready and it's healthy. That being said, it's been the subject of some debate lately. Mommy wanted the Yoplait original kind because it was on sale and I had a coupon (is that an Amen I heard Jacki?). Amiya swore up and down and left and right that she had had Yoplait before and that she hated it. (She had, in fact, had Yoplait before but it was Strawberry Banana and nobody likes Strawberry Banana in our family and it was tepid from the airport food stand. I digress.) So, while she was technically correct, I was willing to use the parental powers of omission and/or selective remembering to persuade her to give the ol' Yoplait another try. She did and it was love at first tentative spoonful. Now she's begging for it, even over the yogurt that some marketing genius (ahem) paired up with mini M&Ms.

And therein lies the clincher. Who knew plain ol' Yoplait was so chock full of crap? I can't recall exactly what it was in there that pretty much ruined it for us, but it seems to me that yogurt should have 3-4 things, tops. Cultured milk, fruit, sugar (if necessary). Throw in some live culture to keep things interesting and we'll be set. I don't want the kids eating aspartame (the most likely offender) or other sweeteners. I'd rather they not have fourteen kinds of gums and thickeners in their morning yogurt, but I'm really not that picky. As long as I know it isn't full of aspartame, Splenda or fake colors, it's a go by me. Take a peak, next time you're in the yogurt area of the grocery store, there aren't all that many yogurts out there that fit the bill. It's not only Yoplait that's got me all up in a lather, it's most of them! 95% of the yogurts on the shelf have something man-made in them and the 5% that don't are not that easy to spot (or pay for!).

So, to the yogurt makers of the world - could you please, please kick Diego off of your chock-full-of-sugar crap yogurt and plaster his face on the all-natural, all-pronouncable-ingredients Stonyfield Farms brand? It'd make grocery shopping a whole lot easier for the Gupta family.

That's all I'm saying.

Good Morning!

This is a week or so old, but so cute and a good indication of what the kids are up to on any giving morning. It seems that the morning can't start without breakfast and then a healthy dose of Caillou and cuddles between siblings. But fear not, shortly after the final words are uttered on Caillou choas and mayhem ensue and our day goes as anticipated.

Ah, Parenthood

Picture 1: Stubbornness

Picture 2: Goofiness

Both skills highly prized in the parenting arsenal, both skills highly in demand these days.

Shiner

We were having a peaceful Sunday morning last weekend - reading the paper, cuddling, clipping coupons, making animal noises, etc. It was all good. Until Kev tripped over his blanket and caught his cheek on the corner of the coffee table. See that red spot? That's the point of contact. See how the bruising is advancing up and over his eye? That's how hard he hit. And this shows about 50% of the bruising, there was still more deep purple to come. Imagine popping open a brand new jar of pickles. That's about how loud it was.

After sleeping on it, we took him to the doctor just to have it checked because the bruising spread so very far from the contact point. The doctor said it was fine and the bruising was mostly from lying down.

So, 8 days out, it's almost all back to normal, although he'll have a skin discoloration at the contact point until he loses his summer tan.

What number shiner are we on with this kid? Unreal.

It's a Zoo Here

So, Michael's craft store carries a wide variety of plastic animals that range in price from $2.99 - $6.99. We have almost all of them, it seems. We're forever stepping over humpback whales to get to the laundry room and the frogs seem to be guarding the line where the tile meets the wood in our foyer. Whatever. The animals provide endless hours of amusement for Kev, we can deal with the nuances of living like the Dolittles.

Until the hippo joined our happy herd.

Last week, we got a hippo. It was love at first sight for Kev. The hippo had to be his. And now, Hippo will not leave his side. Witness:

Feeding Hippo in a lake provided by the vacuum cord.*

Feeding Hippo and others later the same day.

Hippo dining with the tykes at lunch the next day.

Hippo at breakfast the next morning.

Hippo at dinner that night.

Hippo and others eating (again) that night.

Hippo impatiently waiting for breakfast the next morning.

Hippo being forced from the pond by the "Mommy Elephant".

And, as if that weren't enough:

• Mommy had to cuddle both Kev and Hippo through the Space Chimp movie we saw last week.
• Kev is currently distraught as he thinks Daddy threw Hippo away for not listening (Kev, not Hippo).
• Hippo has had several baths, due to getting sticky at breakfast but also because its' guardian (Kev) has decided it is messy.

So yeah, once again, two is a good number for us. Because really, if we had another and it had a special attachment to a toy, I'd be screwed when wanting to leave the house. Between Amiya and Kelly and now Kev and Hippo, my hands are full and the brain is fully engaged. No more wrinkles available for other paraphernalia.

*Thank you for not commenting on my crappy parenting for letting the kids make a lake with a power cord. Mind you, it wasn't plugged in, but the Christy of 4 years ago would *never* have allowed a child to play anywhere near it.

Oh, My Poor Mother

She hasn't had a blog update in foreeeeeeeeeever. I feel her pain, though, I really do. It must be terrible being up in Alaska with wildflowers, mountains, moose and grizzlies. I'll stop now before I break down in tears. Love you Mom!

The #1 reason for my reticence to blog lately? Lack of pictures. We received a very cute handknit sweater vest in the mail about 10 days ago. Elephants galore. I put it on Kev, he was having none of it and hit the camera out of my hand. No more camera for us. So, we bought a new one, but I didn't know how to get the pictures off of it until now. So, we're back (but still with no picture of Kev in elephant vest. This is a $250 camera and I'm not pushing my luck until Vinay is here to hold his arms out of camera range.).

Anyway, it's still summer, it's still ungodly hot and we're still in the pool e.v.e.r.y. s.i.n.g.l.e. day. Amiya is (maybe) finished with swimming lessons for the summer and she is very proud of the fact that she swam a full lap of the pool. Yes, a full lap. She was very excited and I was crying - so proud! When we started swimming lessons four weeks ago, she could have swum ten yards, but she didn't believe that she could. She needed someone else to coach her and get her confidence up to speed. Now she can swim far more than ten yards and in freestyle, butterfly or backstroke. Love it!

So I say we're sort of maybe done with swimming because we've been going Monday - Thursday for four weeks at 10 AM. That's messing with the kids eating, Kev's sleeping and just life in general. If we can work out another time for lessons with the coach (who is nothing short of really fantastic), we'll sign up for more to keep the skills fresh in her mind. If we can't, I'll be sad that she's stuck with me to reinforce the skills, but happy to resume a bit of normalcy in our day to day.


Our second bit of summer excitement is that Amiya is taking gymnastics. It's once a week for an hour, but our little Mary Lou loves it. She's too short to reach a lot of the equipment, so she needs some help. But she's making the most of jumping into the big pit of foam blocks and she spends most of her afternoon trying to figure out how to do the splits. She gets her flexibility from Vinay's genes, poor kid.

And then there's Kev. He's just a bundle of everything right now. Alternately cranky and giddy, but always cuddly. He's always cuddling. Can I say that again? He's always cuddling. And I won't complain, even when it's cranky cuddles. I've said before, the day he gets facial hair is going to kill me. I want him to be two forever.

He is talking up a storm lately and will repeat what he is saying over and over and over and over again until we repeat it (verbatim) back to him. That's all well and good when we pass the ducks in the pond by our house and he yells, "Duss Ommy!" as he does e.v.e.r.y. s.i.n.g.l.e. time when we pass the ducks. But when he yells, "Me wa pay boohus Ommy!" while strolling the aisles of Michael's that I am completely at a loss. Thus leads us to the reason that I love and appreciate Amiya more than ever. It seems her brain wrinkle that deals with baby babble is still easily accessible because she acts as translator often. "Mom! He wants to paint a birdhouse. How can you not get that?" Ok, right, thanks Amiya.

Both kids enjoyed a Fourth of July parade in the sweltering Florida summer. Amiya, once again, yelled "Happy Fourth of July!" to everyone who passed, hoping to get beads. Mark my words - this child will not go to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. Kev was just sort of baffled by it all, until the horses showed up. Then it was a very cool event indeed and we had his approval to stay a bit longer. The Patriotic bug has hit Amiya - her nighttime lullabies consist of America the Beautiful and The Star Spangled Banner.


Last year we were surprised to see confederate flags being passed out. This year, less surprised, but still taken aback. This year's group was dressed in Antebellum costumes and so, I suppose, I can accept the premise that it was a historical thing. But I still wouldn't let Amiya take a flag. Luckily, the lure of beads from the next float distracted her but the explanation is coming. I want to keep her this age and completely ignorant of all these ugly parts of humanity forever. Anyone want to move to the moon with me?

And finally, in perhaps what is the most schocking development of my adult life, I have intentionally eaten fish twice in three days. Pick yourself up off the floor Mom! We found a recipe for a blackened spice rub and have been eating a lot of seared tilapia. Mmmmmmmm. I even want it again tomorrow. Can you imagine? Me? Fish? And not beer battered? That's right, super healthy, super yummy tilapia. Who'd thunk it?

This is for you, Dad!

Please visit:

www.imvotingrepublican.com

Love you!

No kidding.

Please refer to #8 on this list.

I cannot make this shit up.

Vinay and I were joking Sunday morning that Amiya must surely be getting sick as she was a little bit cranky AND (this is the big one) Vinay was scheduled to leave town. One or both of the kids *always* gets sick while Vinay is out of town.

It's not Amiya, it's me. Pink eye and a head cold. Good times.

And Kev pooped in the bathtub for the first time ever in his life. I stepped to the foyer table (from which I can look right straight at him) to put away the debris that accumulates on top of it. I heard a grunt, looked back and there it was. He then proceeded to break it into pieces and tell me, "tinky poop, Mama." Thank you Kev.


Then, while I was giving Amiya her bath, he found an errant bead on the floor and popped it in his mouth and ate it. The bead is smaller than a sweetpea, so I'm going to think we're fine. He's breathing fine, drinking fine and our very own dial-a-nurse Lauren said that I just have to check his poops to make sure it passes. Fan-flippin'-tastic.

Christy Gupta, Queen of Poop

What's been up with us?

Summer vacation is sort of like winter in Australia. When it's winter for Aussies, it's summer for us. When it's summer vacation for kids it's overtime for parents. Holy smokes have we been busy.

What have we been doing, you say? Swimming, playing, swimming, clay-making, swimming, reading, swimming, coloring, swimming, beach, swimming, play-dates, swimming, zoo and more swimming. Our drying rack is a permanent fixture in our foyer as the kids walk in the door, strip off their suits, hang 'em up and hop in the tub. We swim at least once a day and have been up to the pool twice on occasion. It is a good thing to live in a place with a big pool - we get our money's worth out of it.

Other things they've been up to:

Amiya has been watching her sunflowers that Grandma sent grow and grow and grow until this week when three straight days of very heavy rain sapped them of all their strength and now they are rotting away into the ground. We have already bought more seeds and will be planting other flowers shortly.
Amiya has a daily assignment that I've set up for her. Each day she does some reading, some math, some handwriting (her kryptonite) and her chores (minimal. Quiet in the peanut gallery.) Eeach day when she successfully finishes her journal she moves the ACG shuttle from one planet to the next in the solar system. She has made the trip from the sun to Pluto once so far and is well on her way to another trip. Each time she makes it to Pluto she can choose a reward - a small toy, a movie from Blockbuster, etc. She loves the whole thing and asks to do it every morning. I love it, too, as I get 30 minutes of calm and she's keeping fresh on all of her facts/skills/etc.

This is Kev on the last day of swim lessons. He got a medal that says "Winner" on it. And now, we wear the medal everywhere. He calls it his "noonle" (also his word for noodle) and the day can't start until Kev has his medal on.

Amiya is currently in swimming lessons and one of these days I'm going to remember to take the camera to get a picture. Her teacher is a second grade teacher who offers lessons during the summer at a local pool. It is fantastic. Amiya has made such leaps and bounds in the last 5 days in this situation - this teacher knows kids, knows how to talk to her and can really motivate Amiya. Most importantly, Amiya sees what she is capable of and has so much more confidence now while in the pool. It was a lucky day when the information for these classes was forwarded to me.

The two, chillin' out after a hard day of Diego and swimming! Kev and Vinay went to the Diego show for some boy time. Amiya and I spent the day swimming and shopping for Vinay's Father's Day gift. Can you see how tall Kev is getting? I think he'll definitely be taller than Amiya.

And finally, the court case. The whole thing was a horrible, horrible experience. The situation was that a house two away from us has 5 mini-Dobermans. They let the dogs run, the dogs leave piles in yards, they bark all the time, etc. The 5 houses closest to them have put up with this for a long time because they're basically not nice guys and we don't want the situation to get worse. Anyway, Amiya was playing in our backyard with two neighbor children while Kev was in the lanai and I was watching all the kids from the lanai. The neighbors let their dogs out and the dogs chased the two neighbor children from my yard, barking and nipping at their heels. The children's Mom called Animal Control and filed a complaint. (And rightly so. Piles of crap are one thing, chasing kids another entirely.) Animal Control leveled a large fine on the guys and they didn't pay it, so off we went to court. The judge questionned my parenting because I let Amiya play in our backyard without a fence while I was watching her. I was angry - it wasn't about the kids at all. They were in our yard, they did nothing - why do we need a fence? More than angry - I was humiliated. Why was this about my parenting? My kids weren't chasing their dogs, their dogs were chasing kids!!! Additionally, our backyard is all of 15 feet deep and maybe 30 feet wide - Amiya is a smart enough kid to know that she doesn't leave my sight and if she does, we go in. So, had I been inside watching soap operas and eating chocolate, sure he can question me. But I'm probably the most overly-protective Mom who has ever been in his courtroom and for him to put me down was out of place. He also called both my neighbor (who filed the complaint) and myself "overattentive" to the neighbor's dogs. So the moral of the story is children in their own backyard with parental supervision = inattentive parenting. Unleashed dogs charging children = overattentive neighbors. And to top it all off, he didn't even tell us what the final outcome of the case was. So, far all I know, Vinay took the day off work, I was publicly questionned for something completely unrelated to the whole sha-bang and the (bad words) with the dogs got off scott-free. I at least hope they had to pay court fees.

I am still really angry about the whole thing, but, Vinay, as always has helped me be calm. I wrote a couple of letters just to express my disgust with the whole case. I don't need anything to happen, I don't want anything to happen, I just wanted to be heard.

So, let's hope they put up a fence and give some attention to their pets and train them to live in a neighborhood.

Christy Goes to Court

I've been subpoenaed (sp?) because of my neighbors (once removed) and their dogs. So, I'll update when that's out of the picture. Tomorrow I will see the workings of our justice system intimately.

Weekend Update

Remember Dennis Miller on Saturday Night Live way back when?

I'd like him to review the Guptas weekends sometime. I bet he'd make them seem far more amusing than they are to those who are living them.

Amiya and Vinay trotted off to work Saturday morning. Amiya loves going to work with Vinay as his grad. students find her amusing and she gets unfettered access to the computer in their office. When she came home, she was quickly heading downhill with a stuffy nose, fever and general lethargy. We thought she just caught a summer cold somewhere. Vinay proceeded to install two ceiling fans (complete with light kits) in our lanai so we can actually be outside now that summer has started in earnest. I have to commend him on his excellent work - he attended a useless class at Home Depot and then came home to knock my socks off with his handyman skills once again. When I took those seven solemn marriage vows oh so long ago, I was sure we'd have a handyman on speed-dial. He's always surprising me!

Sunday was a hectic day with both kids getting up far too early yet again. Vinay headed out for a bit of shopping Sunday afternoon (the one time, ever, he has gone shopping on a Sunday afternoon), I put the kids down for naps and tried to catch one myself. Not to be.

Kev screamed until I took him into our bed for a rest. Not to be. Poking, tickling, general mayhem ensued. Ok, whatever, at least I was horizontal and he wasn't screaming, just not sleeping. I was making lemonade out of the Kev lemons handed to me that afternoon.

Or so I thought.

Twenty minutes into the mayhem of napping (ahem) with Kev, Amiya came screaming into the bedroom clawing at her ear. Um, I thought we had passed the age of ear infections? Apparently not as the doctor later confirmed that she has one and thank you very much to Publix for offering free antibiotics.

So, that's the story of our weekend. I think this about sums it up:



We were in the aforementioned Publix getting Amiya's antibioitics, when we detoured down the frozen/beer aisle to grab some items. Vinay wandered off towards the beer and grabbed himself a Foster's. He has never, ever, in our married life grabbed a beer without the purpose of entertaining others. And please note, he didn't just grab a 12 oz. size. Oh, no. It's Aussie size.

Let's hope next weekend is only half as exciting.

Summertime and the livin' is.........

.........early.

(sing it with me)

Kids are spastic
and the weather is hot.
Your Daddy's readin'
and your Mamma's not awake yet,
so hush little children
don't you wake.

Alright, that's all I can manage. George Gershwin was a far better lyricist than I.

What in the world is up with these kids!?!?!? They are up at 5:30/6:00 these days. I say again, What in the world is up with these kids!?!?!?

That looks like a picture that would have been taken at about 2 in the afternoon, right?

Don't I wish.

7:32 AM Tuesday morning.

Enough already, enough. They were in the pool for 4 (1, 2, 3, 4) hours today and we kept them up until 8 PM. They better sleep until 7 tomorrow morning because there is not enough coffee in this world to get me through the day if they don't.

Seriously. Because if not, I'm going to paint their rooms black and put plywood over their windows. And then I'm going to switch to decaf and have a big ol' nap.

Delusions of Grandeur

I will only say this. For the past two days, Kev has called himself an elephant when in the bathtub and during diaper changes. That's all.

Shuttle Launch

Saturday saw the Gupta family witnessing a shuttle launch! It was fantastic!

Vinay used his super sleuthing skills to find us a great hotel room Friday night, so we set off for Orlando after dinner. Upon arriving, we cruised the strip for a bit and the kids were excited by all the sights. We turned in for the night at 9:30 PM with the hopes of sleeping in a bit as we didn't need to leave the hotel until noon. It was not to be, even with a 2.5 hour delay in bedtimes, Kev was up at 7 AM on the dot. Bah!

A hot breakfast and a splash in the pool and then off we went to see the launch. Titusville, FL (home to NASA) is about 40 minutes from Orlando and traffic was great. We arrived at Space View park just in time for a 15 minute downpour, but after that the weather was absolutely Florida. Broiling hot and lots of sunshine. We found seats and then waited. And waited. And waited.

The kids were a little punchy by the end, but behaved more than admirably during the four hour wait. Amiya was a goof and Kev played wet t-shirt contest for most of the time. On the plus side, it appears that he is not far from mastering drinking from a non-sippy cup type apparatus. Half of the beverage goes down his shirt, but it's just a matter of time.

While we were waiting, I mentioned to Amiya that one of the seven astronauts aboard happens to be a woman. She was not impressed. So, I guess what they say is true. My Grandmas' generations faught to vote, my Moms' faught to work, my generation reaps the benefits and my daughter's generation will be completely clueless. And that's a good thing, maybe? It's great that for her it's nothing special that a woman is an astronaut - it's just as it should be.

We opted to head to the free park for viewing instead of paying NASA prices. We could see the launch pad (directly under red dot below), although we could just barely see it. We could see fire and smoke and the shuttle launching, but couldn't make out any details. Perhaps if we go back before the fleet is retired in 2010, we'll pay for the good seats. But for the age of our kids, this was more than enough.

All in all a really great day. Amiya tells us she needs to go to Astronaut High School (the public high school in Titusville) because she now wants to be an astronaut when she grows up. A Buzz Lightyear doll went up on the shuttle and will be "blogging" from space, so it seems that space might be a big theme around here this summer. Could be worse, right?

And the best part of all - we were walking away from the park after the launch and Amiya gave my hand a huge squeeze and said, "Thanks for bringing us here." Really, after the emotional high of seeing such an amazing feat it was all topped up with a five year old's unprompted gratitude. Stellar day indeed!