Nothing

By Shruthi.

When we were kids, our music teacher asked us after a two-week long break, "What did you do in the break?"
"We played", we said, "We read books, we painted, we climbed trees, we went to summer camps..."
"Oh, I was hoping at least one of you would tell me that you did nothing", she said.
We stared at her open-mouthed.
"Nothing", she repeated, "As in, lying on the floor staring at the fan? Standing outside and observing the clouds? Lolling on the bed and looking at the patterns on the drapes? Or just staring at the ceiling all day? Did you do that?"
"Umm... err..." Was this a trick question? We did not know what to say.
"All that you did is important. But doing 'nothing' is also as important." She smiled. "You are too young to understand, but I'll just tell you that doing 'nothing' breeds creativity. Next time you are bored, try and do 'nothing'. And see how interesting it is."

I thought she was joking, but now I think she has a point.

Kids of today have their days full. So full that they don't have time to watch the clouds or look at the ladybird make its way across the lawn. And what is life without these little pleasures? What is learning and fun without admiring the world around you? Where is the time to let a child's little brain think and imagine and create by itself?

Perhaps we should encourage our kids to do 'nothing' this summer?!

How to organize a play group ?

(posted by Pallavi)
Now that its going to be warm pretty soon, I am trying to think of exciting new activities for my 2 yr old. Taking him to the park and to the pool are a couple. I am considering a playset for the backyard too. Most kids in our friends circle are much older than him.. Right now he goes to an in-home babysitter(while I am at work) where all the other kids are younger than him and he plays all by himself. We are planning to find a good daycare for him pretty soon. But meanwhile, .. I want him to be able to play a lot more with his age group kids, learn to share etc.

I looked at some moms groups but none are for working moms. So, none of those are working out. There are many kids in my neighbourhood about his age. Ideally, it would be great if all of us get together and the kids can play. Since we live pretty close meeting on weekdays at parks or just at someone's house or backyard would be much easier I think. Also, the kids will grow up together and I think that will be great !

But the issue is that our subdivision is kind of new and every couple of months a new family is moving in. There has not been an opportunity to even meet and talk to everyone yet. So, I am not sure how to approach people and organize a playgroup. I wonder if anyone would even be interested or even care.. Has anyone been in similar situations before ? Ideas/ Suggestions please ?

So that's what it is!

Hiya, all.

I read this article today on mnbc, which discusses the forgetfulness many moms experience after having children, and found it very interesting.

I was particularly tickled by the one where 'mom' cut up her husband's grilled chicken into tiny little pieces 'because that's what a mom does'. Right? Right :). I very nearly did that to my husband's omelette this morning.

"There’s probably not a new mother alive who can’t identify and share a smile with Andi Silverman’s stories of memory lapses. Like the time she went shopping and left her groceries in the store. Or when she went on vacation with her two small children and forgot the diapers.

With two toddler sons, Nate, 3, and Teddy, 2, commanding her total attention, this kind of forgetfulness is to be expected, say medical experts. They even have a name for it — “momnesia.”

“It’s a state of the female brain that is a bit forgetful after she’s had a baby,” Dr. Louann Brizendine told TODAY correspondent Savannah Guthrie."

So that's the word - momnesia !

Do you have days like this ?

You have to, have to read this. It made my day at 8 in the morning and it will surely do yours too.

For fear of Plagiarism, I am not copying the article here.

Go read it Funny Woman's Unbelievably Busy day

Wistfully....this Navarathri!

This Navrathri season has not been good for my spirits. No, indeed it has not. For everywhere I go, I see pretty little girls looking like absolute dolls, wearing their cute cute pattu pavadais and chaniya cholis, with all those sweet matching necklaces, and tinkly bangles and such interesting looking hair clips to hold back the little curls or the straight silky bangs. And dressed in all this finery, they have that perfect little gait, and also a little bit of awareness that they are looking different (just a little bit of awareness) that I could go on staring at them forever.

*exxaaaaaagggeeeerrraaatted siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigggh*

Rainbow seeker than I am, I measured my options. Yeah so I have some. Right. A formal looking sherwani, with overriding sleeves and the silly tassles in the dupatta, when any day I'd settle for a simple elegant little cotton kurta. But then what? Nothing. That's all the choice there is! Forget accessories, forget hair clips, and definitely forget the gait!

Seriously. Living in a house full of Martians and I have all but abandoned any girlishness in me. Its all about roughhousing, and who climbs on top of who, and the sounds of the train going chuk chuk chuk or the noisy engine sputtering car sounds, or just plain and simple screaming like banshees....aaaaand cricket! Cricket cricket cricket! Bah!

I am in serious depression.

For all those who wish to cheer me up...two conditions apply:

1. No hints, teasers or outright suggestions that I can always have another one. Nah ah! Road closed, dead end, finito!

2. Mother of girls wearing their cute cute pattu pavadais and chaniya cholis, with all those sweet matching necklaces, and tinkly bangles and such interesting looking hair clips to hold back the little curls or the straight silky bangs, and walking with that perfect girlish gait.....stay away from this post! You are not my friends right now. From tomorrow maybe...?

And my dear dear Fellow Members of the boys' club...well come on over. Can I get you some tea? Or a hanky maybe?

For now, I am going off to find my best kancheevaram pattu, wrap it around my head and lie low till this storm blows over!

Little crafted box cars

[This post is written by Tharini of Winkie's Way.]

As if Winkie does not have enough train engines, freight cars and track sets, I set out to give him one more. This time crafted from scratch, with the simplest of materials lying around the house. The original idea came in a little weekly craft newsletter. Usually I would glance through them, and since I won't have one or the other raw material at home, I would reject it. But a quick look at the list of stuff needed for this craft and I knew I wanted to try it with Winkie. Take a look at the list yourself. Isn't it simple and easy?

4 matchboxes
Paint
Buttons or black stickers
Aluminium foil
Glue
Scissors
Marker pen
Ribbon

Cool huh?

I didn't follow the exact instructions. Once I got a rough idea, I did my own thing.

1. Took out all the little boxes from the matchbox and painted them in different colours.

2. Took a little ribbon and glued the boxes to the ribbon, so all the box cars get connected.

3. Glued on little coloured buttons for the wheels.

4. Cut half a matchbox and glued it on to the first car, so it becomes the engine.

5. You can used scrunched up circles of foil glued on to the first car, and make it the train lights, or use little silver sequins like me.

6. As an additional personal touch, and since I had them at home, I used some alphabet beads I had lying around (I was to make key chains for every member of the family with those, abandoned the idea when R refused to use his!)...and glued them on to the boxcars, named after Winkie and Thambi.

This was the result. In the original idea, they used the matchbox covers as the actual box cars, and the match'box' with the open side up, was laid on top, and filled with little pebbles so it had the total freight car feel. I should do it that way next time.

Winkie does like them, and its easy for him to play with this mini set on the dining table. And for the past 24 hours, he has set aside his Thomas Trains and Salty engines for the simple pleasures of home made goods.

Mommy Humor

Posted by Kavitha

Hey moms,
I had fun reading it, I know you will too..

THE NEXT SURVIVOR SERIES
(For those that don’t know about the popular TV show – SURVIVOR, read it here)

Six married men will be dropped on an island with one car and 3 kids each for six weeks.

Each kid will play two sports and either take music or dance classes.

There is no fast food.

Each man must take care of his 3 kids; keep his assigned house clean, correct all homework, complete science projects, cook, do laundry, and pay a list of "pretend" bills with not enough money.

In addition, each man will have to budget in money for groceries each week.

Each man must remember the birthdays of all their friends and relatives, and send cards out on time.

Each man must also take each child to a doctor's appointment, a dentist appointment and a hair cut appointment. He must make one unscheduled and inconvenient visit per child to the Urgent Care (weekend, evening, on a holiday or right when they 're about to leave for vacation).

He must also make cookies or cupcakes for a social function.

Each man will be responsible for decorating his own assigned house, planting flowers outside and keeping it presentable at all times.

The men will only have access to television when the kids are asleep and all chores are done.

Each father will be required to know all of the words to every stupid song that comes on TV and the name of each and every character on cartoons.

Each man will have to make an Indian hut model with six toothpicks, a tortilla and one marker; and get a 4 year old to eat a serving of peas.

Each man must adorn himself with jewelry, wear uncomfortable yet stylish shoes, keep their nails polished and eyebrows groomed.

The men must try to get through each day without snot, spit-up or barf on their clothing.

During one of the six weeks, the men will have to endure severe abdominal cramps, back aches, and have extreme, unexplained mood swings but never once complain or slow down from other duties.

They must try to explain what a tampon is for when the 6-yr old boy finds it in the purse.

They must attend weekly school meetings, church, and find time at least once to spend the afternoon at the park or a similar setting.

He will need to read a book to the children each night without falling asleep, and then feed them, dress them, brush their teeth and comb their hair each morning by 7:00. They must leave the home with no food on their face or clothes.

A test will be given at the end of the six weeks, and each father will be required to know all of the following information: each child's birthday, height, weight, shoe size, clothes size and doctor's name. Also the child's weight at birth, length, time of birth, and length of labor, each child's favorite color, middle name, favorite snack, favorite song, favorite drink, favorite toy, biggest fear and what they want to be when they grow up.

They must clean up after their sick children at 2:00 a.m. And then spend the remainder of the day tending to that child and waiting on them hand and foot until they are better.

They must have a loving, age appropriate reply to, "You're not the boss of me".

The kids vote them off the island based on performance.

The last man wins only if...he still has enough energy to be intimate with his spouse at a moment's notice.

After you get done laughing, send this to as many females as you think will get a kick out of it and as many men as you think can handle it.

Krazy Kays & their Knack for Krazy Knicks

Heh! Couldn't think of a "kornier" title :D

[Posted by CeeKay at My Two Cents Too]

Note: I had so much fun writing this post that I decided to "pollute" the club-space with it too :D

I thought I was tagged by someone to list all the silly (and embarrassing, in our case) nick names that we have given to our kids but patrolled the blog sphere up and down three times and still couldn't find the "tagger". So I am taking up the tag on my own because I just loved the idea (of publicly embarrassing my children)!! But if there is someone who indeed tagged me for this, please own up and appropriate credits shall be given!

Mitthi (translated to Punjabi, means "sweet") and Ninni (means "sleep" in kidspeak and can be taken as a twisted form of "naani" meaning "little" in Gujarati) are their “official” nick names. Simple, sweet and harmless. Then I also call S “Sweetie Mitthi Pie” and Mitthi Mouse while Ninni gets called by the nick "Cheeni* Ninni Pie" and Ninni The Pooh (created by big sis). Their Kaka (dad's bro) calls them “Dudu” and dadi has reserved the name “Ghappoodi” :D

* Cheeni: Sugar

Other nick names I use for them are – “Koochie koo” and Chikoo which has now turned into “Chika Mika Pika”. Then there is Sweetums, Jhagdoo (someone who fights a lot), Jhagdoo-Magdoo (you can see my penchant for rhyming here, can’t you? :D Another rarely used but embarrassing name is “Susu-Potty Baba” which came from the fact that this is what they did most of the time during the first three months of their life :P The credit goes to their dad.

Now on to the reeeally embarrassing nick names. There is a story behind them so I will narrate it first. Without it, those nicks just won’t make sense. When we were newly married, one day I called J “Sadela Gubrela” (Rotten beetle). Now J has a knack for playing with words. He can transform the sweetest, most innocent word into something wacky and funny in an instant. So pat came the reply “Sadeli Goo Bhareli”. To those unfamiliar with the middle classy word, it means poop (literally) and the last word means “full of” in Gujarati. So “sadela Gubrela” became “Sadela Goo Bharela” and then we applied this nick name to S (Poor, poor kid! Now you understand why I am saving for her therapy?) She is a good sport and didn’t throw a fit when we explained the meaning to her when she was old enough to understand. When M came home from the hospital, S very generously decided to share that nick name with her. She said she will keep the first part (“Sadeli") for herself, and generously hand over the second part (Goo Bhareli) to her little sis. Only, she mistakenly said “Goo Dhareli” instead of “Goo Bhareli" thanks to her broken Hindi. Now, I might not have the knack for witty/wacky names, but I do have a knack for translating ones that don’t have an apparent meaning. So I translated the second one as “Sitting like a poop” ( I know, I know – this post shouldn’t even have seen the light of the day) as “Dhareli” in Gujarati can be loosely translated to “dumped” in some instances. So now we have a Goo Bhareli and a Goo Dhareli in our house. And S has now generously donated “Sadeli/Sadela” to her mom and dad.

Remind me to start a savings account for M’s therapy too, will you?

Edited to add: S has made up a song with the most embarrassing nick name for M. It goes like this -

Ninni, Ninni, Bahut Sadeli

Also known as Goo Dhareli

(Yup! She got the genes!!!)

Oh, and I tag all the moms (and dads, if any) in this club who haven't taken up this tag already, and who don't mind embarrassing their kids publicly :D