Dessert Baby

Little Bojjandi,

You are eight months old already! How time flies. By now I can barely remember a time when you spent most of your day sleeping or feeding. I can't remember a time when you weren't alert and responsive, looking back at us, eyes twinkling with an intelligent gleam in them. I can't remember a time when you used to lie flat on your back, unable to do more than flail those chubby arms and legs about, instead of turning turtle in the twinkling of your eye J as soon as you're put down, and crawling backward. I can't remember a time when you used to bawl for no reason, instead of having built up your own repertoire of very different sounds to express what you want – that cute little humming sound when you're sleepy, angry grunts when you want your food RIGHT NOW, plaintive bawls as soon as you discover you're all alone in a room. I can't remember a time when mother's milk was all you craved, seeing you eagerly react to the taste of each new food, from mangoes to parathas with sabzi. I can't remember a time when you quietly lay against my heart as I rocked you to sleep, instead of bouncing up and down on those sturdy legs, butting my chin with your teak head.

Your didi gets very upset when she takes you for your evening walk and the neighbor comments on how you're so tiny for your age, and how shocked she is that you still can't sit up though her grandson was sitting up at the age of five months. But you know what, I don't care. That's one of the gifts you and Puddi gave me – the ability to just enjoy what your child is and forget about the so-called milestones. They'll happen when they will, and meantime, I can share your wonder at discovering a brand new world.

Even as I feel time's flying past and I wish I could press pause and enjoy each phase for a while longer, you come up with something even cuter and more heart-warming and I forget all about "time's a fleeting" in sheer enjoyment of every lovely moment. I'm so glad we had you – you're our icing on the cake, our sweet, cuddlesome, chubby little Bojji – and you just complete our family so beautifully. Here's looking forward to more antics from you.

Love,

Mama

A Matter of Interpretation

Puddi: Mama, I wanttosee sussideez barr!

Mama: Eh? Errr…what's that?

Puddi (tearfully): Sussideez barr, mama!

Mama: silent, scratching head

Puddi: Mama, you know – the barr sussideez, the shimpul barr sussideez…

Mama: Oh, The Jungle Book?

Puddi: Yes, mama, sussideez barr!

Nature Nurture

I always wonder how kids born in the same house, from the same gene pool can be so different. Take my sister and I, for example – she's tidy and organized, I'm completely the opposite. She's very good at crafts and packing presents neatly. I'm a klutz at both, not to mention sadly lacking in patience. As our elder two are growing up, it's become clear that they are also quite disparate.

When Chubbocks was little, we had an infestation of ants in some of the woodwork. Every day hordes of big black ants would swarm through the house, which was quite disgusting. But I never wanted to kill them since I have a fondness for the industrious creatures, as opposed to cockroaches or flies. My mother-in-law started a game with Chubbocks of stomping on them and I found it extremely distressing so I told Chubbocks that at best we should sweep them away gently. I taught him to watch how each ant would manfully hoik 10 times its own body weight in a food item and laboriously wend its way home. We used to sit and watch as a group of ants, in a great display of teamwork, would pick up a bougainvillea leaf and wander off with it for some mysterious purpose.

Last night an unwary ant happened to wander onto the dining table. Puddi the boisterous unthinkingly reached out and crushed it before anyone could say anything. I got pretty upset with her and rebuked her that the poor thing must have been looking for food to take home to its family. She of course listened for about two minutes and promptly returned to her primary occupation of playing with her food. Chubbocks, meanwhile, sat silently. A couple of minutes later I looked across at him to find his eyes swimming with tears. He got so upset about the ant, that eventually he just broke down and sobbed inconsolably, distraught at the thought of the ant and the ant's family who would wait and wonder and worry. He was eventually so upset that not even the bribe of ice cream or chocolate worked. He just couldn't get any food down and finally had to be put to bed early.

His dad and I tenderly took the ant outside and laid it down in our garden, at his behest and A had to come up with a complicated story of how the ant had just become unconscious and had woken up later with a big headache, gone home and was now being looked after by his family. This morning as soon as he came down, Chubbocks wanted to go and look for his ant. He went out into the garden and came back beaming. "I saw it. It's fine!" "How do you know it's the same one?" we asked."I saw its face".

I don't know how many kids today are that tender-hearted. I hope Chubbocks remains like this…

7th heaven

Can’t believe my youngest child is already 7 months old and more…almost enough to make me long for another baby! He’s come on in the most amazing way, too. Perhaps it’s a result of how blasé the parents get with a growing brood. With the first child, everything is an event. Each time the baby cries, you question your credentials as parent, you question your paediatrician’s degree and you’re pretty much happy promising him anything to stop crying. I thought we’d be a bit more blasé the second time around and of course, by the third time, pretty much ask to be woken only when someone saw blood. Well, guess what. It’s as thrilling each time, because each baby is so different, despite the same two sets of genes blending and a similar upbringing.

Bojjandi’s growing up and has a definite personality now and it’s a thrill to uncover a little more of that with every day and each interaction. He seems to have a lovely nature, his smiles are so completely guileless and open. Touch wood, like my other two babies, this one too is usually commented on as, “What a happy baby!” He loves greeting us with a beaming smile right from the time he wakes up in the morning, and throughout the day, it seems like he just wants to catch our eye so he can let loose one of those beams of pure joy.

He’s turning out to be a pretty good communicator – or maybe the other two trained us well. He rarely cries but when he does, we can usually tell what’s causing it – gas versus code brown, boredom versus hunger…And he’s already multilingual – he can not only make French-like cooing sounds but also Germanic guttural sounds though we haven’t yet figured out what language the grunts are.

An active baby, he now hates lying down because he can’t see what’s going on around him. He starts yelling loudly until he’s propped up on someone’s lap. He even hates being in his bouncer because it’s too constricting. Like his siblings, he seems to prefer making his own amusements rather than play with toys. He can be endlessly amused by me turning my fingers round and round over his head. He also spends hours making his plump hands turn in circles and sucking at those fat fists. He’s just learned to clap and finds considerable amusement in trying to make one palm strike the other. He also seems quite amused by the mayhem caused by the rest of us and looks on with a goodnatured grin on his face.

He’s taken pretty well to changes so far. I recently had to travel on work and was out of town for 6 days. The poor baby went cold turkey on everything from breastfeeding to hugs from mommy but seems to have not troubled his dad at all. He’s enjoying his solid meals tremendously and as soon as he spots his meal on his little silver thali, starts yelling as if to tell us to hurry up and feed him. He loves a banana for breakfast and now not only finishes a full banana but usually winds up the meal by howling for more. He’s also transitioned quite smoothly from the steel Aladdin’s lamp feeder to sippy cups for milk, and moved from his cloth sling to Puddi’s old cot with ease.

All in all, he’s made third-time parenthood seem like a complete breeze and lots of fun. It’s hard to believe that this time last year he was the size of a zygote and that we ever even had a second thought about not welcoming this blessing into our lives and hearts. If ever there was an indulgence baby made for the pure purpose of enjoying every step of the way, that’s Bojjandi. I’m not so serious about my role as parent anymore – I’ve learnt that a light touch is better than a heavy one. It’s better to enjoy every moment of it – the scoldings, the banter, the tantrums and the topsy-turvy house, because it all goes onto the next phase all too soon and while each phase has its moments, there’s nothing that fills a home and a heart as much as really young children and their perfect imperfections. And I’m savouring each and every moment of Bojjandi’s each phase, drawing it out and hoping the growing up slows down a bit.

Having Bojjandi’s like having a really calorie-packed, chocolatey, sinful dessert after having a great meal. You’re not sure you need it or indeed can manage to have it but you just want to indulge yourself and when you do, it feels so good…7th heaven!

Not This Mother’s Day

This, I think, is going to be my post for Mother's Day. We went through a harrowing experience yesterday and it just brought home to me what all lies in store. Makes me wish I could hug my kids close and curl up under a blanket for aeons…

Chubbocks, as you know, is a very gentle, sensitive type of fellow. His one experience of sleeping over at a friend's house seems to have left him scarred, and each time he goes for a playdate, he is at pains to confirm that he's going to be fetched back that evening. And, now that he's ;earned to use a telephone and dial his dad's or my mobile number, he's on the phone at the dot of whatever time we said we'll fetch him – Where are you? You said 4 o'clock, it's 4:02 now! Why haven't you come? In fact he comes up with the most hilarious reasons for leaving and starts hinting to his friends' moms from about 2 in the afternoon – I have a piano class to attend ( he's not enrolled in any class as of now)…we're going to my cousins' house (his only cousins live in Canada and the US)…and so on.

Last night we had some old friends over for dinner after ages. They have 2 kids, one around 8 or 9 and one who's just a month and a half younger to Puddi. Our kids got to stay up and chill with theirs, which is a rare happening since my brood is usually in bed and asleep by 8, so naturally the kids were very excited, They got along well together and had a good time, Puddi and the friend's son communication in some pidgin toddler-ese together. When they got up to leave, we all stepped out till the gate to say bye. Puddi was holding hands with their son by then and chattering away. As they started walking to where their car was parked, she began walking along with them. "Puddi, you're going to stay in their house", we sais in jest. Puddi nodded, didn't even bother to turn her head back to look at us and kept walking along with them.

A and I waited, with an apprehensive Chubbocks beside us, big smiles on our faces, waiting for the moment when realization would dawn that she'd miss us and when she'd turn and come running back to us. Only to be completely dumbfounded when this pint-sized Puddi kept on marching on and on and down the road out of our sight. Then came the sound of a loud blubbing. It was Chubbocks, waling to think his sister was going off! He wept and wept while I ran after the looney Puddi and grabbed her. I picked her up and turned to get back home, only to find that she had burst into tears, because she wanted to go off with her newfound friend!

Somehow we marched her back home and got her and Chubbocks into bed. She was still sobbing to go ages later, while Chubbocks was telling us that if Puddi ever goes for a sleepover, he'll really miss her and give her one of HIS toys when she comes back home. Much later A and I finally got a chance to deal with our own emotions on this occurrence. And we both realized we were feeling shattered. I mean, of course we want them to eventually become independent little beings and to take their own decisions but this was way too soon. Not to mention the total lack of any looking back on her part. It gave us a tiny inkling of just how it would feel the day our little chicklings finally leave the nest, and left us devastated…

Weaning food

Way back when Chubbocks was a baby, one of my friends mentioned that her sister used to make this traditional form of weaning food for her child. It sounded so healthy I decided to make it as well, and just adapt it in case I found any food allergies or such. It's a very simple recipe, you have to make it maybe once a month and it's easily customized to the child's taste. I must admit Chubbocks is one of the skinniest kids around so that may not be an advertisement for its properties but at least he's very healthy and full of beans, so I guess it did do some good J

Ingredients:

Plain uncooked Rice: 1 cup ( ps. Not basmati but a softer type of rice, like parmal is better for infants)

Moong dal without the skin: 1 cup

Ragi flour: 1 cup

Almonds (blanched): 1 cup

Sooji: 1 cup

Wheat flour: 1 cup

Roast all the ingredients one by one on a low flame in an iron kadhai until well roasted and aromatic. Cool and grind to a fine powder. Mix well and store in an airtight container. To cook this, just steam 2-3 tablespoons in the pressure cooker with some water (1.5 times amount of water should do fine). Add any vegetables or fruit that the baby is fond of, well-mashed, and serve. I used to add mashed steamed spinach, mashed bananas, mashed pumpkin, potatoes, onions, garlic…pretty much anything that the baby enjoyed and top off with a spoonful of home made ghee.