Sleep time - old habits die hard

My parents started putting me to bed in a different room since I was 9 months old. However, what they did not do was to let me go to bed by myself. They put a queen size futon mattress in my room and so my mommy or daddy would go to bed with me and stay there till I was all asleep. More than half the time, they would actually fall asleep while putting me to bed and so will sleep beside me the entire night :) Often times, it would take like 30 to 60 mins for me to go to sleep. When I am not sleepy, I will do all sorts of "nakhras" like ask for water, insist to hear more and more stories, just roll around and do some masti, demand to sleep in their lap or on their shoulder or ask to go for pee pee, etc

Now that I am 3, they are trying hard to get me to sleep on my own. They have been lucky 4-5 times so far (over last 2-3 months) when I have volunteered to sleep on my own and have also successfully done that. However, they are having a hard time getting me to do that everyday. They have tried lots of different options like bribing me with stickers, goodies like lollipop and ice cream AND putting on my favorite songs and music in my room AND telling me that if I sleep on my own, then a fairy will come and put something nice under my pillow AND even making up lots of different stories about other kids that I know who sleep on their own.. but so far, they haven't had luck. God - please give them more patience - They will need it more than ever once my little brother is here since it will be the two of us testing it everyday then :)

When is my brother coming?

Last week, I tagged along with my mommy and daddy to the hospital to check on my little brother in mommy's tummy. They had prepped me about the visit by telling me that I will get to meet doctor auntie there and that I will be able to listen to my brother's heart beat. Since I feel little shy when I meet strangers, they were also trying to teach me about what and how I can converse with the doctor. They suggested that I can ask the doctor about when will my brother come and how is he doing, etc. Of course, they did not expect that I will remember any of it and that I will actually talk to the doctor. Little did they know that they were in for a pleasant surprise. When the doctor called us in, the first thing I did on seeing the doctor was to ask "When is my brother coming?" in my broken English.. My mommy and daddy were surprised and smiling and explained the doctor what I was asking :) The doctor and I soon became friends. She even gave me her stethoscope to listen to my own and daddy's heart beat.

Final quarter of 3rd year of my life

Hello !

I just turned 3 last week and am all excited to be a big girl.

* This past quarter has been very festive with lots of birthday parties, Diwali celebration, Halloween fun and Christmas preparation.
* My latest activities include jigsaw puzzle, playing with my little kitchen and making mess :)
* I insist on doing lot of things myself like eating, changing clothes, putting on socks, sometimes playing, etc and I shout if anyone touches me while I am doing them :)
* I am getting better at going to school and can understand and speak lot of English words and sentences now.
* I am getting the hang of animated movies, although it is hard for me to sit at one place to watch the entire movie.
* My little brother will soon be here and I can't wait to play with him and share all my toys. I am going to be a good big sister - at least so they say and believe :)

This is my last quarterly update email to you. With all the added responsibilities of being a 'didi' and the school work, I will be pretty busy. Besides, I am sure you are bored of reading my emails too :) If you would like to read about what I am upto, you can continue to check out my blog.

Check out my pictures from this past quarter :


Love,
Kavya

How I am changing ?

I have been going to part-time school for almost 1.5 months now (started on Sep 16, 2008). That itself is a big change for me considering that I have been going to a home-based day care all my life so far. Also, mommy's tummy (and my little brother) are growing bigger day by day. So, mommy cannot lift me any more and also cannot run after me like she used to before. These are two big changes in my life lately and knowingly or unknowingly, I am responding to these changes :

* I am picking up English in school and getting better at communication. Also, I used to be somewhat reserved and not mix much with other kids. However, I get along and play with other kids now. Earlier, my parents used to worry that I was so shy and naive that others would take advantage (snatch my toys or hit me) but I am becoming more clever and upfront about it now. In a way, they like that change, but then sometimes if I push other kid who comes to snatch my toy, they get confused about what they should teach me :)

* Since I don't yet enjoy going to school fully, I am a bit cranky in the morning and give my parents hard time with all routine chores (getting up, brushing my teeth, taking shower, getting dressed, having breakfast, etc).

* I have started demanding more attention in everything I do. My parents see this as if they are not watching me then I am in the process of brewing some trouble :) Well, as long as I get the attention, I don't care :)

Mischief to be remembered for ever

This afternoon, mommy had stepped out for an errand and daddy was in the shower. I was all by myself - playing in the room. Then I got hold of Vicks bottle - the balm that you use when you have cold or headache. I have always enjoyed opening the bottle and smelling it. I would also take it to mommy and daddy and make them smell it. Since mommy and daddy were not around, I got this idea that may be the wall would like to have some of it. So, I opened the bottle and rubbed half of the bottle contents on the wall. Some of it also ended up on my cheeks and soon it started burning. But since I knew I had done something wrong, I just sat there - waiting for daddy to figure out my mischief. Soon, daddy was out of the shower and noticed what I had done. He as very mad and scolded me. He immediately took me to a sink and tried to remove all the vicks from my cheeks - I had already started crying by then. He also tried to clean the wall - but since this is so sticky, the remains will be seen on the wall for many more days and months to come :)

My new activity - Jigsaw puzzles

I have recently started getting very interested in jigsaw puzzles. It all started with a 4-piece Winnie-the-pooh puzzle. It used to be lying around my toys, but I never quite figured out how it worked. Then, one fine day, I put it together and realized how much fun and easy it was.
After that, my mom got me larger 25-piece puzzle and I got the hang of it in matter of days. Then, Vishal mama got me another dinasaur puzzle and Varsha ba got me a Princess puzzle (sent by Shivani mami). I can put all of these together in just few mins with little help from daddy and I do this every single day. I can't wait for more puzzles :)

Making of snowman

This morning I was playing with my Varsha ba with 2 balls - one was big and one was little smaller. Suddenly, I got the idea of making a snowman out of the two balls. I put the smaller ball on top of the big ball and shouted "Look mommy, Snowman". My mommy was so surprised and happy at my imagination and creativity that she started clapping :)

Communication Incident at School

Going to school has been a pretty interesting and different experience for me. I am still getting used to the new place and the new environment and the new language. Since it is a big change from the routine that I have had for years, it is taking me some time to get settled in. I cry for a while and don't really want to go to school in the morning, but then Miss Shefali helds me for a while and then I am all OK. I study and play and eat and go to sleep and then cry a little after waking up and then I am all OK again.

Miss Shefali leaves at around 5:30 pm and my mommy comes to pick me up around 6:00 pm. So, Miss Karen takes care of me during that half an hour. Today, I told Miss Karen that I wanted to color. So, Miss Karen gave me a paper and some coloring pens. I found that couple of coloring pens did not have the cap on. So, I held two pens with cap in my right hand and 2 pens without the cap in my left hand and went to Miss Karen. I then told her that I wanted the "dhankanu" for the 2 pens without the cap. But since I was talking in Gujarati (dhankanu means the cap for the pen), she did not understand me. I started crying saying "Dhankanu, dhankanu" and she did not know what to do. Soon thereafter, my mommy came to pick me up and understood what I was saying. She explained to Miss Karen that I was crying for the pen caps and they both burst out laughing. They thought it was so silly that I was crying for the pen caps - and that too when I did not loose them. I was just being nice to them and my mommy found it funny :). She came home and told this incident to my Dad and he started laughing too.

Now they are trying to teach me some English to avoid such communication incidents at school.

Third Quarter of 3rd year of my life

Hello !

I am now 2 years and 9 months old. This past quarter has been very exciting. I wanted to share with you some of the fun things and activities from the last quarter:

* First day at school: Although my first day at school was a "trial" day on Friday, I technically started part-time (Tuesday and Thursday) pre-school at Bright Horizons today. My mommy and daddy had prepped me for the first day and so I was really looking forward to it. I met my teachers - Miss Shefali and Miss Crystal and all my classmates. I had my breakfast and lunch there and played in the school's backyard with sand and swing and cycles. I was not very used to other activities and so I just watched. I will get used to them as I continue to go. I will have more stories to share with you next time.

* Little baby on the way: As you know, I am going to be a big sister in January. I was so excited with this news, that I went and told my baby-sitter at 7 weeks that there is a baby in my mommy's tummy :) Thankfully, I don't have to keep it a secret any more. I am prepping up to help my parents with the feeding and diaper changing and taking care of the little one. The baby is taking a lot of time to grow up and come out of mommy's tummy - I can't wait.

* I am a big girl now: I touched the 3 feet mark this quarter. I also have one more teeth making the total count 17 with the 18th one on its way.

* Summer activities: I enjoyed swimming and biking a lot this summer. My dad used to take me to swimming classes and it was a blast. Although, I don't like water on my face and head, the different water activities like monkey walk, kicking, singing songs and dancing, etc was lot of fun. My teacher, Miss Katelyn, was also very good and loving. I got the big girl's bike and I love riding it. I ride it almost every day and I have good control of speed and turns now. I also enjoy riding on daddy's bike in the little baby seat. Its like having fun without doing any work :) I went to a circus for the first time in my life and it was so much fun watching the jokers, elephants, horses, tigers and all their tricks and performances. Last but not the least, I enjoyed the trip to the Gilroy Gardens on a hot hot summer day. Although it was very hot, I enjoyed the various rides and not to forget the ice cream :)

* Learning: I can sing and read the ABC..XYZ. I am now learning to read the lower case letters. I can count till 25. I am learning to identify all the numbers now. I can also count the objects - for eg: if you give me a bunch of coins, I can count and tell you how many coins I have. I can name the 7 days of the week and the 12 months of the year. I also know that my birthdate is on 16th December :). I can spell my name and correct you if you spell it incorrectly :). I can sing lot of english and gujarati songs and some bollywood songs too - My favorite one is "Kajra re, Kajre, tere kale kale naina". I can understand and answer some questions in English like What is your name?, What is your daddy and mommy's name? Where do daddy and mommy work?, etc. Now that I have started going to school, I expect to learn lot of English words and sentences. My parents are hoping that I will continue to speak and understand Gujarati at the same time - we shall see :)

Here are some of my latest pictures:


Love,
Kavya

English skills

Although my primary language is Gujarati, I am picking up some English words and sentences pretty rapidly. I can understand and answer some questions in English like:

* What is your name?
* What is your daddy's name?
* What is your mommy's name?
* Where does your daddy work?
* Where does your mommy work?
* Where do you live?
* What is the name of your mommy's mommy and daddy?
* What is the name of your daddy's mommy and daddy?
* What is your birthdate?

and so on.. I am enjoying the learning and hope to be bilingual pretty soon :)

My academic progress

As of today, these are the things I can do from an academic point of view :

* Sing the ABC..Z

* Identify all the upper case alphabets and some lower case alphabets

* Count till 25. Learning to identify the numbers

* Spell my name K-A-V-Y-A and correct you if you spell it incorrectly

* Identify all the colors

* Tell you my birthdate (December 16)

* Tell you the 7 days of the week and the 12 months of the year

* Sing lots of English and Gujarati songs along with some bollywood songs

My Menu

As you know, I am a very picky eater. My mom keeps a menu of things I eat so that she can quickly look it up to see what she can give me for lunch or dinner. This is how it looks :

*Roti-sabji (mainly okra sabji)
*Daal-rice
*Mac N Cheese
*Pasta
*PBJ (Peanut butter jelly) Sandwich with cheese
*Pudla (besan omlet) with peanut butter/nutella
*Spagetti (The Campbell's alphabet spagetti)
*Idli
*Poha
*Khichadi
*Pooran-poli
*Upma

And she hopes this list will grow longer over time.. I call it wishful thinking :)

Second quarter of 3rd year of my life

Hello everyone !

Sorry, I am 2 weeks late in sending my progress update, but I am here now. I am two and a half years old now. Growing up is so much fun - I am learning new things everyday.

* As I am growing up, I am being more independent day by day. I insist on doing lot of things myself and that sometimes annoys my parents - but hey - I gotta learn too. Wouldn't you agree ? Things that I can do well lot of times (ofcourse, it depends on my mood too !) include eating breakfast, fetching water from the outlet on the refrigerator, putting on or taking off shoes and flip-flops, taking off clothes, washing my hands and face after each meal, etc.

* I have recently become very fond of crayons and coloring. If you give me simple drawings, I can color them well - almost within the boundaries. I am also learning to ride my tricycle. I can paddle and steer on my own for most part. Now, I am looking forward to get the big girl's bike.

* Although, I primarily communicate in Gujarati, my English vocabulary is increasing. I am beginning to form small sentences - sometime only with nouns :). If I have to complain about something, I only speak English and so sometimes people don't understand me properly :(

* The most memorable event this quarter was the cruise to Alaska. It was a 10-day vacation with my parents and grand-parents. We also visited Seattle and Vancouver. I got a chance to ride a car, plane, boat, bus as well as train during this vacation. I got so attached to my mommy and daddy during these 10-days that now I want to be with them all the time. I insist that they take me to work with them and am giving them a hard time while going to the day-care :)

Summer is here and I am looking forward to lots of outdoor activities including swimming, bicycling, going to the park and even camping.

Check out my photos at :


Love,
Kavya.

My imagination at work

Here are some of the events that made my parents notice my imaginative skills:

1. I have seen lot of bikers on the road - each riding a fancy motor cycle. Last week, my parents were taking me for a stroll in the stroller. Since I didn't have anything else to do while riding in the stroller, I started playing with the shade of the stroller. I discovered that I could bring it all the way in the front and as soon as I did that, I shouted to my dad "Daddy, Look ! I am a biker".

2. I have seen my parents working on their laptops many times. I have myself had the pleasure of thumping on the keyboard. So, I know what a laptop computer looks like. On couple of different incidents, when I had two square/rectangular flat objects like 2 books or 2 square stickers, I would put them together such that one is perpendicular to the other at its edge and shout "Look, I made a computer"

3. Lately, I have become very fond of the story of Goldilocks and the 3 bears (Papa bear, Mamma bear and Baby bear). In the story, the biggest bowl, the biggest chair and the biggest bed - all belongs to the Papa bear. The medium sized things belong to the Mamma bear and the Baby bear has the smallest bowl, chair and bed. I have now heard that story so many times, that I have come to associate big size with the word "papa". The other day, I noticed that one of my mommy's socks had a big hole in it. So, I cried out "Mommy, there is a papa hole in your socks" :)

4. Two days back, I went to a friend's place to play with him. He had a nice plastic golf stick. As I was playing with it, I put it upside down and suddenly, it occurred to me that it resembled a light post. So, I called my dad and said "Daddy, look its a light".

Caring for the crayons

Recently, I have become very fond of crayons and coloring. However, whenever I get a new crayon, the first thing I do is to remove its wrapper. Earlier today, when I was removing the wrapper of one of my crayons, my daddy asked me why did I do that. My prompt response was that because the crayon is feeling hot (karan ke crayon ne garmi laage che). My mom and dad were both very surprised with such an instant and thoughtful answer :)

Learning to rephrase to convey my thoughts

This morning, I said something to my Daddy and then immediately added that "Kavya joothu bole che" (meaning that Kavya is lying). My daddy didn't hear that properly and so asked me to repeat what I said. I figured that my dad just doesn't understand. So, I rephrased the sentence as "Kavya sachu nathi bolti" (meaning Kavya is not telling the truth). My dad then immediately realized what I had said earlier and how rephrased it to convey what I was trying to tell him. He was so impressed that I could do this that he has already told quite a few people about this incident.

First quarter of 3rd year of my life

Greetings everyone !

I am back with the quarterly updates for the first quarter of 3rd year of my life.

Here are the top 12 memorable events and achievements this quarter :

12. Talking in English : I used to speak in gujarati only, but I am starting to learn some English now. One of the sentences that I have recently picked up in English is "I don't know". As you might have guessed, my parents are not very thrilled about it :-)

11. Routine tasks : I can take-off my shoes, socks as well as clothes on my own. While this is a very big achievement, my parents are not very excited about it since I take off the clothes whenever I feel like it and then I make them run after me to put them back on :-)

10. Favorite Vegetable : I have identified my favorite vegetable. Its Okra. If you give me okra sabji with roti, I will eat without any fuss. My mom is happy about it, but she is upset at the same time because I want that everyday for dinner now :-)

9. Gymboree : I started going for Gymobree classes every saturday morning. I love it and eagerly wait for Saturdays.

8. NY trip : When my mommy went to NY for her work in January, I tagged along to meet my grandparents. It was cold in NY, but I enjoyed it.

7. Lake Tahoe : We spent one full week in Lake Tahoe around Christmas. It was lot of fun wearing all the winter gears and playing in the snow. Check out the pictures to see my snowman !

6. Little helper around the house : I have started helping my parents with little things like putting the lights on or off and putting some things where they tell me to. I can also get some things within my reach (like a dish or spoon) for them - ofcourse, when I am in good mood :).

5. Coloring : I have started using coloring book and crayons. At first, I would just randomly color here and there, but gradually, I am getting the hang of it. Now if you tell me to color a circle, I will just put some lines in the circle. I cannot color it fully yet, but I don't color outside the circle at the same time.

4. Playing pretend : I have started playing pretend (not sure if this is because I watch lot of Barney :) ). I pretend being a mommy or daddy to my dolls and softtoys and feed them and take them for a stroll in their little stroller. I also pretend to be a cat or tiger or dog or rabbit or fox or even strawberry :)

3. Story Time : I love to hear different stories. So, my parents make up lots of stories involving different animals and day-to-day activities like brushing, taking a bath, eating, playing, etc. I can also tell you most of those stories (word for word - no kidding :) ) when I am in good mood.

2. Identifying the alphabets : I can identify lot of alphabets along with what they stand for. For example, A for Ami, B for Barney, D for Desai, K for Kavya, G for Gaurav, and so on...

1. Potty-training : I am "almost" potty-trained. Yeaaahhhh !! This one makes my parents very happy. I say "almost" because although I go to potty, I don't always say "I want to go pee" - instead one might see me do the "pee-pee" dance. Also, I don't always wake my mommy up at night :-)

Enjoy my pictures:


Love,
Kavya

I am a little helper around the house

I have started getting interested in small chores around the house. My mommy and daddy keep me by their side when they are doing some of their tasks. For example, mommy will make me sit on the kitchen platform while she cuts some vegetables or cooks something and daddy will take me for a walk with him when he goes to check the mails. While I am still little for most of the tasks that they do, I try to help however I can, of course, only when I am in good mood. Some of the things I help with are :

- If my parents give me something and ask me to go and put it in the stairs (so that we can take it upstairs whenever we go), I will go and place that thing very nicely in the stairs.

- I also help out taking a dish or glass to the sink. Since I cannot reach the bottom of the sink yet, I will put it on the kitchen platform.

- I can also turn any lights on or off as requested.

- I also help with clean-up after making a mess with all my toys - although, this is only sometimes :)

- In the mornings when we are all upstairs and we need a dish to put some "prasad" (goodies) for God, I can go down all by myself, open up the drawer and get a dish and return upstairs - Isn't this something ?

My little mischief

This evening when my parents were busy with something, I quietly turned on the stair lights and went upstairs. Then I turned on the lights of mommy-daddy's bedroom and went to the small "mandir" (temple) that they have in their room. I knew they had some "prasad" in a box near the mandir and I love that prasad very much. So, I tried to open that box, but the lid was too tight to open it fully. I managed to open it a little just from one side - enough to put one of my hands inside. I pulled out couple of pieces of the prasad and put them in my mouth very quickly. Soon there after, my mom came running looking for me and caught me red-handed with the prasad still in my mouth and also all over my hands and mouth (Ooops!) I could see that she had very confused looks on her face. She wanted to laugh but at the same time she wanted to scold me - so she didn't quite know how to react. She called my dad and told him about my mischief and we all burst out laughing :)

Potty training

My mommy-daddy started potty training me for the first time in November 2007 when I was about 22-23 months old. But I wasn't quite ready at that time. I got scared when I had to pee while sitting on the toilet because peeing in the diaper was so much easy and fun and no one would even know when I would pee. As a result, I started holding my pee and would cry when I cannot hold it anymore. So, my parents got the hint and gave up few days later.

They let couple of months go by and then again started the training in early February 2008. I was very much ready now and got the message in no time. Initially, I thought potty training was for pee-pee and not for poop.. But then with little more explanation and training and patience, I learnt that part too. I was potty-trained in 2-3 weeks. I am almost potty trained now. I say almost because sometimes instead of saying that I want to go pee, I would do the pee-pee dance :). Also, at night, I don't wake up my mom always. However, the fact that I am almost potty trained does make my parents very happy. It also makes me happy because I am a big girl now ! :)

My new found interest in stories

I have started getting very interested in stories. My parents tell me lots of different stories involving different animals and day-to-day activities. I love to hear them all. I make them tell me the same story so many times a day (especially at meal and bed time) that sometimes they loose their patience :) I can also repeat lot of those stories and that makes everyone very happy. Here are some of the stories that I have heard :

1. The crow and the fox
2. The lion and the mouse
3. The cap seller and the monkeys
4. Cinderella
5. Snow White and the 7 dwarfs
6. The zebra (Whitey) and his potty training
7. The giraffe (Patchy) and the lesson to not throw toys
8. The ball that kept jumping and making noise
9. Two cats and the monkey
10. The dog Tommy who played "Ring around the Roses" with his friends
11. Short stories involving Kavya, Khushi, Tanay, Daddy and Mommy
12. The fish Nemo who used to play hide & seek with its mommy
13. Five twinkle twinkle stars