Ishaan is concerned about mommy's schedule.. Can you believe it ?

I volunteer for Computer Lab at Kavya's school every Friday. Ishaan somehow knows this.
Now, tomorrow - Friday, December 6th is Ishaan's Winter program at his school. So, parents are asked to come and see as the kids sing different songs.

This evening Ishaan came up to me and asked "Mumma, is it going to be tricky for you tomorrow?"
I could not understand why he was asking that. So, I asked him "Why do you ask that?". He promptly replied "Because tomorrow my winter program and you have computer lab too". I was  pleasantly surprised that my almost 5 year old was concerned about how I will manage both of these things on the same day. I smilingly replied "No, it should be OK". He immediately asked "Is that because my program is in the morning and the computer lab is in the afternoon?". I smiled and nodded. He had a wide and innocent smile on his face.

I was very happy to see how concerned he was  because it tells me that even at this age, he realizes that parents have these conflicts when both kids have some activity on the same day.

Pressue of homework and tests in US Elementary Education

Kavya is in 2nd grade. For the past 2+ years of her Elementary education (KG, 1st grade, first couple of months of 2nd grade), I have never felt any pressure or stress due to her homework or tests. I have to push her to finish her homework, but that's just because she is interested in doing everything else first. Her homework has always been easy and simple. I always wished that the teacher gave more challenging homework to keep her busy and motivated. To that extent, I was also thinking that may be I could give some extra homework sheets to the teacher that she can give to Kavya as extra homework (without Kavya realizing that it came from me :) )

This changed all of a sudden yesterday. I got an email from Kavya's teacher that they have a Social Studies test on Friday. So, she will be sending some papers and the text book home for the kids to review and she requested parents to go over the material with kids. She also said that the test will be in a different format than what the kids are used to and that she will allow them to refer to their books for this first test. The email got me serious (probably more serious than I should be) So, after dinner, I sat down with Kavya to review the materials. The test was regarding Unit#2 which was about 70-80 pages long. I started reading the pages with Kavya and asking every possible question to test her. We covered about 20 pages when I realized that both of us were tired. So, I told her that we will finish the rest of the pages the next day.

After finishing the social studies review, Kavya said she needs to practice 50-in-a-minute. Since those are getting harder (both due to level of difficulty and due to the time limit), Kavya wants to practice every day to make sure that she clears the level during every Thursday test.

After she finished both sides of 50-in-a-minute practice, I remembered that she had Library on Thursdays and so she would have to return both of her borrowed books. But she had only read one of them and she wanted to read it again. I could see how tired she was. So, I told her to read it later.

After all this, when I went to sign her homework folder, I realized that she hadn't done 10 minutes of Lexia. There was no time for it since it was late and Kavya was very tired. So, I did not mention it.

Then today, I spent almost another hour with her to finish reviewing the book for her Social Studies test - asking her multiple questions along the way. Although I knew Kavya would do well in the test and that the tests here are not as grilling, the Indian mom in me wanted to make sure Kavya knew the entire unit properly :)

After finishing the review, she spent 15-20 minutes doing Lexia on the computer (the homework that wasn't done from yesterday).

She can also take 2 AR (Accelerated Reading) tests during their computer labs on Monday and Friday. That's how they meet their allocated target goal for AR. While Kavya has already reached her target of 8 points, I always ask her to have 2 books that she can take the test on. That way she will read and identify books she want to test on. After all the studies yesterday and today, there was no time to read a book for the AR test. So, without tiring both of us any further, I decided to call it a day.

For the first time, I felt like there was too much going on in school. Reading books for the monthly reading log and AR tests, everyday homework, 50-in-a-minute practice and tests every Thursday, Spelling Word test every Friday, Lexia and Dreambox practice on the computer at home and Accelerated Math (AM) is starting this week and to top it is this Social Studies test for each unit that they finish. Oh.. and not to forget the monthly book project and the monthly poems :)

Studies are starting to get busy. I wonder how will we manage once both kids get in this phase ? Hopefully, Kavya will manage her own things by then :)

Ishaan wants to be a race car driver when he grows up. Guess why ?

Today morning, when I was driving Ishaan to school, we had an interesting conversation.

Ishaan : Mamma, I am going to be a race car driver when I grown up.
Me : Why ?
Ishaan : So then I don't have to go to work everyday!
Me : Why do think that you won't have to go to work everyday ?
Ishaan : Because races don't happen everyday.
Me : But you have to practice everyday. Only then you can be good at it.
Ishaan : But I don't care if I don't win a trophy.
Me (Trying hard not to burst out laughing) : But they will not let you race if you are not good. They will kick you out.
Ishaan : Oh, Is that how it works ?
Me (Smiling away) : Yes, you have to practice everyday.

So interesting how kids think and reason :)

Ishaan's excuse that made me laugh

Most of the times when kids come up with excuse for not doing something, I get mad. But this one made me laugh.

Ishaan was trying to fill-up an entire page with dots using crayons. After he made lot of dots, he started complaining that his hands are getting tired. So, I told him to take a break and just go walk around the house. His prompt response was "But then my legs will be tired". So, I said "OK. don't go walk.. just go and sit on the sofa". His response right away "But then my butt will be tired. They get all sweaty when I sit for a long time".

I couldn't stop laughing :)

Kids do talk when you listen

Recently, Gaurav started listening to this audio book titled "How to talk so kids will listen and Listen so kids will talk". He liked it very much and suggested that I read it too. He put it on kindle for me to take when I went on a business trip couple of weeks back. While I was able to only read first couple of chapters, it did inspire me to be more patient when dealing with kids.

One of the evenings this week, I gave a 50-in-a-minute sheet to Kavya for practice (They have these sheets with 50 addition/subtraction problems for various levels and they try to complete those in 90 seconds). Now, Ishaan loves Math and is also able to do these problems - although not as fast. He was working on a lower level sheet at the same time. He kept talking while he was doing it and that bothered Kavya since she was being timed. She got mad, shouted at Ishaan, threw her pencil and walked out crying. Ordinarily, we would be upset with Kavya for being upset about such a small thing. But for a change, I asked Gaurav to keep Ishaan away and went and talked patiently with Kavya without being mad. I hugged her and let her cry a little. I told her that even with all that disturbance, she was doing fine and would have completed the sheet with plenty of time left. In a little while, she opened up and started talking.

She said that Ishaan was learning things much faster than she did at his age. Like he learned to bike without training wheels at 4.5 years age, while she learned it when she was 5.5 yrs and that he was also so good at Maths. I told her not to compare like that and that Ishaan is learning fast because of her... that he looks up to her and wants to do the same things as her. I told her she was smart and that she is older and can do the Math problems much faster.

That was when I realized 2 things :

• How important it is to give your kids a chance to open up !! Being patient and keeping ears open with welcoming arms is so important - especially in our fast paced lives !!

• We always assumed that Kavya was happy to see Ishaan's progress. Her previous reactions always suggested that. But I am glad she shared her thoughts that made us realize that she was seeing this as a competition. So, we need to be careful in our words and actions - try not to compare the kids and encourage each of them in their own ways. It also made us realize that although she is the older sister, she is still little !

I am going to try and practice listening more !!
Often times its hard.. but the hope is practice will make it easier

How far back do kids remember ?

Ishaan started school at Montessori Way when he was 2.5 years old (July 2011). He went there for little over a year before we shifted him to Challenger last year (Aug 2012). He was pretty set and happy at Montessori way. He loved his teachers and enjoyed his days there.

During the entire last year, we talked about Montessori way and the teachers some times, but we never visited the school. For this summer break, I figured it would be best to send Ishaan to Montessori school since it was familiar environment. When I went there with Ishaan to enroll him last month, he stayed very close to me and he seemed to not recognize his teachers or school building/classroom.

That surprised me quite a bit and made me wonder "How far back do kids remember?". I am sure each kid is different and some events/memories stick with them while others don't. May be at 4.5 years of age, it is hard to remember things from 1 year ago. I guess if we had visited the school in between and kept in touch with the students/teachers during that year, he might have remembered it.

He has been going there for about 3 weeks now, and while everyone is nice, he still doesn't like it as much as he used to like it before. He does not want to let go of me or Gaurav (whoever drops him off) and asks to be picked up early. Although, when I go to pick him up, he seems fine and happy.

Along the same lines, Kavya often says things like "Remember when I was 5, we did xyz...". While her recollection of xyz is accurate, the age is totally off. We might have done that when she was 3 or 4 or even 6. So, it seems that even if they remember things, they don't have the right concept of time/age associated with it.

It is also interesting how photographs help them remember. I have selected photos printed and nicely stored in photo albums and kids often pull out an album to look at their younger selves. And from time to time, they talk about some events from the past that they remember based on the photos they have seen.

When I try to remember my childhood, I only have few memories from 6-8 years range. Most of my memories are from when I was little older. I guess some memories fade away to make room for new ones :)

Very fascinating how human brain works !!

Ishaan learns to bike without training wheels !

Ishaan had out grown his 10 inch bike. So, we thought its a good time to teach him to bike without training wheels on that bike since his feet fully touched the ground.

Our good friend Shailee loaned us the bike handle that makes it easy to run after the kids as you teach them to bike without training wheels. Ishaan liked the idea. We started using it in May .. used it for a week, but didn't see much improvement. Then we had a couple of weeks of break and then started again in the first week of June. The first day it was the same as before.. but then the second day, Ishaan was able to paddle a couple of times without any help.We all were very excited. Gaurav, Kavya and I encouraged Ishaan and he wanted to bike more and more. He continued to improve over the next couple of days.

June 6th was the last day of school. So, he practiced some more on June 7th and at this point, he was able to ride quite a bit (couple of rounds on the road in front of our house) on his own.

That called for a celebration ! We went to Yogurtland to celebrate the milestone :)

Since then, he has continued to practice and has become more and more confident - even going up and down the ramps.

So proud of my 4.5 year old !! Looking forward to go on longer family bike rides !!

Kavya wants her own room

Recently, we got new curtains and paint in most of the rooms. We put blue and grey in the guest room upstairs and told the kids that it will be Ishaan's room when they got little older. We put purple on 3 walls and green on the other wall (where Ishaan's bed is) in the kids room that they shared. We also put some flower decals on Kavya's wall and some cars and trucks decals on Ishaan's wall. The room looks very beautiful.

After we put the cars and trucks decals, Kavya immediately asked, "Can we move those decals to Ishaan's room when he moves to his room?". We smiled and nodded.

Then yesterday, Kavya came upto me and asked "Mommy, when will Ishaan move to his room ? I want my own room." I couldn't believe that my little girl has grown up so much. I guess the day when she would have her own room is not very far.

Ishaan is getting smarter in dealing with Kavya

Kavya has figured out ways to manipulate Ishaan and get her way. She would say, "If you give me X, I will draw car for you".. OR "If you do Y, I will make a goodie for you at CDC" and Ishaan would listen to her.

Today morning, I took out 2 sand timers (both pink) and gave them one each and told them that they need to use it to monitor how long to brush. Kavya looked at hers and asked Ishaan if she could have his. She explained that she wanted Ishaan's because it had a "Made in China" sticker at the bottom. Ishaan looked at Kavya's timer and said "No, I don't want yours. It's broken." Kavya gave a cunning smile.

I realized that Kavya knew that hers was slightly broken and that was why she wanted to exchange. But she couldn't fool Ishaan this time.

Ishaan is getting smarter and getting ready to be a good match to his older sister :)

Ishaan's fascination for coins

Ishaan loves coins and money. The moment he sees any coin or money, his eyes glow and he has a wide smile ! Not sure why - may be because we started giving them coins for getting them to follow the routine during crazy morning hours...

Earlier, if we gave him coins, he only cared about the number of coins.. not the value. So, if we gave him 10 pennies, he would be happy. But instead if we gave him 2 nickles, he would be upset that he only got 2 coins. But now, he understands that 2 nickles is 5+5=10 cents. Kid is getting smarter..

We used this fascination to get him to like hiking. Last year, he wouldn't want to walk at all when we went for hiking. But then recently, we started throwing pennies every 5 minutes or so on the trail and help him find them to keep him going. He thinks that God throws them for him and looks forward to hiking. Even at the Spring Program at his school, he announced "Hi ! My name is Ishaan and I like to go hiking." :)

I also offered him 10 cents if he slept in his own bed the whole night. It worked for couple of days mostly because he was so tired that he didn't wake up at night. But the 3rd night, he came to sleep with me in the middle of night and while he was settling down, he asked "Mommy, will you still give me 10 cents in the morning?" :)

Good or not, bribing him with few cents to get something done is working like a charm right now. If we forget to give him coins that we promised for certain thing, he remembers and doesn't let it go till we actually give it to him. He goes and put them in his piggy bank.

We have recently introduced the concept of putting money in a real bank where you can earn interest to him and Kavya. He is very fascinated by that since we told them that we will match whatever money/savings they put in the bank account :)

Value of Money

Often times I find myself struggling, trying to figure out how to teach the value of money to kids these days ? There is so much abundance - too  many pencils, erasers, toys, electronic devices, etc .. that I feel they don't understand that all these cost money and that parents are working hard for that. They just take everything for granted. If something breaks or gets lost, they are very quick to say that its OK, we will buy new one.

Here is another example .. Kavya buys lunch from school twice a week - Mondays when they have PBJ and Thursdays when they have cheese pizza. The other days they usually don't have good vegetarian choices. The lunch costs about 3$. The other days I give her lunch from home. One or two times a week, I give her indian food like roti-shaak burrito .. and she definitely prefers the junk pizza, etc over it. This week, they had grilled cheese on Friday in the menu. So, she wanted to buy lunch from school on Friday too. I didn't want her to get into a habit of buying from school whenever they had her favorite food. So, I told her that you can buy twice a week. If you want to buy on Friday, you take lunch from home on Thursday (instead of pizza at school). However, she wanted both. So, I explained her in terms of money. I told her that we spend $6 every week for your lunch from school. So, you have to manage within that. That is your budget. She was quick to respond that if she buys on Friday too, it will be "only" $9 for that week and that is not too much. Gaurav and I struggled for a few mins after that to explain her that $9 is too much .. It will take her over an hour of hard work to earn that. Even then, I don't think she got it. ** Sigh **

Kids can let go so easily...

Kavya and Ishaan often get into a fight.. it may be verbal where they both warn each other that they will never talk to the other person or not do xyz for them ever again.. Or it could get physical - hitting each other, calling names along with the verbal warnings.

Gaurav and I often interrupt their fights and scold the one who we think was as fault. Sometimes, it gets frustrating when they cry and argue...

Often times we have noticed that a few minutes after a big fight, Kavya and Ishaan are merrily playing together again. It was as if the fight never happened. And then we wonder why did we interrupt and scold ?

It is amazing how kids tend to forget their fights and differences and get back to playing together within minutes. Too bad grown ups cannot do it that easily.. Grown ups tend to hold grudges forever :)

Kids are growing up

In today's busy life, we are always on the run. Running for school, work, classes or social events .. that also means kids have to keep up and if they act up and don't comply, often times we loose patience and get angry. But then when you take some time and think about it, you realize they are only kids.. you cannot expect them to run with you all the time. They need to do things at their own pace and sometimes they need to do things their own way too.

When kids give hard time for certain things, I always say to myself, " It's a phase.. it will pass soon". Sometimes that helps.. Other times I loose it.

Kavya is now 7 and Ishaan is 4. Looking back, so many things have become easy now.. Kids are growing up.. and they are growing up fast. Often times, that makes our lives easier. Here are few things that have made me realize this..

• Brushing teeth used to be a big struggle with Ishaan, but he is much better now. He still has his days of push back, but its less and less.
• Kavya can take a shower and get dressed by herself. (However,  sometimes she does argue to wear different clothes than what I pick out - At times, I argue back and at other times, I let her win :) )
• Going out for dinner is so much easier - Recently, we had great experience going to Scramblz, Chaat cafe and In-N-Out. Both kids ate by themselves and did not create any mess or fuss. It was indeed a memorable change.
• Kavya eats by herself all the time now.. even the Indian meal (rotli-daal-bhaat-shaak). Ishaan still needs help with certain items, but does eat on his own at least 50% of the time. Best part is breakfast - after getting ready, both kids run downstairs and eat their milk and cheerios all by themselves..
• Kavya and Ishaan are playing together more often. With Ishaan growing up a little, there are more things that they are able to agree on and play together. The other day, they arranged all of Ishaan's cars and trucks to form 2 teams and setup bad guys Vs the good guys fight. Kavya also tries to please Ishaan more often than not -she perhaps does not like to hear him cry since he can be very annoying when he does that :). They do have their fair share of fights - both physical and verbal.. but that's only normal.
• They have both outgrown TV shows like Dora and Caillou. Ishaan's favorite is "Chuck and friends" and Kavya enjoys "Phineas and Ferb" and "Good luck, Charlie"
• Kavya has become very matured and understands things. She can also manipulate Ishaan to do things her way :). She is also fond of combing her hair and putting fancy clips all by herself.

.. and the list goes on. While I am happy, I am also afraid - I don't want them to grow up too fast..

Being a stay-at-home mom

I have recently taken on a new role at work - its a new product, new team, new manager and new role. While it was not much of a choice, I was looking for change - so it worked out well. Due to this new role, work has become quite hectic. I have meetings early morning and sometimes late at night. Also, I don't get much time at work to do anything else - walk or catch up on news or learn new technology. Few days back, I also had to go to Costa Mesa for 2 days. While it was only 2 days, it does need lot of prep due to kids routine and school.

Being a stay-at-home mom has often crossed my mind, but I have discarded it thinking I will go crazy if I stayed home all day long with kids. But now, with this busy schedule, I often find myself scrambling for time - for kids and family, for home and for myself. The TODO list keeps growing and the everyday rush continues. It brings back the idea of being a stay-at-home mom. Is it really for me ? Can I do it ?

I have heard from friends that being a stay-at-home mom makes life less stressful for everyone. I can understand why. But I also feel that staying home all day, taking care of house and kids, can get boring. It has its own rewards and merits, but I think it will not provide the kind of satisfaction and self-respect that job does. While I don't feel pressed to work for money, it does give a sense of independence when you can go out and make money. In more ways that one, going to work is satisfying and keeps mind healthy.

The other option to consider is work part-time. While that seems good on paper, it is hard to find a job where working part-time really means less work. Often times, when you change to part-time, your job and responsibility stays the same, only your compensation changes.

Kudos to moms who are able to maintain their sanity and support the family needs by being a stay-at-home or part-time working mom. I just feel like its not for me - not at this time .. May be if it continues to be super busy at work, this might change.

2013 India Trip

We were a little skeptical about our India trip this time since both kids got sick and we had to cut short our last India trip. We were little hopeful at the same time since the kids had grown up a little since our last visit.

Overall, we had a good India trip this year. It was great to meet family and friends. Everyone was so welcoming and loving - the kids felt right at home and easily mixed in with everyone.

They had nothing much to do. So, they kept themselves busy with various screens : TV, phone and ipad. They became fan of Chotta Bheem cartoon and watched it everyday. They also enjoyed watching the various ads and picked up punch lines like "Ehh , Du kya" from poppins and "Mummy khatam" from Quaker oatmeal ad.

We had planned a 3 day trip to Kumbhalgadh and Shreenathji. However, just an hour into the road trip, both kids complained of stomach ache and Ishaan even threw up. So, we took a U-turn and came back. Glad we did, because Ishaan had very bad diarrhea that day. Also, it was very cold in Khumbhalgadh. So, we felt good about our decision and got some time to relax and socialize.

Kids had fun playing games with the society kids. They would play "Stop and Party" which is very much similar to hide and seek and ride bike/scooter. Kids also loved it when anyone would give them a ride on Motor bike or Activa - they were both ever ready to go out.

Gaurav had a couple of sick days - got diarrhea and then some cold/fever. So, overall kids did better than Gaurav on this trip :)

We celebrated Ishaan's 4th birthday there with all the friends from the society. The highlight of the party was the pony ride. We got a person to bring his horse for an hour and the kids took turns at riding on the pony on the society road. Kavya and Ishaan were super excited and had lot of fun. The next thing Ishaan enjoyed was a Chotta Bheem chocolate cake.We had ordered pizza from Dominoes. At the end of day, everyone had fun and we were glad we celebrated on a smaller scale.

Gaurav and Kavya returned on Jan 13th. Ishaan and I stayed back for Tulsi's wedding. We enjoyed Uttarayan on Jan 14th (although it wasn't very windy and Ishaan was more interested in the food I had packed for him than in kites :) ) and also the wedding. We were able to go to all the marriage festivities. Ishaan mingled well with all his cousins. The games on phone kept them busy and also gave me some time to meet and greet friends and relatives. I was also able to go for some shopping during the last week. Having the driver was a big help.

For the first 2 weeks, Ishaan just listened and absorbed all the Gujarati that was spoken around him and then starting 3rd week, he started talking in Gujarati. Although slightly broken, he speaks Gujarati/English mixed and looks very cute when searching for right words to form his sentence. He has continued speaking in Gujarati even after coming back - lets see how long it lasts.

The plane journey both ways went pretty good - again Thanks to the private screen in Singapore air - the kids were entertained throughout with their choice of movie and episodes.

Overall, a good trip.. lot of good memories.. good experience for kids as well. Looking forward to the next trip.