25 August 2012 - Surprise Baby Shower

               When I woke up this morning, I thought today would be just another Saturday. Day went on as a leisurely week end day, we didn't go out for shopping since it was already done last evening. I didn't force your dad to take us out, he too needs a day totally off once in a month or so. 

               We just cleaned the house as usual and in the afternoon your granny wanted to prepare Gulab Jamuns for us. I didn't know why she was adding more water to the batter and then to make the batter proper, she was adding some more powder and then again batter was too thick and some more water and some more powder and finally we prepared more than 60 Jamuns in it! Mom said we can give some to friends too. There were a few over ripe bananas and mom gave the idea of making Mangalore buns and we could skip that day's dinner. Your dad said that is fine and even buns prepared were a lot because there were many bananas, had to finish them somehow. 

               In the evening your dad got a phone call from somebody and after some time he asked me if we could go for a walk. We do go for walks sometimes and your granny didn't want to join us. We walked near the spa and sat there with our feet dipped in water. There was a nice breeze late in the evening and sat for half an hour. Since your dad has never taken me to spa earlier and he was not even willing to go home so soon, I was wondering what was wrong with him! After few minutes, he got a call again and told me one of his colleagues was calling. Since there was the noise of water falling, he got up and went away to talk on the phone. Then we returned home and there was a bi......g surprise waiting for me. 

               I noticed a few pairs of shoes near the door and immediately heard the "SURPRISE!!!" cry from inside the house. Our living room was all decorated with pink balloons and baby shower board and hangings saying it's a girl! I could find Chaitrakka (by the time you read this blog you might be calling her Chaitra atte or Chaitra doddamma), Ashwin and Anvi, Prasanna and Sunita aunty, Dhaval, Manali aunty and Rishab, your dad's colleagues Purushottam and Priya, Shireesh and Tejaswini aunty and of course your granny dressed in saree. (When we went for for walk, she was in Choodidar). I turned towards the table and it was filled with fooood! Oats - Rava Idli, Lemon Rice, Mangalore Buns, Gulab Jamuns, Potato Chips, Coke, Watermelon pieces, paper plates, bowls, glasses, napkins and there was a big chocolate cake with a cute pink baby bassinet in it and Congratulations written on it. (I am writing this blog 4 days after the baby shower and still somehow could't cut the bassinet from the cake and eat it! It's just too cute to cut). We then had a little chitchatting, I was sent inside to wear saree and then your granny and Chaitrakka took 'aarati' for your dad and me. They put kumkum on our foreheads and dinner followed that. Then came the cake cutting part followed by a lot of talk and play with Anvi. Everyone enjoyed playing with your Anvi akka. Looking at her, I was even eager to see you at her age. 

               So that was my Surprise Baby Shower. Your dad and Granny had done a good acting to keep it a secret from me! Chaitrakka and Ashwin had taken a lot of trouble arranging it. After dinner when you started dancing inside me, I knew for sure that you thoroughly enjoyed your party!

16 August 2012 - Granny has arrived

               I had an appointment with my doctor yesterday.

               Your grand mother has come from India 2 days ago to America to welcome you! She and your dad were with me when I went to the hospital yesterday. Your heart beat is 150 per minute. Your granny didn't realize it at first that she was hearing your heartbeat. But later when she got to know that, there was a broad smile on her face!

               Your granny has brought a lot of eatables for you and I make it reach you. America is new to her and she still has not come out of jet lag. Her supplies from India for her grand daughter includes frocks, towels, bed sheets, baby blankets, pillow for you, clothes, bangles, 'kaadige', powder dabba, puff, socks, frilled under wears and so on... Some 'arishtas', 'lehas' and ayurvedic medicines for me to take and once again that is for your growth. She also has brought colour papers, gift wraps, paints, colour threads and feathers for me to make a baby scrap book. So indirectly even that is for you along with all the food items she has brought! She is my mom and not even a single item exclusively for me! How can I not be jealous when all the attention I used to get is diverting from me to you?!

My Childhood Story Told by my Parents to me

               I was too small to remember this particular incident, so this story was told to me by my parents. It happened long ago when I was 2 years old or so. My parents, Brother and I had gone to a circus show in Mangalore. In the row, towards my right side, my family was sitting and towards my left, the was a lady wearing her 'Burkha'. Her face was also covered and I didn't realize that there is a human being in it until she started moving. That was when I got terrified, moved closer to my parents saying, "there is something black next to me and I think there is a creature in it, because it is moving!" The lady's husband understood why I was scared and with a smile he made his wife remove the cover from her face! 

Pictures

YOUR DAD'S 30th B'DAY GIFTS

AND 

Discovery on Agarbatti

               All of us have done a lot of discoveries during our childhood. Some of them might have lead us into trouble and some have taught us new things. At the end of it, these discoveries are the ones made us who we are today!

               This new discovery of mine was made way back in 1993 or 1994, when I was still in my 2nd or 3rd standard. My parents were not at home, I don't remember where my brother and grand mother were. I was wearing a skirt, which was bought for me to wear on my brother's "Upanayana" ceremony, and it was over long before then. I found an Agarbatti (Oodubatti) somewhere and had lit it and holding it. That was when I accidentally touched my skirt with it and was surprised to see the beautiful tiny hole it made on my skirt. I discovered that, it is very easy to make holes with agarabatti and they come exactly in round shape! Creative side of my brain worked then and I made hundreds of same sized round holes around my skirt. Had done it very neatly and beautifully in circles on my skirt and I was very happy with my new achievement. But the broad smile of achievement remained on my face only till my mother came home and found all the holes on my skirt! So I don't have to say what happened after that, but never did I try it on my clothes again!

Brother's Essay on Mosquito

               I have already mentioned in my previous post about an essay my brother wrote on mosquito. If you haven't read the mention of it in my previous blog post, here is a little introduction about it. 

               When I was 9 - 10 years old, I was asked to write an essay on a Kannada proverb, "Kai Kesaraadare Baayi Mosaru" (Implied Meaning : Hard work pays you rich dividends. Literal Meaning : When your hands get dirty (while working) your mouth will be filled with food). That had to be written on my neatly covered and maintained essay book. I started with the introduction and wrote "if we sit at home with our hands folded and still, ..." and that was when my mother called me to the kitchen. My brother was completing his home work in the same room when I left from there. After some time when I came back, this is what I read in my essay book, under the heading "Kai Kesaraadare Baayi Mosaru" :

               "If we sit at home with our hands folded and still, (it was my hand writing till here) mosquito might come and bite our hand. Then we will have to forcefully open the folded hand and move it. But by the time we move it or shake, the mosquito might fly away. That might make us very sad. So there can be another method to keep our hands. You need to keep them on your waist, so that when a mosquito bites one hand, you can move the other hand slowly from your waist and hit on the mosquito. And that is when the mosquito gets killed successfully and that might make you extremely happy! So I can conclude that keeping hands on your waist is always better than folding them. Moral : Kattida kai mahaa maari, sontada melina kai santhoshakke daari (Folded hands are very problematic and hands on the waist are the way to happiness)!

My Treasure Box

               Everyone has his or her own unique childhood memories, I consider them as personal treasures. Some memories might have brought tears in our little eyes, but once we grow up they make us smile and are priceless. As many people, even I have a treasure box of my own, which looks like a garbage box to my brother, mother and father. What my family calls with various names like "Uma's bhandaara", "Uma's kasada raashi", "Uma's santhe", "Uma's haragana" or "Uma's kaatu kattale", it has a different name is my dictionary and that is "Uma's Treasure Box"! I am planning to dedicate this post in my blog exclusively for this little box of mine! Though my family has been laughing about my treasure box ever since I was five years old, I have not let them throw it away till today. When I got married and went to my husband's house with my belongings, it had become a new subject for my brother to laugh at saying, "why don't you take your 'bhandaara' with you?" But all those memories belong to the place where I was born and brought up, it will remain there forever and I don't let anyone touch them even now.

               Anyway, that was an introduction to my little priceless treasure. Let me now give you an insight to my box. First of all, I am very proud of the hundreds of colorful feathers in it. I collected them during my school days and that reminds me of the shouting I used to get each and every day from dad for roaming in the forest on the way home from school. That was the reason I used to reach one and half hour after my brother's arrival at home though we used to leave our school at the same time. But I am still very proud of those colourful original feathers in my box ranging from 2 cm to 25 cm. It still makes me smile when I remember my dad's unsuccessful attempts to stop this habit of mine by saying "birds don't take bath everyday".

               The next treasures in the box are a few nests I collected after the birds flew from them. I had to hide them near the jeep shed since it was not allowed inside the house. I did try to hang them on the trees and make the birds re use them. But none of the birds accepted them.

               Then there are a few of our childhood drawings. These are the drawing of my cousins, my brother and my own. Most of them are cartoons and our childhood hero characters from our story books. They are not drawn on a neat drawing sheet, but drawn on regular paper pieces and I get to see scribbles behind them. I get to see the way how my and my brother's signature changed in the course of time!

               Also there are a few poems I had composed and a few pages of my childhood diary. Poems are absolutely in free verse, no rhyming words in it, nor any subject. And sometimes, the subject has nothing to with the poem. So I can now say that those are modern poems and it is left to the reader to find meaning in it! These poems make even my parents smile now.

               If you still keep opening my treasure box, you can find a few favourite chocolate wraps, neatly pressed under a book. I had preserved some to show my dad after eating some particular chocolates, so that dad could get the same chocolate next time. We were not allowed to eat chocolates without wrap, so some were preserved to prove that the chocolates I ate did have wrap and are of 'campco' company!

               Next comes a few old stamps, but some of them were not postage stamps. I had not realized it then. So it was collected and preserved. I also have a huge collection of greeting cards we got.

               When I became a little older, I started collecting pictures of a favourite writer of mine. Though I haven't read many of his books, I have a great respect for Dr. Shivarama Karanth and collection of his pictures was the outcome of it. 

               I also have a few torn pages of stupid essay my brother wrote on my essay book in my absence to get me in trouble by the teacher. That reminds me of the time he wrote it. I had a homework of completing my kannada essay on Kannada proverbs and had started with the first line of introduction. That was when my mom called me to the kitchen for some work. My brother was sitting in the same room and when I returned from kitchen, the essay was complete. And the entire essay was written about a mosquito that bit him! Anyone can imagine the huge fight we had that day, and the complaint went to parents and the deserved person got punished too. But today when I read that angrily torn page of my essay book, it brings a huge smile on my face! 

                You can also find peacock feathers kept safely under the pages along with a few pieces of paper for the feathers to eat and grow. Because that was what my friends and I believed back then, that if we feed peacock feathers with paper pieces, they don't just grow in size, but also in numbers! Since I didn't keep an exact count of how many feathers were there when I kept them in my book, I can't say it if the number of feathers has increased. 

               So the list of items in my treasure box goes on from a stick I hid (so that nobody would find it to hit me) to dry flowers (which I had found beautiful) from various years. I had considered all these items as a treasure, I am considering it so even now and I will call it treasure in the future too. Because my childhood is exclusively mine and I don't want to forget these tiny funny details of it ever! 

2 August 2012 - Hospital Tour, Regular Visit, Hiccups and New Clothes

Hospital Tour on 31 July 2012 (Methodist Willow-brook Hospital) :

               On 31st July, we had a tour to the Methodist Willow-brook Hospital where you will be born in another 5-6 weeks. Our appointment was at 7 pm and it was really nice to "fit in the group" of big belly women! I was not the odd one out for once, all the other 15 women had equally big stomach as mine. Some had even bigger ones! And your dad was one among the other 15 future fathers. It was exciting to see the labor room, after delivery rooms and newborn nursery where we could even see the little ones. All the guidance and instructions were given to us, made us really get the mood of welcoming you and made us eager to see you. 

Regular Visit on 1 August 2012 (Your head has come to position) : 

               

               We had our regular hospital visit (Northwest Women Center) today and I was expecting just the usual check up. But after testing, doctor had a good news for us, that you are already in upside down position! So you are no longer going to keep turning in my womb. You have already come to the birthing position and settled there. No wonder I have been feeling a little bump on the upper side of my belly. It is the size of peeled coconut and so far I thought it is your head. But now I know what it is! Whenever you trouble me, you made it easier for me to hit on your butt! Your heart beat is 150 per minute as always and my baby bump measures 33 cm. And your kicks are still wonderful and welcoming no matter how many times you woke me up early in the mornings.

Felt your hiccups today :

               It was a funny feeling when you started fluttering rhythmically inside my stomach. I kept wondering for a few minutes about your new kind of light kicks. But then I realized, since your legs were up, tickling below my naval can not be the kicks. Then I realized that you were hiccuping. I could feel your entire body shaking and the time gap between hiccups was very short. It was too cute, but after 10 - 15 minutes when it still continued, I could say that you were getting irritated. Your kicks began, you were restless and I didn't know what to do to calm you down. Gently patting on you didn't help, so I had to experiment. Drank water, ate a dosa, drank lime juice. Somehow slowly it stopped after some time. But I don't know if it stopped because I ate and drank or it just stopped naturally. But altogether it was a new, cute experience. When I checked in the internet, it was given that hiccups are very very normal for the babies in the womb. 

New Clothes for a New Baby :

               It was another nice thing for today to receive the courier of newborn clothes set! I couldn't stop staring and touching and holding those tiny little clothes with a broad smile on my face. I was lost imagining you in those little pants and hats till your dad came home from office! Then it was his turn to examine them. It was a set of  5 creepers, 3 gowns, 2 body suits, 4 pants, 3 hats and 4 pairs of mittens. We can use it till you are 6 months old and I can't wait to see you in these clothes!