The last three months

Playing in the kitchen as I work

So as the title suggests, it's been three hectic months since I updated the blog.

Here are some memorable moments -

In the beginning of June, we did a Thulaabhaaram in the local Guruvayoor temple where Atri was weighed on a large balance with bananas. Little did we know then that bananas would turn out to be his favourite food. He was surprisingly very calm as the priest laid him on one side of the balance.

I took Atri to stay at my mother's for the first time as he turned six months old and he displayed a very strong stranger anxiety, going to absolutely no one and clinging to me as though I would disappear in thin air. I almost cut short a weekly plan to a couple of days as I had to attend to all his needs without a break and was missing S desperately to relieve me. Thursday arrived and S gave us a big surprise by taking the day off and landing up in Mulund. Atri's bad boy phase vanished the moment he laid eyes on his dad. May be he was missing him too!

End June also brought home Atri's uncle Kaushik, from Philadelphia who spent a few days with us. Luckily Atri didn't display too much stranger anxiety this time. We also dared to take him to Rajdhani restaurant with baby in tow - after two minutes, his patience was exhausted and we took turns pushing him around the floor of the mall while the others attended to their delicious thaali.

We love our meal times

We started Atri on solid foods just as he turned six months old, going by the book. His first food was mashed bananas, liking both the green and yellow variety alike. Next in line was mashed boiled carrots, stewed apple and then many many more. In the last three months, Atri has tasted the following:
Cereals - Rice, Ragi, Sago, Rava
Fruits - Banana, apple, papaya, chikoo
Vegetables - Carrot, pumpkin, potato, sweet potato, beetroot
Others - Moong dal, Farley's rusk, Gerber's Oatmeal-apple-cinnamon, Gerber's Sweet Potato, Cow's milk, Rice Cerelac, bits of Marie biscuit, bits of Idli / dhokla
He has had them in all possible interesting combinations which is the subject of a different post altogether.

Me-Athai-Atri

My dad's sister, Lalli Athai came after 20 long years to India and she was nice to spend a day with us end July on her way back to the US. She got many cute clothes for Atri including an Auburn University jersey set :) He got along pretty okay with her I must say. However, he refused to stay quiet with my mom and sis the afternoon I stole out with Athai to take her shopping. They had to run to my house-help Nirmala's house to get her to quieten and mind him until I was back in the next one hour! My entire building and part of the neighbourhood came to know of this episode where a shopping-starved mom left her baby crying with her mother *red faced*

With my baby on Varca beach - Goa

After Athai's visit, it was time to prepare 'the big list' for our first travel with Atri. The last time I'd taken a flight out of Bombay was in November 2007, so it was a much awaited trip, first to Goa, then back home for a day, unpack, repack and off to Bangalore. We traveled Business three out of four flights. As we failed miserably in getting Atri to take to the bottle, and I had to nurse him during take off and landing, business class provided the much needed privacy. It was my first experience feeding in public. After the first flight though, I couldn't care much. But I do hope this was the last time I had to do it. Goa stay at Club Mahindra was fun. Atri enjoyed our taking him out at least five times a day if not more. We stayed mostly inside the resort, taking spa sessions, beach walks, admiring the landscaping in the resort and occasional buffet binging. We managed to stick to our diet most of the time though! Bangalore was good fun. Atri met another set of grandparents - Meera Athai and Athimber, who took very good care of us while we were there. S's parents were also there on a short break, so Atri met up him Paati after five months. S's dad had been with us for over a week end June as we were all down with flu / cold with no one to take care of us. Sadly, Atri did not show any extra familiarity to Thatha :)

Figuring out the Kinetic in Mysore

We went for a day trip to Mysore - the onward journey taking over five hours and turning out to be Atri's longest road trip. We met up with my aunt, uncle, cousins and my little nephew Sumedh making our trip worthwhile. The whole travel experience was very positive, and the next step is to shake off my laziness and get documents organized for Atri's PP - and get cracking on a peachy plan for a trip abroad.

The large living room in Meera Athai's house also injected a heavy dose of enthusiasm in Atri to get moving and he finally start creeping around. First hesitantly and then in all speed. Now he keeps rushing towards Nirmala's voice, any scraps of paper / plastic / threads and his stroller's wheels. He'll also do he needful to reach out to some of his favourite toys or their boxes.

August brought in the long-awaited visit of my in-laws from Chennai. They were in a day after we landed home from Bglr - so the hectic unpacking and clearing up the house was tiring enough to make me forget I'd gone for a vacation at all! Atri displayed his moody self to them despite spending a few days with them in Bglr. But there is progress and today I can leave him alone with them for a couple of hours, without breaking into a sweat. Atri's Paati has gotten two lovely personalised quilts made for him - Snow bunnies and Disney Friends. While Atri plays on his quilts - he'll realise how lovely they are once he's able to comprehend better and when he can read the alphabets. There's another alphabet quilt in the making. He's a lucky fella, what else!

I bought a cute pair of full denims from Mothercare with a comfy broad elastic waist band - I guess Atri will fit into it nicely by Diwali. Whenever I go shopping, there's only enough time to pick out Atri's clothes. Though I did have sometime inbetween to pick out a pair of skinny jeans for myself, to flaunt my new waist size :)

I have reached way below my pre-pregnancy weight, but as that wasn't my ideal weight to start with, I have a slight bit more to go. A diet and finding time for regular walks is helping and I hope to be a yummy-mummy soon (well, yummier)

Atri has started displaying affection generously - biting my chin or cheeks, patting my still jiggly belly and blowing BIG raspberries on it, which makes me burst out laughing. He can sit without support for some stretch of time and stands while holding onto hands or some support. He's very quick to sense that his dad is back from work / run, and coos as soon as he hears the doorbell ring, raising his arms up to daddy as soon as he spots him. His sleep has become disturbed and we fret about it a lot, but hey, I'm focusing on the positives here ;)

I hope to get regular on this blog as it's very tough trying to recollect what happened three months ago, as I'm realising now. Time is moving very fast and too much is happening too soon.

Atri - my little sweet potato, I'm falling more and more in love with you, as the days go by! God bless you my darling.

Nearly there

My mom and my son

Atri turns six months old on 4 June. And if times were flying fast earlier, now it's at supersonic speed.

I've come to know more people in my building in the last two weeks that I've been taking him down for a stroll, than I've known in the 3 and a half years that we've lived here - and I mean from ages 2 to 85 - not bad eh? How is it that a baby in your arms makes you more likable to others? More approachable rather. Earlier I was aware of only 3 kids other than Atri in the building and I just discovered there are two more, and the moms have been kind enough to offer me their no-longer-in-use strollers, Baby Bjorn etc. - not to mention tips to find a right maid and some more useful advice.

A baby is always a good starting point for a conversation, even with complete strangers. Besides, earlier I would never be loafing around the building in my free time, just to chumma hava khaane (just enjoy the breeze I mean) - of which there is plenty now a days. Thank God for a decently bearable summer with lovely sea breeze in the evenings - especially because my boy is pretty heat-intolerant, developing furuncles (boils) in his ear and now nose with some regularity. Antibiotic therapy is something we are growing used to, and I no longer lose sleep over the fact that my baby is being dosed on 'strong' medications. If we have to live in a polluted, hot and humid city, we just have to take this in our stride.

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We successfully spent a night by ourselves (Atri and me) - and I overcame my fear of staying the night alone with him (I thought I could only manage the daytimes). This was when S had to leave for a London trip for two weeks on a Sunday and my mom could make it here only Monday morning. Well, that is one fear less now (actually two, first one was fear of dosing antibiotics). My mom's time here was a good break for me, as in I could take a nap without keeping one eye and one ear open (if it is possible to nap like that) - she could spend some quality time with her grandson. Unfortunately it happened to coincide with some irritation in Atri's life (lets attribute that to teething for now) - and we started him on Denton homeopathic pills - which made him much sober and less keen to pounce & bite (with gums of course, no teeth yet) my ear, nose, chin or cheek, whichever was closest to his eager mouth. So I'm assuming he was in a kind of teething phase and the pills helped him cool off a bit. After that, it was more or less smooth sailing for granny and grandson. As much as I was waiting for S to come back and the two weeks to pass off soon, I was also sad that it would mean the end having mom around to free my hands and eyes for a while to do and see other stuff.

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Anyway, it's two weeks since then and we are back to being by ourselves. A building friend has kindly passed on her stroller to us. The first use of the stroller, which I discovered quite accidentally was when Atri napped off while being taken around the house in it, and this was when he was a bit cranky to sleep mid-morning. So I now use the stroller as method no. 79 to put him to sleep. This method has just placed itself one position higher than the earlier discovered 'Radio-gaga' method, wherein we had to start the FM radio (Worldspace Jazz channel or some soothing CDs wont work here) on full blast with surround sound in the living room, clear up the floor space and dance to the music wih Atri on shoulder until he fell asleep, unable to bear the torture of the St.Vitus' dance. This is was a foolproof method that worked 98.97% of the times. Only that it turned out difficult to use this for putting him to sleep at night after a good dinner, where a full belly presented an impediment to free-style dancing (with weights). So the stroller method turned out easier for times like these.

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At just over 5 months of age, Atri's become a big brother to my cousin's son Sumedh - who was born on May 6th. I can foresee a lot of bonding between the two boys as we are going to be living close to each other soon.

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We tried a dinner at a proper Italian restaurant with baby in tow a few days ago - we did all the things 'What to expect' asks us to do - Calling ahead, warning about baby, going in early etc. - and we managed to eat one course when he got fed up sitting on his bouncer chair throwing those little hangings around and we had to pack up and leave, only to finish the remaining food at home. I had the foresight to inform the waiter about this too. The restaurant was not to filled at that time and I didn't get any angry glances from people around, so I'm willing to try this again sometime. Otherwise, we went to the neighbouring Crepe Station for breakfast yesterday and it went pretty okay. My friend, S and me took turns holding him and eating, and Juhu people were busy sleeping at 9 am on a Sunday morning, so a few cries and no harm done. Another big event attended with Atri was my med college reunion on the last Sunday (24th May, coinciding with IPL finals). There was DJ music (very loud) and a big crowd (for us anything more than 3 is a crowd, and there were over 50-60 people there), S carrying Atri in his carrier. I managed to spend over an hour there catching up with classmates whom I hadn't met in the last 9 years. Most had come with their kids - and I was much appreicated for coming in with a small baby ;) and a very caring hubby! It was funny how the boys from my class (now big physicians and surgeons) were treating S like a damaadji telling him that "dinner will be ready soon", "don't leave without dinner" etc. A lot of contacts renewed and it felt superb that I could make it.

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I have also started doing some work off and on - taking up some writing assignments from friendly people who give me easier deadlines and accept my excuses like ' nanny joined and left' etc. More on that in the next post.

Some firsts

We've always been a social life loving couple - hardly staying at home on weekends. I'm not talking about gracing page 3 parties (even if someone invited us I mean), but going out to restaurants, movies, friends' places or getting friends home. Which restaurant to try out anew was a topic of much debate from Friday night onwards and we'd compete with each other to post the review on Burrp - our favourite restaurant review site. But things have changed so much in the last 4 months. Our last dinner together was on our anniversary a week before Atri was born at Mangi Ferra and since then we've been ordering out from places which are not exactly on our favourite list, or pleading / threatening some of our favourites to come the extra mile and deliver food home. Since last Sunday, things have taken a turn for the better - last Sunday we took Atri to our neighbourhood posh (air conditioned with dinner napkins) Udupi restaurant for breakfast. While we demolished the piping hot Upma-Shira and Masala Dosas (and filter kaapi), he managed to sleep to the instrumental music playing in the background. And you could spot the happiness on my face from a mile!!

The same week, my friend and me went out to a pub (that serves a wicked buffet lunch) with Atri in tow of course. While he wasn't as peaceful as he was in the breakfast episode, he was good enough to let me go up to the dessert course. As my friend tells me, expecting him to sleep each time we go out is asking for too much. As long as he is not crying loud enough to bring the place to a stand still and the people's glares are not burning holes into us, we are doing fine. Now I'm waiting to take him to the movies. Please pray that you are not a part of the crowd in the multiplex screen that we dare to hit for the first time with him ;)

We also took him to the lovely park in our neighbourhood, where S walked with him in his carrier and I walked by myself as fast as I could after the long break in physical exercise. I could see women give S appreciative glances as the daddy who's taking care of baby while letting mamma get her much needed dose of exercise. At this point I couldn't help remember the episode from Everybody Loves Raymond, where Ray takes the kids to the park one evening and amasses a fan base from all the moms struggling alone with their kids.

Atri has also been getting licks of my favourite fruits like apple, oranges and bananas, along with an occasional lick at Parle G biscuit. Instead of making him taste my current most favourite Ginger Nut McVities, I thought it's a better idea to make him get a taste of India's largest selling biscuit and instill a sense of patriotism in him.

He is not yet turning from back to tummy independently as his hand fixation continues, but a slightest nudge with my little finger does the trick and he enjoys lifting his head up to do a perfect bhunjangasan and explore the room around him. His sleeping hours at night are more or less fixed except for some unlucky days (for me) when he wakes up in 5 hours and makes loud hand-sucking sounds.

We're trying to introduce his toys one at a time so as not to overwhelm him. Otherwise, life nowadays is moving very fast and I'm trying hard to record the little things about our lives now that will be over too soon and I'll miss later.