Perfect day!

To me, a day that starts with music and ends with books is a perfect day. It doesn’t matter what happens during the day. That’s not totally in my control and I really can’t expect everyday to be the same. But I guess we can hope for the start and end to be peaceful. After marriage, for about two years before the baby was born, this was how my life was. First thing in the morning, I would keep the milk on the stove and switch on the TV for what else but M.S. amma’s voice. The early morning breeze combined with hot filter coffee and M.S. amma’s voice in the background was divine. Once the baby was born, sleep was the only thing that was divine. :)

What makes me happy these days is that I have transferred the same ritual to my son without my consciousness. He loves M.S. amma’s voice and can listen to her songs for an hour. (I am not kidding.) Once he wakes up, the day starts with 'Bhaja Govindam', followed by 'Vishnu Sahasranamam'. If time permits, a few of her famous songs follows. There are about 20 songs that my son loves in her voice. (We will ignore the fact that this is more a selfish motive and I finish off my morning chores during that time. We are concentrating on spiritual experience here. :))

In the evening, I take him to the park or a walk in our street and then finish off the home work activities given by therapists. All this goes until 8 p.m. And then I loudly say ‘Book Time’, he flashes his 1000 watts smile and keeps saying ‘ook ime’ until I actually give him all the books. I then go to kitchen to have dinner. After five minutes, he will bring a book to the kitchen and ask me to read it. Once we have the read book for 5-6 times, he will go and bring another book. This routine continues until I finish my dinner, clean vessels and cut the vegetables for next day. After which I sit with him to read some more books. :)

I hope I am able to continue this for all the years to come.

My son,

I guess few years down the line, I would be more than happy if the day ends with you reading “text books” :) Yes, I am a normal mother who expects her son to take the IIT – IIM route.
Hey, what happened? Why did you fall down? :)

So, readers, What is your perfect day?

Week of milestones

A couple of days back, I looked at the calendar to realize that November had come to an end and it was December, last month of the year. I was lost in my own thoughts for a couple of minutes. It was a realization that I had actually faced every single day of this year, which I dreaded early in the year and how far my child had come. There were days I wished that all the troubles were actually dreams and I will wake up one fine day just to know everything was perfectly normal. Life is not easy that way, is it?

Well, I am drifting from what I wanted to write. This is definitely not a year-end post. This post is about last week and truly a milestone week in terms of my child’s progress.

My son,

Milestone 1:
I had blogged earlier about how you had not settled in group therapy. Well, you did settle down a few weeks back. And then I had to travel to Chennai for a week. So, I wanted to see how you would react after the break. You were absolutely fine the next class too. The next week the therapist was on leave and again I was concerned. But you were fine. And then I stopped taking you on other days and wanted to see how you would cope with just one visit per week. Again you were fine. So, I guess now I can safely say second set is also won.

Milestone 2:
You have also started enjoying going to park and can sit on a swing with no back support for 10 – 15 minutes. Clearly, your body balance is improving.

Milestone 3:
As I mentioned in the last post, you have started saying your name. Though you still make only sounds of vowels, I am amazed at how you sing rhymes, read books, and say so many words with just a few basic sounds. Of course, a stranger may not be able to understand what you say but I am not bothered. I am feeling great that all the rhymes that I sang, all the books that I read are etched in your memory.

Some of the words you say now are
…oon for moon
…ow for cow
Ow… for owl
Uee… for queen
Aah….an for orange
aa….eee for honey
ua…e for square
ou…e for house

The rhyme that you sing cutest is
“Aai  ain  oo  aaa” for “rain rain go away”

The book that you read best is Eric Carle’s “Brown Bear, Brown Bear, what do you see”

When left alone with the book, you say

“ow.. ea… ow… ea… aa oo uu ee
I ee ____________ ooin a ee”

Which is:

“Brown bear brown bear what do you see
I see a red bird looking at me”

And you continue the same until the end of the book. Eric Carle’s books are a hit in our household.

You have come a long distance, my love. I am just proud of you.

Love you loads.

Library - Here I come!!!

I registered at a nearby library on Saturday. I wanted to do this for years, but never managed to go to a library. If I wanted to read a book I bought it. Because I did not want to pressurize myself by setting a date before which I should complete the book and return.

Then why did I register this time? Because I thought may be time has come to introduce books to my baby. I found a nearby library which has children’s books too. So, I browsed their website, saw their collection and just registered for it. Its surprising how something that I have postponed for years got completed in a matter of days because baby was involved. :)

So, went to the library on Saturday, touched a lot of books and felt wonderful. :) I like the smell of old books. :) I picked a couple of books. One was for the baby – a book which had 5 pages in cardboard paper (very important if I wanted to return the book in proper form :)) with bright colours and having pictures of animals.

The other one was for me. I wanted a story book that had a few pages so that I can complete in a couple of hours and something on the lighter side. My choice was “வாஷிங்டனில் திருமணம்” (Marriage at Washington) by Saavi. Everyone who knows Tamil would know the story and the plot. But it was wonderful to read it. Some of the translations and descriptions were hilarious :) (For example, “Umbrella chillies” for “குடை மிளகாய்” and the description of “ஜவ்வரிசி பாயசம்” were too good.) I loved it.

A weekend well spent. :) Hoping to read a lot more.

Yet another reason to thank the little wonder in my life. Thanks love!!! Cheers to more fun-filled evenings with the books. :)