My routine at 6 months

With me completing 6 months, I thought I should record my daily routine (if there is one :-)).

Morning
I wake up around 7 AM. It takes about 30 to 45 minutes for me to completely come out of sleep. With a little murmur and false alarms, I manage to wake my parents up as well. If papa is around, he entertains me while amma prepares my breakfast. Cereals are my breakfast. I allow about 45 minutes for my breakfast to settle down and go for a bath. Amma's expert hands now massage me and give me a good hot bath that completely wears me down. I sleep till 11 AM in sheer exhaustion.

Noon to Evening
I play for one hour before lunch and until I am tired after lunch as well. The dirty little secret to keep amma around is to cry or imitate crying. Both amma and papa come running whenever they hear me crying. I take a small nap and get ready for evening activities

Evening
Evenings are diverse. If amma has dance classes, I will be with Nidhi aunty and Pranay. If not, I stay at home and play with Amma. I like both Nidhi aunty and Pranay a lot. Pranay is trying to teach me few more tricks. Shhh.. just between us. Don't tell amma. If Prateek uncle comes home early, he sings nice little songs for me. It is a great fun. Little play, little time on the rocker and another quick nap takes me to dinner time

Night
Dinner is at 9:00. No, it is not late. If I eat early, I get up early. So having a late dinner helps me to have a good night's sleep (only till 3AM). I don't like waking my parents up but hunger takes over all the time :-(. After feeding, I sleep again till 7 AM and the whole story repeats.

Merry Christmas everyone and a Very Very happy new Year.

hey hey! fruits and veggies

Now Amma is feeding me different kinds of fruits and veggies. First she introduced me to Apple sauce. Aaaagrh.. it was sour. Next day she fed me Sweet peas. Take a look at the video. I liked it. It was yummy. Eating prune next day for the first time is unforgettable. I can't explain its taste. My video will entertain you nicely. The one I liked the most was sweet potato. I hear talks going on telling about boiling veggies at home to feed me... Will get back to you after that. . .

My first Teeth

Hello there,

I can start new trouble now. I have two teeth coming out. It hurts a lot. Appa and Amma are trying all they can do to ease the teething trouble. I nibble at frozen bagle (thanks to Linda Ajji's advice) and my teething friends, as well as anything that I can grab to my mouth.. Amma took nice snap of my teeth. Since it is very special, I have embedded it to this post (Click on the photo to see the big photo)

That's how I laugh . . .

One of the most memorable moments for all of our family at Leela Ajji's place. I was laughing out loud looking at Shadow (Leela Ajji' favourite cat) and everyone thought that I was laughing out because of Appa's pranks .. A little secret... Enjoy!

Deepavali - Festival of Lights

Deepavali wishes to everyone. This is my first Deepavali. Traditionally, we celebrate Deepavali with a nice oil massage and a sacred shower symbolising win of Good over Evil. Well in my case, I get the best oil massage every day from amma. She does magic with her fingers. So nothing was special with the bath. But evening was special. I got a Jubba as a gift from Sumana aunty. Appa also wore a Jubba and amma a nice Sari. We all took some snaps (you can see a few in the latest album) and appa savored amma's lentil payasam


Before I posted the Halloween entry, I forgot to write about my New York city trip to see the Incredible India show and also meet some of the legendary Yakshagana artists. Sri Shambhu Hegde, Sri Nebburu Narayana Bhagavata to name a few graced the occasion. I had the best time so far seeing all the color and cultural richness in the event.

Legend:
Deepavali - Festival of Lights
Jubba - Traditional Indian long shirt
Payasam - Sweet Dish

Halloween

Ok, now I am going to write about my first Halloween celebration. Pappa and Amma were thinking how to dress me up. Pappa wanted to dress me up like casper, the friendly ghost. But Amma was concerned that my face needs to be painted. So she figured out an easy way by dressing me like a butterfly(Chitte Mari). I liked the dress. By the time Amma got me and herself ready to go to Ramya Aunty's place, it was my nap time. Still I managed to go there. Lot of Trick or Treaters came home that evening. My neighbor Sebastian was dressed as a pirate. Amma managed to get some pictures of me and other monsters, princess, fairy, witches etc etc. We came back and within two minutes I dozed off on Mommy's lap. When I woke up I was on the swing with lots of candies on my lap with my little candy basket. When I was thinking Yummy...., Mommy took all of them out. She had put them just to take pictures. Soumya Aunty and Krishna uncle also came and Krishna uncle made me fly in the sky. It was fun. By then it was my dinner time. Amma took off my cap, wings etc and fed me. You know who was missing all this time, my Pappa. He was on a business trip. Amma immediately that night prepared an online album and sent it to Pappa. Here is the video take a look....................

My first manni(Cereal)

Hey,
Amma fed me the cereals after doctor told it is okay to have solid foods. It is yummy. Sumati Dodda had prepared it at home(Banglore) and gave it to Amma when she visited us. Take a look at the video. Amma puts a little brown sugar and butter for taste. First day I liked it. Now a days I am finding it difficult to swallow as I have sore throat and some nasal infection. Amma is feeding me twice daily. Once in the morning, before bath and once in the night, before I go to bed. Any ways I will keep you updated how is my cereal feedings are going on. . . .

I have to broadcast this...

I am on the online news site..... Check this Link on ThatsKannada.com out

I will write the details about what happened prior to the photo being taken in the next post.

An evening at the beach

Gosh! these events are coming quicker and quicker. It was just last week, when I had my first shopping spree. This week it was an evening at the beach.

Saturday, Sri Krishna Brindavana had organized 'Sri Raghavendra Aaaradhane'. We all went there in the afternoon, took Lord's blessings. After lunch, we went to Padma Ajji's place in Englishtown. Padma Ajji has recovered well from her fracture. She is able to walk without the crutches now. My Ajja and ajji wanted to meet them and say bye to them before they leave to India.

From Padma Ajji's place we went to Ocean Grove beach. It was a short 30 minute ride to the beach. I start to ride my vehicle when everyone else gets off from theirs :-) Didn't get it? It is the story of me and my stroller.... Ha Ha Ha! Fun apart, all of us had a good walk on the board walk. The beach was very clean and the weather was just perfect.

Everyone went into the water except me. I was enjoying the sound of waves hitting the shore and the occasional giggle from Amma and Appa. Judging from amma's reaction, it seemed like the water was cold. But all of us enjoyed the outing. You can see some of the pictures in the current album.

Appa and amma ate ice cream while I screamed. Nooooooooooo that was just another prank. They ate the ice cream alright but I behaved like a gentleman until we reached home late in the evening. I was almost asleep when we reached home. I ate dinner and slept off dreaming of those waves and the water splashing against the rocks and the gentle rocky ride on the board walk....

Talk to you later about one of my avatars....

Legend:
Ajja - Grandfather
Ajji - Grandmother
Appa - Father
Amma - Mother

My First shopping Trip

Long time Eh?

Well, I was busy growing up. I am 2 months old and have learned quite a few tricks. We will talk about the tricks later. First, all the happenings since my Scranton trip.

First was my, ouuuu it hurts even to tell - My first set of shots. I know it is needed to keep me healthy and prevent infections so that I can go out and start enjoying the world. So I have to bear a little pain. It is okay. Funny part was I got Mickey Mouse band-aid that looked cute

Then Sudha doddamma and Sumathi Ajji visited us from Detroit. I quickly became friends with Achyuta and Sucheta (Sudha Doddamma's sons). We watched some cartoons, ate together and slept together. You should have seen the expression on Achyuta's face once when I threw up on him. What could I do? He over fed me. Was it my problem? You be the judge.

Biggest of all is my first shopping spree. All of us went to Woodbury commons so that Siriajja and ammamma can pick some things to take back to India. There we went to quite a few shops (Polo Children's Shop, Carter's, Gap etc.) I lost count of shops we visited. There were so many people and so many shops. I looked around for quite some time and then decided to leave shopping to appa and amma and slept off.

It was dark when I woke up and I was still in stroller and in some store. I decided to ring the bell to say it is time to go home (or time for me to eat? :-)) and then suddenly in a rush we were back at home with a lot of shopping bags!

See you later
Saaranga

Legend:
Doddamma - Aunt
Ajji, Ammamma - Grandmother
Ajja - Grandfather
Amma - Mother
Appa - Father

Scranton PA

Folks,

Yesterday (10 Aug) I had been to Leela Ajji's place at Scranton PA. Alok (Leela Ajji's eldest son) graduated from Univ of Illinois at Urbana Champaign and is moving to NC State for his Doctoral study. So for the good wishes and blessings from God, there was Ganapathi homa and the yearly Durga Namaskara pooja at their house

We left early in a hurry. It was raining a little bit. Amma and Ammamma tried hard so that I would not get wet in the rain till I reach our car. Pappa had loaded most of the things into the car before I sat in my "seat". I don't like to sit idle in that small seat you know. It makes me uncomfortable. But it was for a short period. Pappa started driving and things whizzed past me at great speeds. I was counting "one tree" "two trees" "three trees" ...zzzzz..

I don't know what happened in between. When I woke up, we were at Leela Ajji's place. It was my lunch time. So Amma fed me and then I sat near the Ganapathi homa. Alok, Megha, Ashwin (Leela Aunti's children) were looking cute in different type of dress. After the homa, it was Kadubu (Coastal Karnataka version of Idli) lunch. I could hear everyone chomp chomp... I also met Raj Ajja and Rohini Ajji. I said thanks to them for their wonderful swing gift. I like it you know. It makes good (sometimes funny) sound in the middle of all cacophony to relax me and make me sleep.

I slept well till evening but then something happened during the evening pooja. I cried non stop for half an hour and wanted only Pappa to hold me before going back to sleep. Pooja was over and everyone had their dinner. Good food. (Gosh - my parents they can't stop telling about how good the food was at every place we go. They talk about food, food and food. Just teasing them. I too should have my moments. Don't you think)

We all started in a jiffy back to NJ. We had two traffic jams, but made it safe and sound back home by 11:30. I was half asleep. As amma was feeding me, I dozed off dreaming of the beautiful day and making a promise that I would go again to Scranton another day.

Ciao

Legend:
Ganapathi - Elephant headed God
Durga - Goddess
Idli - Rice dumpling
Amma - Mother
Ammamma - Amma's Amma i.e. Grandmother
Ajja - Grandfather
Ajji - Grandmother

One month into this world

Hi there,

So many things happened in the last one month. It is becoming difficult to keep track of things. I had my paediatrician visit. We finally could meet Dr. Sirikonda. He was in India on vacation when I was born. He told amma, something can be given in 6 weeks. I could not hear it clearly. So we will wait and watch.

I had my first outing on Jul 22. We all went to Sri Krishna Brindavana (A temple) in Edison NJ. Dad taught me how to do namaskara to Lord Krishna. First I thought, my head is going to hurt a lot. But that was not the case. All went well. We took God's prasada and drove to Padma Ajji's place. Triveni Kannada koota had organized a send off event to Bhagavathi. I got a chance to see a lot of people. All of them would come near me, look at me and do some koochie koochie things. Some folks would pick me up and hold me for some time and take a walk etc.

When the food was served, looked like pappa and amma forgot about me. Jayanti aunty was carrying me without eating but pappa and amma were busy eating food. I heard pappa comment that the food was really good. So in all, it was a good gathering.

Just a week later, we were back again at Padma ajji's home for ajja's talk. Ajja did a fantastic show based on one of his short story. It was very good. Appa was busy taking pictures, amma shot the video. It was sad to see Padma ajji's leg wrapped in bandage. She apparently has a fracture and will have to use crutches for some time.

Then we met Madhyasta family on Jul 29th. Sri Visveshwara Madhyastha and Smt. Rosemary Madhyastha. Vish ajja is from Siriajja's family and has been in US from 1956. They narrated a lot of their stories. I also met a new friend - Shraavya who is almost as old as I am. Both of us very busy in disturbing our amma's. Amma had to feed me twice while eating her food. But once I ate, I let them eat at peace.

I am waiting for more and more outings now. I like to see new things. Hope pappa's schedule allows him to take me to different places....

Ciao

Legend
Amma - Mother
Ajja - Grandfather
Namaskara - bow to God

Siriajja

Hi There,

Remember Siriajja? I had told you about him in the last post. He is amma's father. He is my best friend now. Every morning he takes me out for a quick walk and a sun bath. He keeps telling that early morning sunlight is good for my health.

Siriajja's day starts very early in the morning (last stage of my night :-)) He gets up and has his morning tea (Indian Style with lot of milk and sugar) and goes for a walk in our complex. By the time he finishes his walk and takes some rest, I am ready for him. He entertains me all morning. He helps Ammamma (ajji) when she gives me my daily bath (boo hoo... I cry a lot during the bath).

Do you want to listen to the funny part? Siriajja calls me by so many names. All I had heard was putta, pitta, anna, ranga from appa and amma. Suddenly Siriajja calls me Somesh. That is cute! I liked that name too. Then suddenly I hear him calling me "jinke mari".

Siriajja was busy practicing for a solo performance all of last week. We all went to see the performance. They called my name and dedicated the performance to me. I had to give something back in retun. I tried giving some background music to the performance. Then ammamma put the bottle in my mouth. I fell asleep slurping my food..... yawn yawn. feeling sleepy now. more later okay?

Bye now.

Legend:
Ajja - Grandfather
Ammamma or Ajji - Grandmother

My Cradle Ceremony

Hi There,

Now I have a name and I am able to write myself. I know my dad wrote the first post but I take over from now on. This is the age of connectedness and of community and I want to be part of this as quickly as I can.

On 11th day after I was born, there was this cradle ceremony where I was dressed in traditional dress. Leela Ajji did the the difficult bottom part of the dress and my mother had stitched the top even before I was born ( psst. I was trying to make it hard for her to guess my size but she beat me to it). Anyways lot of people came that evening and I enjoyed the company.

The cradle was decorated and the house was gleaming clean thanks to the effort of Ammamma and Siriajja (Ajja from Sirimane - you know who keeps telling me good stories all the time and keeps watching over me when I am asleep). I like Siriajja very much. He comes up with these names for me all the time. More on that later. Back to the cradle ceremony. House was decorated, I was decorated and mom wore a nice sari and folks gathered in the evening.

Lot of amma's friends, Leela Ajji and her children and surprisingly folks from West coast - entire family of Ram Manohar Ajja came to visit me. That was so cool...

Cradle ceremony is an introduction for me to sleep alone in my own space (Myspace ???). Gundappa went first and then it was my turn to go over and under the cradle in circles three times before I was put on the bed. All that warmth of folks waiting to lift me sizzled out as soon as I was on the bed. I tried to sleep but there was too many things not to miss. So I enjoyed everyone's company. Many people gave me gifts too. Oo La La. I am waiting for papa to open them up and assemble some of them.

Let's talk about Siriajja in next post okay?

Bye Bye
Saaranga

Legend:

Amma - mother

appa - father

Ajja - Grandfather

Ajji, Ammamma - Grandmother

Gundappa - an imaginary person supposed to take away bad omen

XXX - Week 1

Hi there,

I wanted to start posting my own blogs for quite some time now. The perfect opportunity has arrived with the addition of a new member to our family. Our wait for 9 months is finally over. Bhramari delivered a healthy baby boy on June 22nd at 2:18PM Eastern Time.

It is just amazing to see a new born in the first couple of hours. The first weighing, wash and the Mohawk hair style etc. were very good opportunities for me to experiment on my new digital SLR camera as well. I thanked the nurse profusely for the hairstyle. Our boy looked really cute in it.

You might be wondering why the XXX in the title. We did not know whether we were having a baby boy or girl but unlike most parents, we did not finalize the names. So there we were left wondering what to name our son.

Our logic was simple, name must be unique ( uh! that was simple?), must start from S and must be easy to spell and pronounce. Bhramari's father helped a lot and started to short list a series of names. We finally settled on Saaranga. Don't know whether he will like it or not. But name has all angles to it, common, cultural and philosophical meaning - Common meaning is Deer, philosophically it is Lord Krishna's Bow and we have a raaga called Saaranga in Carnatic Classical music.

He is healthy, at home now, peacefully sleeping for 18 hours, making us change his diapers multiple time and crying whenever he is hungry. We are going to put him onto his cradle on Monday 7/2. I will share more details and photos in the next version...

Ciao.