REFLECTIONS

GPB Writers Contest Win!!!

2021-08-13T22:37:00.004-04:00

Story title

It was the year 2013 and we were living in Nashville. My older son Aarav was about 9 months. We had the very basic Comcast TV service where you got the very basic free channels to watch. We barely watched any TV and one random day while he was crawling around and fidgeting with the remote, he hit a button and the PBS channel number 9, I so well remember, came on.

There was a show called Super Why going on and he got hooked on to it so quickly; these characters with big eyes and it was a wonderful show teaching about letters and building small words and the sounds of each letter! So, I figured out that it came at certain times during the day, twice actually and I would selectively put on the TV for him to watch because he really got engrossed into it.

So that's how our relationship with PBS started. From there and of course we moved on to other shows also like Daniel tiger, Curious George, and the dinosaur show.

The Monster Blackhole

And cut to 8 years now, we got to know about the GPB writers contest which is held from kindergarten till third grade and my son was in second grade this summer. So, one month before the submit date, we got to know about the contest and we thought, sure we can give it a try. Why not!

Planets meeting for the escape plan

Some of Aarav's fav subjects are space, maps, music, reading books!!!

So, I pushed him a bit saying he's read so many books until now, he can easily come up with something... Anything using his fav topic.

From there he quickly thought of space and planets and black holes. And soon he had a rough idea of what's the plot of the story. The technicalities are known best to him. He built the story around the plot - How to escape a black hole monster!

A fictional story of all the planets and Sun planning how to escape a black hole monster!

At the onset only, I really loved his story. I deeply wished for him to win. And if he didn't win, at least get his handwritten story back.

And guess what! Aarav won! 1st place in second grade! How proud and elated we are to share this! 😃

He won a certificate, a medal n lot of goodies from PBS!

Back in 2013, I would've never thought of being so closely connected with PBS in future!

This was a great opportunity for Aarav, and we are glad he participated!

Here is a link to his story in his own voice!

2021 Winner: 2nd Grade 1st Place – "How to Escape a Black Hole Monster" by Aarav Dharmaraj | Georgia Public Broadcasting (gpb.org)

And her is the link to his story pdf!

Meet The Winners Of GPB's 2021 PBS KIDS Writers Contest | Georgia Public Broadcasting

Thank you PBS and GPB!🙏

Wheels on the bus – 1st Birthday theme

2021-04-09T19:25:00.005-04:00

Center stage for cake cutting.

Hello all! Since the recent birthday theme of continents was so popular, I am back with another birthday theme! I designed a “Wheels on the bus” theme for my second son, Amay’s first birthday in 2019. 🚌🚏

At age 1, he was fond of Wheels on the bus song. We have seen so many versions of them on youtube!!! So, I had to search a lot on Pinterest and google for ideas! What you find mostly is the school bus theme online. So, I made it work for my theme of colorful bus around the town.

Bus table for cake cutting

Again, a whole lot of paper cutting DIY to do. The birthday banner was to look like a road with HAPPY BIRTHDAY letters. I chose a blue sheet for sky, pasted strip of black sheet with white bits for representing road. Drew the letters on each sheet and then put them thru a string. At the beginning and end of this banner I added a bus cutout made from thin craft foam sheets, drew windows and doors in it to look like a bus. I cut out his name using Styrofoam that I had at home.

Theme words

I mostly make stuff with whatever I have at hand and buy craft things as I need.😁

So, next was the theme specific words like BEEP BEEP, DING DING. I cut out these
letters using poster sheets. Basically, I chose the smallest words from the song. I used regular white stitching thread to make the streamer. Because it’s a road theme, there’s a lot of sign boards that can be made. Along with the words, I made signal light streamers with octagon shaped STOP fillers. I used regular construction paper for this.

All signs ready to go

I used pizza boxes to make the sign boards. The words were party specific like DUMP GIFTS HERE, PARTY ZONE for lunchroom, STOP and AMAY IS ONE. Sprayed the yellow and used markers to write. Painted the STOP board and AMAY boards.

Next was the cutest task of making bus cut outs. I used entire poster sheets. Drew a light outline of a bus such that there was minimal cutting and wastage of paper. I used black and white sheets for making the window shields, eyes, bumper, smile, and tires; drew whatever was needed on them with sketch pens and crayons.

Photo frame prop

For the cake cutting table, I decorated it to look like a bus. Used a blue table cover, pasted white paper using black masking tape to make door and windows and used 2 round boards to make wheels.

The last thing to make was a photo frame prop. I used a foam poster sheet. Cut out two large window shields for people to pose through. Painted it with yellow color and added the other details like lights, tires, and mirrors; I used aluminum sheets to make it look like mirrors.

Bus stapled to spirals

To add more buses to the room, I cut out small sized foam sheet buses and stapled them to the decorative party spirals and hung them from the ceiling, windows etc.

The cake was bus theme too. I just placed a toy bus on it to complete the theme. I also kept a tray of chocolate donuts with a label of ‘Extra Tires’!😄😄

The entrance door of our house had the signs – STOP the BUS AMAY is ONE!

The photo frame and the donuts were a hit. And because most of the kids visiting were my older son’s friends, I had rented a jumping house for their entertainment in our backyard.

I hope you enjoy this theme and the work done and find these ideas useful. Thank you for reading.😊

Around the world through 7 continents – Birthday Party

2021-03-29T19:34:00.007-04:00

Cake Cutting - North America station

My eldest son Aarav turned 8 this year and I had planned this birthday theme for last year on his 7^th birthday – Travel the 7 continents. You see, 7^th birthday and 7 continents would have been such a wonderful coincidence. But along came Covid in 2020 and it were the initial scary months . I had to scrap off the whole celebration. I had finished a bunch of DIY decorations, ready to print material I created on my PC. I didn’t feel like wasting all that effort.

So, 8^th birthday was “Around the 7 continents”, instead of 8 planets, another favorite topic of Aarav.

To me this theme was so much fun that I decided to share it, for anybody who’d like to use it. I shall link the items I got from Amazon and OrientalTrading.com.

So here goes the whole plan and execution.

7 continents = 7 table stations. Each table would be unique in décor to represent the continent. Each table would have some interactive games or activities and as we leave each station, the kids get a souvenir, just like we do on vacations 😊 Easy!

Passport prep

Before any vacation you’d need a passport, a boarding pass, a suitcase of course to load up the souvenirs and a stamp on your passport indicating you visited!

Placards for each station

First I started with the labels for each station. I used carboard boxes to cut out the large placards for each continent name. Painted each in an obvious theme color representing the continent (that came to my mind) like ex. Europe is a lovely pink board with letters written in red.

Continent	Décor	Activity	Souvenir
Australia	Koalas, brown table cover	Kangaroo hop race	Boomerangs
Asia	Chinese doll, dragon, elephant, buddha etc	Pick gummy fish with chopsticks in 30 sec	Paper fans
Africa	Pyramid, hieroglyphs chart	Animal bingo	Hieroglyph bookmarks for each kid’s name
Europe	Eifel tower, Pisa tower, valentine décor	Lunch – pizza	Eifel tower painting kit
South America	Multi color décor, skull	Making Maracas	Carnival eye masks
Antarctica	Paper Penguins and whale, white table cover	De-freeze frozen dinosaurs	Arctic animal string bags
North America	Globe, birthday banner, flags streamer	Cake cutting	Flag Pencil and erasers

DIY Pyramid for Egypt

Then I decided the décor and activities for each, that relate to the continent. Luckily, my parents have been touring around the world since couple of years. And I have free souvenirs from them!!! 😄

Africa and Antarctica are where they haven’t visited and those I really had to create something from scratch.

Passport, boarding pass and pretend suitcase

On the event day, I used my Instax camera to click instant photos of each kid and paste them on each passport, that I had ready with their name and other common details in the passport for them to fill later. I had made sure to label pages with each continent name so it would be easy to paste the stamps on the go. I designed and printed boarding passes which were the invite to the party. Stapled those to each passport!

Boarding pass

I prepared pretend suitcases using brown gift bags, labelled their names and stamped some pictures for beauty effect!

Australia Station

1st Stop: Australia – Koala show pieces. Kangaroos belong there, so the activity was Kangaroo hop race using pillow covers in the backyard on lawn, so we have no scratches on driveways and kids are safe! Souvenir was plastic boomerangs I got from Oriental trading site. Candies for being a sport! Stamp on passport and move on!

Asia Station

2nd Stop: Asia – I have lots of Indian and Chinese dragon décor. I used my colorful dupattas to decorate the wall and the table! Activity was a game of chopsticks used to fish out “fish gummies” in 30 seconds! Must say kids are good at using chopsticks! Souvenir was handmade paper fans (I made them) because paper was invented in China – Asia! Stamp on passport and move on!

Africa Station

3rd Stop: Africa – no ready décor, so I had to make my own pyramid using 4 ‘Your Pie’ pizza boxes!!! Picked the easiest design on the internet and added the brick details using markers! Done! Activity was animal bingo sheets that I created on my laptop such that everyone is a winner in the end! Basically, same animals shuffled around to make different combinations of sheets! Candies to ALL winners! Africa = Egypt = hieroglyphs. So, I created, printed and laminated personalized bookmarks for each kid using the symbols and setup a poster for all the letter symbols for each kid to identify their name in the form of hieroglyphs! That’s their souvenir! Stamp on passport and move on!

Europe Station

4^th Stop: Europe – This is the land of love. So, I bought some heart shaped doilies a month ago during Valentine’s month! Pasted them on pink sheets and they made wonderful wall décor. I had leaning tower of Pisa and Eifel Tower show pieces. So, décor was done. Italy = Pizza so, Europe was a pit stop to have lunch!!!

Souvenir was a 5x7 canvas boards with Eifel Tower drawn on them by me, paint, and a heart candy! Stamp on passport and move on!

South America Station

5th Stop: South America – It was colorful shimmery floor-length wall streamers! Just a pottery skull décor my son had made a while ago! Used a colorful dupatta to cover the table! Activity was using the plastic Easter eggs I had, to make maracas. I drew designs on them using permanent markers. Spoons, beads, tape and voilà- you have maracas ready! Souvenir was carnival eye masks ! Stamp on passport and move on!

6^th Stop: Antarctica – Again no ready décor, so I made simple penguins and drew a cute whale using cereal boxes! Used a white tablecloth. Activity was excavation. I used small sized paper cups and inserted small plastic dinosaurs, poured water, and froze them! The kids had to crack the ice to discover the dinosaurs. Souvenir was these arctic animal string bags! Stamp on passport and move on!

Birthday cake from Walmart - Edible map

7^th Stop: North America – This was our final party place where we cut the cake because, we are literally in N America! Décor was a globe, a liberty statue craft my son made in the past and the entire party wall décor! Activity was cake cutting and souvenir was flag printed pencils and eraser!

DIY road map banner

Cake cutting décor – I made the birthday banner using simple black poster sheets, pasted the highway road maps on each and then painted each letter of HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Bought the flag streamer and taped Aarav’s world map sheet on the wall!

Note: Thru the party, between each continent I sanitized the kid’s hands! They were provided inflight refreshments like chips and juice at different stops!

The kids had a great time. I was nervous if even one kid would get bored, but luckily no one was bored. They were excited for every next continent. It worked out perfectly because it was one of a kind party! No one could guess what to expect next! Kudos to all kids for their full participation and enjoyment!

DIY souvenirs

Party Invite

It was a whole lot of DIY work for this party, but at the end of the day the kids had so much fun, I am so thankful for that! It was WORTH all the effort put in!

PS: Anyone here in Savannah/Pooler would like to use any of the posters or placards are welcome to take!

I hope the readers got a fair idea of each detail per continent! Questions are welcome too! Thank you for reading!

Home Depot – kids construction project

2018-01-07T13:21:00.000-05:00

Reading instructions and following the steps

We recently learnt that the local home construction hardware store Home depot arranges free kids construction sessions every month. It’s held on the first Saturday of each month. So Friday night I saw an ad on my Facebook page and I remembered about this, so I got my son registered.

The session is held from 9am to 12 pm. Once registered, you can stop by between the session times. They provide you a pre-packed kit. The kit has all the required items to make that day’s project. They additionally provide paint and hammer.

Home depot DIY session link

This month was a block calendar. So when we got the kit, it had the raw material of wooden pieces and blocks; A step by step instruction manual that even kids as old as 5 can read and understand. As it was our first time, my husband did the hammering though we let Aarav hold the nails a couple of times.

We were done with the block calendar in 30 mins and then we painted it with my son’s choice of colors.

After drying it, we got home to finish the project. Stuck the stickers and it turned out pretty impressive. More like a manual calendar.

But it was a fun task to introduce tools to my son. He helps my husband to arrange furniture pieces that come with manual assembly. So he knows quite a few tools and reading the instruction manual. But this was his first time doing a project of his own.

The kit also had a badge for completing the project which can be pinned up on the apron they give the first time. I am definitely taking him every month for these sessions. Looking forward to collect all 12 badges this year for him. Already registered for Feb 3^rd project 😊

Growing up in India, we never had any such events. It’s a fun way to introduce different interests and logic building for kids.

So any parents out there in the US, could try one of these session in your local home depot.

Sanibel - Shell capital of the US

2017-12-29T16:12:00.001-05:00

Sanibel Causeway - giant hard clams

So this Christmas vacation, we decided to drive down from Savannah GA to Sanibel FL - the island famous for its shells. Commonly known as the Shell capital of the US.

Why Sanibel? So a while ago I researched where to find shells, because normally when we visit the local beaches I hardly find any good shells. And as I surfed the internet, Sanibel came up in my results. So I started reading up and checking videos and indeed it's famous for the large variety of shells that wash up the beaches.

Shark Eye (Moon Shell)

I had shared this information with my husband then. So when we thought where do we vacation this year, he knew exactly where to go. Sanibel it is! Almost 8hr drive from Savannah.

I planned the food for the day through the long drive so we have minimum stops. Though we wanted to start at 5am, we could only start by 5.45am. But we made through the drive really well and we were on the Sanibel island at 2pm.

Shelling at sunrise

Info: The island has a toll entry - $6 each time you enter. Luckily, my husband had booked a hotel on the island so we paid the one time. We stopped right at the beginning of the island and we found these large palm-sized clam shells. I knew I was in for big shelling of my lifetime.

We went straight to Bowman's head beach. It's a lovely stretch of beach with heaps of shells piled up at the beach. Out of habit I did pick a few but they weren't the one's I had looked online, or that I had hoped to find there. From there on, we went to Captiva island; again with not much luck at the shells I wanted.

Lighthouse beach - incredible sunrise

So on our way back we stopped at Blind Pass and saw the most beautiful sunset in the longest time I can remember. The sky had cloud formation by the horizon and the sun rays through and after the sunset threw such a lovely blend of colors, no picture can justify what our eyes saw! The beauty of our nature!

Live Lightning whelks - let them back to the ocean

First morning we made it at the Light house beach at 6.45am to see the sunrise at 7.14am. Again...the beautiful colors of the first rays of the sun, scattering through the grey skies was just unbelieveable!

SANIBEL - shell capital

Sunset at Blind Pass

It was a pleasant morning with the low tide on, I started shelling by the still waters at the beach. Tons of Apple murex shells with crab like creatures in them. I have never been so friendly with critters, but this time I was indeed having fun exploring the sea beds. I found my first Lightning whelk shell - a big one, buried in the sand. Little did I know that it would be a live whelk..my excitement died in seconds as I knew I had to let it go back in the ocean. So I showed it to my husband and my son and did the next right thing - put it back into the ocean..and this happened about 5 times to me. Finding live whelks and putting them back into the ocean. I was so dejected!

Shells at Gulf City park beach

I was hoping it would pay off at some point. And it did on the next morning.
We ended the first day strolling about the beach and picking other shells like the kittens paw, scallops, clam shells etc.

Day2 morning we went to another beach close to our hotel - Gulfside City Park Beach. My husband had found on his instagram that people had found shells on this beach. As I headed to the beach, the shore was full of fighting conch...sooo many of them. Reminder: there was a low tide at midnight, which probably has showed these shells the way out. By the time my husband paid and parked and came to the beach, the shell bag was half way full of fighting conches! It was payback time indeed. I found all the best shells on this morning the fighting conches in all possible sizes, the empty whelks, olive shells, tulip shells and murex. It got all of us busy shelling on the beach!

Final loot of the day

Truy satisfied, I was done with my shelling desire. Although I didn't find a few of the common items like worm shells, urchins, sand dollars and larger whelks - but, there is no scope to complain when you look at my final loot!

The beaches had amazing sand castles created by the tourists. Managed to capture pics of few castles.

Beautiful castle with a moat to let the water go around

Tips:
1. Low tide is the best time to do shelling, so do consider checking the times online (I did)
2. Full moons also help in the tides and thus in good shelling.
3. Ideally after storms, the beach is full of the best shells. So may be consider the hurricane/storm season of Sanibel (Aug-Nov).
4. Time of year also would be important. As december was a holiday season I believe there is a larger audience to the amount of shells on the beach.
5. Early morning visit can give you higher chance of finding more shells.
6. Shelling tools like a digging net, sifter would probably help you to pick up chunks of shells on the bed and look through to find tons of shells. ( I didnt have any)

Hopefully this post will introduce you to the joys of shelling and make you visit Sanibel. But I'd definitely mention that whenever you find a live shell, please just put it back into the ocean! It's against the law and its just the right thing to do! There are TONS of dead shells washing up to the shore! I can't wait to go back again, but not anytime soon!

Now, that I have my shells all washed up in clean water and sorted, I am deciding the right way to clean them up. I have studied that using muriatic acid brings out the true colors of the shells, by removing the calcium buildup. For now I have just cleaned them up. I have to shop for the acid and go through the whole process. Really hoping I do it sooner than later like so many of my pending tasks in past year!

Here's to a wonderful new year 2018. I wish all my readers a happy new year!

Upwork - work from home options.

2017-12-28T23:17:00.001-05:00

Hello readers. It's been a really long time since I posted on my blog. I have checked once in a while though. I have thought of posting so many events and occasions, but just kept forgetting with daily chores. 😞

So recently, as in from May 2017 I started working from home. Again, I am put up in a small town that pretty much has no IT jobs. And now that I have an almost 5yr old boy, there is no scope of moving to other cities in search of job; which I have done in the past.

After waiting for almost 6 months for any IT opportunity, I finally thought of looking for any possible "work-from-home" options. I have never been keen to work from home, I am social person and I would like to go to a real work place, meet colleagues and work ..the usual work life!

Anyhow, I really didn't have much hopes of finding anything. But I came across a website https://www.upwork.com/

It had a freelancer account creation. So I followed the usual online profile creation; uploaded my latest resume. This website has logins for both job hunters and job posters. So as a freelancers seeking a job, I can send a proposal to the jobs I search. I basically did a keyword search like "testing"; it shows up tons of jobs posted and you can submit your proposal. Basically the rate at which you want to work etc; its pretty much like a regular online job aplication with resume and cover letter.

If they like your profile they might get back. Also the jobs posted display the pay they are willing to provide. I considered the posts that has a blue tick mark saying "Payment verified". I believe it means they provide payments sincerely.

So I created my account not having much hopes; but to my surprise I got an interview invite mail in 3 days and I agreed to interview and after an hour of video call interview I got the job. Now I won't say the pay is exactly what I'd earn at a regular office job; but it ain't bad either considering I get to work from home, no travel, easy breaks as required.

How it works is once you get a job, the website provides an software to install that clocks your time and takes random snapshots of your PC screen. Basically monitoring your work hours.

Tip: As a freelancer, you can take up free tests on different subjects which I did and I chose to display the scores on my profile. Not sure, but it must definitely make your profile score some points and appeal.

Now it's almost 8 months and I am happily working from home. Infact my entire team works from upwork from different locations across the globe...US west coast, east coast, germany, UK, australia. Everyone works during their day time. I can take breaks as needed (flexible hours), so I can manage getting my son ready for school in the morning, drop him and get back to work; pick him up on some days if my husband is busy at work. And this job came just in time as my son started a 6hr school. So sitting idle at home watching movies and shows would have been such a waste. Instead I get to do what I love and also paid ofcourse!

I wanted to share this information for all those women who are at home after marriage or kids etc...and want to start working. There are different jobs with different work hours. Like my job is 40 hrs/week; so it's like a regular 8hr job. But you can look for jobs like 30hrs per week or anything that really suits your situation, your expected pay and your skills.

Hopefully this post will help one or many readers out there who are looking to get back to work at their pace. Best of luck 😊

Home made costumes

2016-03-10T23:06:00.000-05:00

Aarav has quite a busy month of March at preschool. With so many events, I end up being busy doing craft projects on his behalf.

Every week they have a "letter of the week", and his teachers mentioned couple of weeks in advance that during the week of W, they'd have a day of wearing "What you want to be when you grow up".

Personally, I didn't take up this event seriously because at his age of 3, he doesn't understand the question of what you want to be when you grow up. And even if we ask, his answers are so cute..but wild! Some days he'd say "I want to be a Kangaroo", or "Penguin" or "horse" on other days, as he gallops around the house.

My husband insisted to buy a pilot costume, which when I googled came out to about $50!!! So much for a couple of hours! Then as I surfed through the internet, I noticed the commercial pilot costume is easy; white shirt, black pants, shoulder pads, tie and a hat. With so much of crafty things I do, I happened to have all the required things to make his costume except for the white shirt which I bought. Rest all cut out from the art sheets; referred a video for making paper pilot hat and voilà, Pilot costume ready!

And then March 3rd was Dr. Seuss birthday and they had to dress up as one of the characters from the comic. A blue feather garland from dollar store and matched up his red clothes and again, voilà - Thing1 character was ready!

His teachers loved his costumes at school. We never had these events during our school times, but I enjoy the fun in making these creative things while making memories for my son to look when he grows older!

Now working on his Easter party goodie bags for his friends at school!

Painting Gift for Birthday

2016-02-13T23:52:00.000-05:00

Original Image

About 6 months ago, a dear friend moved to a new house and I thought I would paint one of my modern Ganesha as a gift. When I shared my thought to her, she said she had a wonderful picture of Infant Ganesha that she'd like to put up in her study room; it'd be great if I could paint that for her.

I asked her to share the picture while playing it safe; saying I'd try to paint it. I sat over this idea for about 6 months and just a week before her birthday I thought I should give it a try to make it a birthday gift.

I started to sketch on the canvas board and it got really difficult as the pencil gets stuck in the groves of the canvas cloth. Racked my head for more ideas, came up with drawing on chart sheet and framing the final painting.

My attempt

Drawing on plain sheet is so super easy; I finished the sketching in like 15 mins. Almost exact to the original. The sketch looked so beautiful, I wanted it on a canvas so she can hang it directly on the wall. Then I racked my head further and the idea of carbon paper lighted up! Spend 2 days looking for carbon papers; finally found a good stationary store locally - The Paper clip (better than Michael's) about 14 miles from my house. Drove down and got perfect A4 sized carbon papers.

Only on second attempt with the back of a fork, I finally traced out the image onto the canvas board. Next day, finished the entire painting in 1 sitting. Have totally fallen in love with this image of Ganesha, couldn't believe I'd be giving it away as a gift!

But it made a perfect gift for my friend. Feel accomplished! Glad I attempted and it came out close to the original picture. I may make a copy of the same painting for myself too!

HELP: A friend diagnosed with Breast Cancer

2016-02-01T23:47:00.000-05:00

Sara McDowell

I met this amazing girl Sara McDowell during my Seattle days in 2009, doing Thriller flash-mob. She recently was diagnosed with breast cancer. Frankly as much as I was shocked to know someone from my friend circle to have this illness, I'm praying each day for her recovery through her well planned treatments. She's a wonderful girl & she's got the right spirit to fight back, all she needs is some financial support that can help her get through the treatment costs.

Of course, an illness like cancer is going to cost her a lot, and she is trying her best to deal with the stress of both recovering and covering the cost!

If you can, PLEASE help her with any possible amount, small or big. Every amount paid is going to help her for treatment costs, medicines, food etc.

Please read the link below to know details of her illness and ways to help her. Thank you for helping my friend. And please do share among your wonderful, kind-hearted friends.

THANK YOU :)

https://pages.giveforward.com/medical/page-t1dtrj5/

Star of the day - Aarav at school

2016-01-27T00:08:00.000-05:00

My almost 3 yr old son has been going to a christian preschool for the past 6 months. After the first 2 days of 3hr separation, he got the idea of school. From day 3 until now, he's always been excited about "going to school"! At home he converses like adults, frankly he has a great memory and he uses my sentences exactly each time in the right context!

I got his FIRST report in Dec, all good but working on skills of crayons, painting and pasting. So over the Christmas vacations I made him complete all the crayon art sheets he gets in school, that are incomplete. He wasn't very interested but I managed to sweet talk him and hold his hand to finish all the incomplete sheets.

For pasting, I had color papers and glue from my art hobby, which I'm not pursuing anymore. So now everyday we sit and do simple pasting projects like a tree, sun and letters!

Art work at home

Over these months at every meeting with his teachers, I have learnt that he's a very sweet kid in class, never throws a tantrum, in fact he's always smiling! I asked them at occasions if he talked to them willingly, because he was in that phase of conversing 3-4months ago. But they said, apart from asking for using the restroom he wasn't much of a talker! Surprising, coz we at home were pretty much like "Shhhh...stop talking for 2 mins".. haha.

Reason for this post is- Yesterday one of his teachers, Ms. Tiffany came to speak to me and she mentioned "I just wanted to let you know that Aarav has been doing so well, he's been talking to us off late, he does all the activities so well, we just wanted to share this with you. He was the best kid in class today!"

I was so happy..I just thanked them. I'm so glad they are getting to see his real side! The way he's so interactive and talking with us at home!

When I checked his bag, I saw the certificate for being the 'Star of the day'.

Proud mama! JJJ

Road Sweeper

2016-01-22T23:31:00.001-05:00

The locality we live here is developing rapidly; every day we see new cleared forest area with construction vehicles and workers. On a particular route I take to my son’s preschool, I saw a vehicle that was cleaning the dust, gravel, dirt from the road. When trucks move in and out of construction sites, they obviously leave trails of thick soil which make such a mess of the existing good roads.

Superior Broom - Road Sweepers Model DT80CT

Living in India, be it any city Pune or Bangalore, we’ve all witnessed how the municipal people come, dig out a perfectly good road and then cover up haphazardly leaving back mud/gravel and bumps. When we lived in Bangalore, Electronic city was developing with construction sites everywhere. So much of fine dust would be on the roads that during the rainy days the roads would be full of the muddy slush! And in the dry hot weather, it would fly up in the air.

Every time I would tell my husband, why don’t these construction site engineers make sure to clean up the roads after they are done! All that dust and dirt particles going into our eyes, nose, mouth, hair and skin! Uugh! I never knew there was vehicle to clean roads like this!

When I saw this dirt cleaning machinery here, my mind instantly flashed back to those Indian streets. Why don’t we incorporate this tool? Make it a mandatory equipment in construction!

One of the major differences between American and Indian roads is the DUST! You never ever see dust on the streets here…we’ve discussed on this..how come there is no dust here! I guess I saw the answer – Road Sweeper!

Note: Image link - http://www.jandjequipment.com/SuperiorBroomz.ivnu

BLACKFISH – A Documentary on Seaworld Orcas

2016-01-19T00:55:00.000-05:00

During the recent December 2015 vacations, we visited Atlanta, GA. Our son Aarav will turn 3 in March 2016; we thought it would be nice to visit a zoo and aquarium again. At his age, this was his 4^th visit to a zoo and 2^nd to an aquarium! We just assumed he has much better understanding now so he’ll enjoy better!

Atlanta Aquarium is rated as the best aquarium in USA! Personally, I have never seen whales! Never been to Seaworld. Had been to a small seaworld kind of amusement park in Hawaii where I saw the dolphin and sea lion shows; the jumps and tricks they do! Atlanta Aquarium has the Beluga whales and giant whale sharks! Huge magnanimous creatures that just leave you in awe!

Aarav was excited to see the Dolphins! He loved the show, though he was almost asleep by the time the show started! The dolphins were just beautiful!

After we returned we were discussing with our friends of the two amusement parks and how the Aquarium is one of the best! My friend shared that this particular corporation has intensive care for the dolphins and they have a panel of scientists, doctors and psychiatrist to study and provide them a healthy environment! She then suggested of a documentary “BLACKFISH” that’s available on Netflix which has the orca trainers disclose and share their experience of training the wild orcas, the unpredictable nature of the animals, how they are captured from the wild, the emotional trauma that the animals endure in captivity through their life, the major accidents that have occurred and how the huge business corporations ruthlessly work despite history of fatalities and clear indications of disturbed animals, while putting the trainers lives at risk each day!

The documentary is very emotional on many levels, mainly from the animal’s perspective that without a doubt it shames me to think of how selfish Human race is! And not just selfish, but ruthless, ignorant and utterly insensitive! There are so many points that the audience probably never thinks of like how did they get them, how are they trained, how are their enclosures etc. I never did myself!

Prior to this documentary, I never had any idea of how gentle, super intelligent and emotional these gigantic animals are, so much like us humans! After watching the documentary, I felt so so sorry for these animals, though they are so much larger in size than us, our cunning intelligence beats their innocence!

It makes me think how as an audience, I’m contributing to the animal’s captive life! I know that just sharing the information won’t stop people from going to these amusement parks, but can spread awareness. The story of Tilikum the Orca at seaworld is truly heartbreaking and to see that huge fish with a bent dorsal fin…you know it’s just WRONG!

Sharing the trailer video link on youtube. Recommend to watch and share.

While I was still disturbed after watching the documentary, I came across an article of how even Dolphins in captivity suffer and how the ‘Swim-with-dolphin’ program is disturbing!

The Disturbing Truth Behind Your Swim With The Dolphins

"The World Collage" Campaign - Get your own copy!

2015-09-24T15:34:00.003-04:00

As continuation to my previous post, I now have the actual Campaign website which shares the details of the photo book from my Author friend Mrunal Gawade, a small video describing the book in his own words and details of the variety of contribution that can be made with the corresponding perks for the same.

The campaign link: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-world-collage-juxtaposed-photo-stories/x/12208849#/story

The Campaign is trending #1 on the platform with $1300 raised in just 24 hours!

My humble appeal to all readers across the world is to have a look at the link, do read the details mentioned, the right section of perks and if it appeals to you, please come forward and contribute and help my friend to succeed in this campaign!

Mrunal has discussed all points regarding what the book offers, why did he pursue this idea, how can you contribute and if you still have doubts he has shared his email ID to be contacted.

Thank you for reading through my post and your time and contribution to the campaign!

Good Luck Mrunal!

"The World Collage" - photo-stories across 4 continents

2015-09-15T22:32:00.001-04:00

Here is an idea I came across from a dear friend. My friend Mrunal Gawade has been working very hard on a book recently. The book, "The World Collage" tells the photo-stories across 4 continents (Australia, Asia, Europe, North America) through juxtaposition of people, cultures, places and architectures. It's a collection of 142 photos, with insightful descriptive captions.

He has been an avid traveler and a photographer, and an excellent one at both. Being a computer professional, he has traveled to many countries. Not limiting himself to conference rooms, he has ventured out and captured glimpses of what's around. Having seen his work before, I am sure, these are amazing clicks!!

One often says that life offers opportunities to explore your passions despite busy schedules. Mrunal Gawade has actually proven it.

I want to spread the word around hoping more and more people get information on this effort!

Please click on the attached pictures to view them fully - the book cover and the flyer . I will update when the campaign link becomes available. Thank you!

The Book cover

The Flyer

I am back

2015-08-25T23:57:00.002-04:00

Hello to all my readers from the past and new ones to be. I have been away for long long long time! It almost feels like I took a sabbatical! The last time I posted was from Nashville, Tennessee and today I am posting from Savannah, Georgia. Yes we moved to south of USA, almost into Florida; so Disney World is like 3 hrs!!! Great time to move so close with a 2.5 yrs old toddler at home!

Ganesha - Acrylic

YES! My dear son Aarav is grown up and guess what, he started his preschool just yesterday! Now, that should explain why I am back here on my blog! :) From Nashville to now, a lot has changed and happened! We moved to this new place but have a bunch of old friends from India, so for the first time, it feels good and close to home here in USA. This movement makes me be in the same time zone as my brother is Boston!

Crab Shack - Watercolor

I jumped back to my painting hobby and have taken it up a few levels up this time around...now when I look at the paintings I did 8 yrs ago, they look like some kid in 4th grade did them.

Dancing Lady - Watercolor

I started with Watercolor painting and slowly moved on to Acrylic paints. I have started painting on CANVAS! Now, that I hadn't even dreamed of. As always, my husband is pushing and encouraging me to go for big..do canvas ...do oil painting! Do big stuff. But I know my limits and I try to set smaller achievable goals...so far I am doing stuff I see on the internet, ideas that come in my head and I look for them and see if there is something I can replicate! There is lots to learn on YouTube, many tutorials and lessons that help me improve each time!

Traditional Indian Man - Watercolor

Friends only wonder how I manage to get time to paint with a toddler at home. Well the secret is that I do all my paintings late at night, after the kid and husband sleep at 10! I paint till late like 2 or 3 am! True Artist style! J

Buddha - Acrylic

We recently went on a long 5 week vacation to India. Had my son meet all possible relatives in both our families, had his hair removal ceremony. That was pending since his birth and he had really long hair..looked like a cute girl. Now he looks like a perfect BOY!

Spanish house - Watercolor

The past year without the blog has been so busy with raising Aarav, moving to new city. He has been growing up so fast! Learning things so quickly. He speaks English and everyday I hear something new and we are surprised how quick these kids can learn and speak! He is so thorough with the letters and numbers and rhymes. He's reading story books from the library! I am so proud of him!

Poppy field - Watercolor

In 8 yrs of our marriage, I never had a driving license in the USA. Thanks to my growing son and his needs to school I had to get it done...I am glad I did. Now I have a driving license and today it truly felt like the typical American lifestyle. Woke up at 6 am to drop my husband at work, came back and got my son ready for his school, dropped him, stopped at the post office and mailed off Rakhis to my brother and now back home; waiting to step out and get my son back in 2 hrs! Now I know what the other ladies meant by freedom after getting a driving license!

Cheers to taking more responsibility and of course freedom! J

Aarav’s FIRST Birthday celebration

2014-05-19T21:58:00.000-04:00

WOW! Almost 6 months since I have posted anything on my blog. I had been very busy in the first quarter of this year. We had planned a visit to India to celebrate my son’s first birthday with his grandparents. Last year, we had left India abruptly and came here to Nashville. We hardly have any friends here.

It was my thought from the beginning that we should celebrate Aarav’s first birthday with both his grandparents. I mean first birthday is the special one…the next birthdays will happen.

"Super why" blueberry cake

I wonder if I mentioned earlier, but he is a fan of this educational cartoon program “SUPE WHY”. So we decided to have a super why themed party; for which I pretty much bought all the decorations here in the US. His birthday banner, balloons almost 100, the super why character cut outs, plates and cups and spoons and fork – all with super why cartoons on them.

I had my brother-in-law in India to help and co-ordinate the party. I stayed there for 6 weeks; 3 weeks each at my in-laws and my parents in Baroda and Pune respectively! It was a trip to remember. Both his grandparents waited eagerly to meet him, play with him. 6 weeks flew by so fast! Well his entire first year has gone by so fast! He got used to seeing so many new faces all the time. He used to get scared and feel shy…by the end of my trip he learnt not to cry seeing new faces; yet didn’t go instantly to any new person. That is probably common to most kids.

"Super Why" theme party

We bought a Samsung tablet only to keep him busy on the plane with Super why episodes. Well actually I was travelling back alone with him, since my husband had only a 10-day vacation planned for himself. But my son as before too, did not trouble me at all. He pretty much slept though both ways.

By the time we started to India on March 18^th, he had picked up walking. He would walk 5-6 steps and then put his hands down instead of crashing badly. And by the time I returned he was a perfect walker! He got enough space and opportunity and people to take him out walking in India.

"Super why" coloring activity for kids

He played a lot with his grandparents, especially his grandfathers. He bonded with them easily. May be because they would let him play freely, as against grandmothers who like to cuddle more often; with his age of being a rebellious walker! J

My grandmother was there to spend time with him tooJ. She of course could not dare to pick him up, but she enjoyed playing with him at a distance.

As per Indian traditions, we successfully displayed his skills where he showed where the fan, light, moon, airplane, birds. Now it’s a coincidence that all his answers are the same – up, towards the sky! But he knows them correctlyJ. He got to see lots of birds in India, he pretty much screamed with joy every time he saw them. I thoughtfully taught him actions to “how do birds fly” and “how does fan work” – some new entertainment for the grandparents and more stories to brag aboutJ.

Color imaginations

Nowadays he has learnt to say few words – choose (shoes), train, truck, tar (car), dog. He can show A to D on the picture chart, Apple, Ball, Car and Dog. And off the sequence Onion, because he played with it often in my mom’s kitchen.

Those are the important updates from recent months. All in all, beautiful start to the year.

One of the best things about Aarav’s birthday was this idea I implemented – a diary with hand-written best wishes from all near and dear ones on the occasion of his FIRST birthday. Something he will have to read when he grows up. I hope he will enjoy it as much as all the well-wishers did!

Christmas Day - Cook Out Special

2014-01-04T14:56:00.000-05:00

Opryland Christmas Lightings

My husband had a big official vacation period at work, 24^thDec to 1^st Jan! We decided that we did not want to go out of town vacationing, considering we have a 9-month old and also that it’s chilly and freezing most of the days. My biggest concerns are by son’s food; as I give him homemade food everyday using Cerelac while on a trip needs a bunch of arrangements. So why not just skip the travel. Moreover, we haven’t seen much of Nashville yet.

Intricate lighting job!

So my son turned 9 months on 24^th and 25^th was my mother-in-law’s birthday. So I decided to make a common cake for both on 25^th. 24^th we went out to a resort close by, The Opryland. It’s a huge area with hotel and recreations, not to mention it’s probably designed for the richest class of people. But they have a free entry to watch Christmas lighting…for 20mins..beyond which you pay for your car parking.

It was freezing at about -2 degC and we for some reason decided to go and watch the lightings along with my husband’s colleagues. 10 mins out of the car, walking through the lighted area and my hands were numb from holding the camera and clicking pictures. I instantly got a fear of my son falling severely ill; though we had 3 layers of warm thick clothes on him. The place was small enough to drive around in your car and enjoy the lighting so I told my husband that we’d just drive around and leave. Nothing’s more important that my son’s good health. We all rushed back to the car and drove around.

Lights and Birth of Christ arrangements

So Christmas lighting's at the Opryland was a 15 mins event for us! But it was pretty beautiful. They could make it more colorful though! And since we were already in the area and the Opry Mills Mall is right next door, we thought lets go into the Mall and let our son play in the play area. He loves it there. He’s quite social as in, he smiles at other kids around him, goes close to them, doesn’t touch them though. He is always the youngest child in the play area..every other kid there is a walker or much bigger! So sometimes I feel sorry that my son is crawling around and watching other kids walk and run all over the place! He’ll get there soon, he’s quite close to walking. These days he is leaping a lot or raising his hands in the air as if to stand up…raises himself to ever elevated piece of furniture, box, wall, fridge, bath tub!

Buns brushed with milk, ready to bake

Pretty much everything is closed on 25^th Dec in the US..may be some stores will stay open exceptionally. So we knew we’d be stuck at home all day long, no place to go out. I already had plans of baking a cake. So decided to multi-task and use the oven at a stretch and bake couple of things, spicy savory buns – Iyengar styled added to the cake job!

Iyengar styled Savory buns - edible gifts!

My husband wanted to cook Dal Makhani for a while, so I planned to use the “25^thDec-stuck-at-home” day for it! Soaked and pressure cooked it for him and by lunch time he served me a delicious lunch of Hot Rice and Dal Makhani…such a comfort food on a cold wintery Christmas Day! I spent the afternoon baking an amazingly light white cake and Iyengar Khara buns that I devoured so often in Bangalore!

Super yummy Dal Makhani made by my husband

To sum it up, Christmas day turned out to be a cook-out day. We ended it with meeting a friend of mine from Pune who was relocating to Michigan. We visited them with some Christmas gifts and Spicy buns for the two lovely girls they have!

Memories for future

2013-12-16T19:16:00.000-05:00

I am not sure if I mentioned this earlier on my blog; mostly not! In the early weeks of my son’s birth, my husband came up with a cool idea – creating an email account for him; and mailing him from now on, anything. It could be updates about him.

I liked the idea and I created a gmail account for him. And since then I have mailed him...quite a few times! In the early weeks of course it was difficult to find time really, and later there were so many developments, I moved back to my home in Bangalore, then to the US…etc. So while adjusting to these changes, I lost track of mailing him.

After 5 months I today mailed him. Subject – Some updates J. I mentioned all the transitions and milestones he has been accomplishing since my last mail. One of his recent behaviors is that he is kinda scared of the mixer and vacuum noises! He wasn’t like this when we moved here. I use the mixer everyday to puree his food to feed him. So it’s unavoidable! And the times when I have to blend for dosa/idli batter; it’s crazy!

He is not a crying baby, he very rarely cries..but for the mixer and vacuum he cries terribly. Yesterday, my husband was with him and I warned him that I need to blend the tomato chutney so he is going cry now when I turn on the mixer! And as expected he burst into tears and loud cry..even with my husband being right next to him.

He was seeing me across the kitchen counter and still cried. So my husband and I both got a thought-that he might not be scared of the sound really; somewhere in his tiny mind he might be thinking that mommy is getting hurt L. May be that is why he breaks into a loud burst of cry! Like any 9 month baby he is very attached to me.

I have tried holding him and turning on the mixer to show him what it is and where does the noise come from. It’s my way to get him familiar with things; like I used to hold him and stand in front of the Indian pressure cooker to show him where does the whistle noise and white mist comes from. Somehow the fear of mixer noise is not going away.

Very often we think what he could be thinking! Since he was little my husband has been fascinated by this – what do babies think? If there was some device to find it out!

So hopefully these mails will be fun for him and us in future to read!

Sunday “Shudh Desi” Brunch

2013-12-01T16:09:00.001-05:00

Yes, as planned yesterday today’s Sunday brunch was ever comforting pure Indian delicacy – Pav Bhaji. The bunch of Pav (dinner rolls) were waiting all night. I woke up at 8am and started off prepping all vegetables. Also got to use the complimentary food processor I got in my Oster kitchen mixer/blender package for the vegetables. Made my vegetable chopping so quick, with my husband’s help we quickly finished cleaning and chopping all the vegetables and set up the cooker! Aarav was busy crawling all over the kitchen floor around our legs. He also got his share of vegetable mix for lunch!

11 am and Sunday brunch was ready. Buttery pan-roasted Pav with spicy yummy steaming hot bhaji with a garnish of crispy onion and green cilantro and a dash of lemon juice! What a hearty warm meal for cold Sunday! That’s a good end to the long weekend of Thanksgiving!

My Father’s perfect recipe for the Bhaji, for those interested!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Pav-Bhaji: for 10 persons.

Ingredients: Vegetables– Capsicum, Carrot, Green Peas, Green Beans, Cauliflower, Tomatoes, potatoes 250 gram each and one onion.

Spices – Ginger- 10gm, Garlic – 10 gm (10 –15 pieces), four green Chilies, Tamarind - 2–3 gm, pav-Bhaji masala, Sambar masala.

Wash nicely all these vegetables before cutting and cooking.

Preparation: Fine chop capsicum, carrot, green beans, cauliflower and potatoes. Except capsicum cook all other vegetables in cooker till it whistles 6-8 times. Make paste of ginger, garlic, Green chilies and tamarind in mixer. Chop tomatoes in small pieces. Cut the onion in thin slices.

Making Bhaji: Heat a big pan/vessel. Put in100 gm edible oil. Once oil is warm add one small spoon mustard seeds in the oil. Add thin chopped onion and fry it till it turns little brown. Add chopped capsicum and fry it till half cooked (10-12 minutes). Then add above paste and fry for 2 minutes. Add chopped tomatoes and fry it well for 5-6 minutes. Press this capsicum & Tomatoes well by some pressing tool like a masher. Then add vegetables cooked in cooker and mash it well with above tool. Add 25 gm pav bhaji masala and 25 gm sambar masala. Add salt as per your taste. Cook the whole stew for another 10-15 minutes. Serve with chopped coriander leaves and fine chopped onion, as you like.

You can use other vegetables as per your choice and availability. If green chillies are big then use 2 or 3 only. Nicely mash all the vegetables till it turns in paste form or homogeneous mixture.

Bon Appétit!

French Croissants and Indian Pav!

2013-12-01T01:53:00.000-05:00

Step by step - from left anticlockwise

I am late by a fortnight in posting about my croissants! I had been mentioning it for so long …and finally I took up what seemed like a herculean baking task. I kind of kept it as a mark of achievement; if I can make croissants then I am here to stay in the world of baking.

Final product - Croissants

Started off on the 2 day process from Friday morning, planning to have croissants for Saturday breakfast. Coming straight to the point, the final result of croissants were good.. I wouldn’t say excellent. As they were not flaky like I wanted them to be; the store bought croissants are flaky like puffs. My croissants were soft and buttery and yummy but not the exact texture I was aiming at. I have learnt a bunch of things that can be done differently next time, which can get me closer to the flaky croissants. For now, these are good to move on! I am proud to have reached this milestone on my baking journey!

Home made Pav bread - dinner rolls

The long weekend of Thanksgiving is on here and we are at home for 4 days. The weather here in Nashville is very very cold; as cold as -6 degC. And having an 8 month old makes it even more difficult to step out of the house! The second day was bright and sunny so we stepped out for some lunch and Indian grocery shopping. It’s been a while since I made Pav Bhaji and have been craving to eat it. But every time I want to make it, one of the vegetable is missing in my refrigerator! But this weekend I have all the ingredients to make my Father’s special Pav Bhaji! To make it more exciting, I decided to make homemade Pav, another first time baking experience. They are so so simple to make!

Shiny butter glaze top

So Sunday special menu is fixed – Can’t wait to get up tomorrow morning and cook up some yummy Bhaji to go with the Pav ready on the kitchen counter!

Hand of God

2013-11-27T22:58:00.000-05:00

My cousin brother, who lives with my parents, sent me this picture the other day; with the email subject – Guess who? Who in the world cannot identify the hands of their parents; those hands that held you first time you were born, ones that taught you how to walk, ones that held you all through your growing years and will forever!

"Hand of God"

I replied right away that it was my mother’s hand. As obvious as is her saree in the back…I still instantly recognized her hands, the particular shape of her nails, the wrinkles she lately has developed..all through her physical hard work. She is a working woman, working both at home and at the bank! In the recent months when I lived with her during the birth and early days of my son, I noticed how she is busy at home all the time. Always cleaning something, furniture, grains/lentils, kitchen, vegetables or cooking. Of course she does watch TV, her favorite Marathi serials. But in these times when life is so easy and quick she still does a lot of things the old way. My husband those days once said, “How much your mom keeps working. Every room she leaves is neat and clean”.

As we had a couple of chain mails on this picture, I remembered a phrase ‘Hand of God’. Sometime ago it was someone’s email password, I don’t remember who. That’s how I know this phrase. I thought it was a perfect caption for the picture.

I googled the phrase just to see where does it come from; came across Soccer’s Deigo video – Hand of god where he made a goal with his hand and won the world cup for Argentina! I further googled to see if it had any mythological reference. Well it has in Jewish and Christian culture.

To me, the caption brought deeper levels of interpretation of this simple picture. J

Double standard

2013-11-18T20:25:00.000-05:00

Facebook is full of Sachin’s retirement.

“Sachin retired...people cried, disappointed blah blah. I know it’s such a loss to watching cricket now...I am a great fan too. I have enjoyed tons of matches watching him play. But somewhere it crosses my mind, as to how much we Indians are attached to public personalities! Everybody retires, OUR PARENTS retire, but don't ever see posts of the same! Nobody mentions how their parents felt when they retired. I spoke to my Father 3 months ago when he retired and how empty he felt that day. That he choked thrice at work while saying goodbye to the 'other' family he had for 30+ years! Cricketers, actors, politicians - they play such important roles in our life! We forget they are doing a job! Jai Hind!”

I posted this today on my Facebook. Very few had the same views and liked it; as most of them as still in the agony of the GREAT RETRIREMENT! Why do we have such double standards? Why don’t we see jobs as jobs! Actors are doing a job, politicians, sportsmen…all the same!

A couple years ago when YSR…Andra Pradesh politician died in a helicopter accident, I read about how one or more people committed ‘suicide’ because of the loss of a great politician! REALLY??? So for these people, their parents come later..beyond these money raking public personalities? We never read a news that a son committed suicide after his parent’s death! Why are we so obsessed with public figures? At the end of the day, Sachin did his job of playing cricket for the country, yes we are proud of his achievements as an individual and as a country, and yes he had to retire some day, so another Sachin has a chance…that Sachin could be one of our sons!

The hypocrisy behind loving him and hating…until last year people were fed up of him…openly saying why doesn’t he retire already? And when he finally does, people want to cry and miss him and tweet and compose a song! Truly, I wonder what Sachin thinks of all this!

My father-in-law retired in 2011 and we (my husband, me and my brother-in-law) has flown in to town to surprise him on his last day of work! I feel sorry that my father did not have this moment of joy, as I and my brother both are here in the US. But I did make it a point to talk to my father and enquire on his last day. He did seem very down, like a lost battle. But it ain’t that bad as he got an extension and started his work the next following day. Point is my father and mother are idols to me, and yes their retirement bothers me much than Sachin’s!

Some of the over dramatic posts on Facebook were –

Life se ek question khatam ho gaya ................."Tendulkar ne kitne banaye?"

There is nothing left in Cricket now, time to start following other sports.

Can FB/ twitter release stats? How much posts were there for Sachin's retirement? I bet more than Obama winning the polls

Baking..I've got the tools!

2013-11-14T10:01:00.002-05:00

It’s been a busy cooking time for me….for a while now! Diwali was simple this year for us…thanks to a 7 month baby at home who crawls all over the place following me, which makes cooking quite a task! Last year during my pregnancy I managed to make 4-5 items for Diwali in Bangalore; this year my husband asked me to avoid getting into any elaborate cooking. Still I decided to make Obbat …puran poli in Marathi.

My Oster hand mixer

Since I got the baking craze in my mind, I had been looking for an electric mixer. The cool branded ones cost about $350-400 which is way too much to cater my new found hobby. I looked online for used mixer which still cost about $250. I was ready to shell out some $50 max. After a lot of research and review reading online, I shortlisted Oster’s clean start hand mixer. Typically baking mixers have 3 attachments – dough hooks, whisk, beater. I was looking for a hand mixer that came with all these attachments. My idea was that if I can’t afford the expensive mixers at least the hand-held mixer should have the attachments. And then identifying the features and speeds eventually brought me to Oster’s clean start mixer. Another reason I trusted the brand is because I have a regular cooking kitchen mixer/blender of the same brand which works well for my needs of dosa/idli batter, sambar, Aarav’s food purees etc.

I take part in online surveys that give some money; I had mentioned this in my recent post. I was waiting for my first paycheck of about $40, which would cover my hand mixer costing $29.92. I was eager to earn this mixer! Well by the time my paycheck came, it was Diwali time. We were in Walmart for some shopping and I just wanted to see if the mixer is available in store, coz it is available online. Searching through the appliances aisle, we found it! So my husband forced me to buy it off then itself than delaying it for my paycheck. And then came Diwali Padwa..for which I thankfully accepted this hand mixer as a gift.

Cake rusk for tea time

So the first item I made using the hand mixer was cake rusk; I realized that the Biscotti I made before was more dense than the store bought rusk, which lead me to realize they are slightly different. So I followed the cake rusk recipe, and in 10mins I had the cake ready and then getting the pieces roasted took some 30mins…but it was all so easy and they got over in 2 days…straight! So now I will make a bigger batch!

Off late I keep watching only cooking videos, especially breads! I have been watching Croissant making for a long time now; I am just too lazy to kick start as it’s a 2 day process. In the mean time I saw simpler recipes of banana bread, zucchini bread, sponge cake etc.

First ever Banana Bread

So after a long wait I finally was all ready to make my first banana bread yesterday. Ready in the sense you need really ripe bananas, which generally isn’t the case! Luckily the recipe I followed didnt need an electric mixer. So once I put Aarav to his nap, I started off with a spatula and whisk. Two hours later the bread was ready. I had never eaten one, so I was too eager to taste it; didn’t bother to wait until my husband returned from work. I was busy taking pictures of it when my husband called, right when I was thinking of him. He was excited to know it’s done and ready! So quick!

Slice of the nutty choco chip banana bread

Next week my husband has a potluck at work (meaning everyone bring a food item to share with all). So my plan was that if he likes this bread, I’ll make the same for his colleagues. When we lived in Spokane 5 years ago, one of his American colleague’s wife would sent baked goodies to work and he’d mention it then. I would wonder back then that I can’t make any baking dishes; the least I could do is Indian sweets like Gulab Jamuns…serving that to American colleagues would be a task with the sticky syrup and cups and spoons..I never sent any back then!

Now I am excited I can share some food that I can make and they can eat easily..and most importantly, they’ll like it!

One of these days I have to actually take up making croissants; I love them! Same goes with puff pastry, I never knew I could make our Indian khari using puff pastry – thanks to no baking knowledge!

This week I got to know about Tarla Dalal’s death. I never knew she had a cooking show of her own. I searched for her on youtube; watched how to make jalebi and rasgulla…never knew rasgullas where SOOO EASY to make! At least that’s how it looked in the video. I have never followed her cook books or recipes; but from her video she reminds you of your grandma, the way she talks so sweetly and convincing you that nothing is difficult to do! I might watch more of her videos to learn some of the very basic Indian food delicacies! RIP Tarla Aunty.

Spine of the home..Yes we are!

2013-11-08T23:58:00.002-05:00

I came across this article on facebook. It literally points down every single minute of my life..and of course of all other women! It's pleasing to see a man pen it down voluntarily!

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/open-page/woman-the-real-spine-of-the-home/article2704619.ece

Best Buy …indeed the best buy!

2013-11-08T10:37:00.000-05:00

My laptop adapter was living its last moments since a while now. You know how the adapters are ….the point close to the laptop where they crack and eventually the power supply cuts off one day..leaving you aghast (in my case the battery is dead long ago…which is mostly everyone’s case too I believe). Yeah, so aghast that now there is NO-WAY to switch on your laptop!!!

Moreover not all laptops have the same adapters, so there is a rare chance you can use or borrow other’s adapter! I am not an online shopper; somehow I feel there is a high chance of cheating online as I will never see the product I buy until I pay for it and it reaches to my door. Being Indian, we are used to the ‘No exchange policy’ all through our lifetime shopping in India. That’s why I am not an online shopper. I might as well go to a shop and buy what I see and like!

So here I was at a point where I had to buy an adapter ONLINE! I googled all website that were selling, chatted with a DELL rep for the actual adapter; they apparently are quite costly…around $70ish. That’s a lot of money for an adapter…which die every now and then. I checked with my brother who lives here in the US for a long time now. He suggested me ebay, best buy; ebay had some really cheap ones like for $8-10..but they were unbranded. So we were not sure to buy and then have it blast the moment we plug it in! Eventually I decided to go with Ebay. I placed an order for Denaq DQ-PA-12-7450 adapter ($25 including $2.99 shipping charges) which is compatible with my Dell Inspiron 1545! I ordered it on Nov 5^th Tuesday and the website said it would be shipped by Nov 15^th. So I was mentally prepared to wait for it to reach in 10 days. But to my surprise it reached in 2 days, Nov 7^th! How fast is that, totally unexpected!

I totally loved this online purchase for the speedy delivery; moreover its working fine unlike some website reviews that said the adapter didn’t work or burnt etc! Here I am posting from my laptop using the new adapter! The joy of using your own laptop is so amazing; I had my husband’s official laptop for last 2 days..but it’s not the same. After all it’s for official purpose and I feel guilty using it to watch cooking videos or a couple of Marathi serials!

I take part in online surveys of yet to release products or already released products. These days quite often I see a question – which of the following activities have you done; they have options like ‘complained about a product to the company’, ‘posted a review about a company on a blog, social network’. Now I can choose the review option for my online purchase on Best buy!

I am surprised as to why dell adapters are expensive here in the US. We bought one this January, in Pune from a DELL outlet on MG road and it cost us 1600/- which is approx. $25-30. Pretty much what I paid for this Denaq adapter!

While we are on adapters, I wish there was only one kind of adapter that goes into all the laptops. Life would have been so much easier eh! Well I think it’s just another marketing idea; the more different adapter models, more are the sale and hence greater business!