Missed opportunities

As a parent there are many things that you never get around to. For me, one was making a baby book. I still have her foot prints from the hospital and my own thoughts on being pregnant, loosely lying in manila folders. Another was to sew play food like this. Now Anjali is barely interested in playing in her kitchen.

Tonight she was writing about slavery in her journal. She asked me why slaves didn't know their birthdays; And I didn't know the answer (we googled it).

How do they grow up so fast and where does the time go?

Read-o-rama

A miracle of childhood is how kids learn to read seemingly overnight. Anjali started kindergarden reading words such as ‘cat’ ‘hat’ and ‘pot’. By the end of the school year she is reading at the 3^rd grade level. I always wondered how the letters transform in their brains and make the sounds. Its still an amazing mystery to me. The books that have taken us by storm are the Mary Pope Osbornes’ “Magic Tree House” mystery series. These are delightful in their weave of mystery, fact, and fiction. She is on book 31 of the series! She reads so much that we’ve had to set limits. (Here she is reading while we are having a picnic).

I love to read out loud and a little sad that I dont get to do it as much now. Our present designated read-together book is the original Charlotte’s web. What a masterpiece!

Hiking

I love to hike (or even walk). And this photo of Anjali and me captures why.
When I was pregnant with Anjali I made a vow to myself to show her the beauty of the world as I see it (before she realized that it is not all so). Its a simple concept that your feet can take you to extraordinary places. And when you are in that place everything you know looks different, better. And you realize you are part of something much bigger. And its no small feat that she climbed 1200 feet in almost 4 miles!

On becoming a ballerina

Anjali debuted her solo ballet performance at the school talent show. As parents we were blown away by her grace and confidence on stage and leading up to the performance. She put a lot of thought into her routine and her personality was not lost on her choreography notes where she made notes in two columns, left in green (things a ballerina should do) and the right in red (the things she must not). We loved it!
She also got tons of praise from the older kids (huge deal), the principal, and her class teacher. I am so grateful that her (public) school provides kids this opportunity. This is a picture from her classmate.

Yuletide

The tree has been trimmed, stockings have been hung, and gingerbread houses have been made. Its Christmas time! Our friends have a great tradition of getting the kids together to make these fabulous gingerbread houses (all from scratch)!. I think it really sums up the season. There is sharing, friendship and lots of sugar. Its hard being a minority in a majority culture, so we embrace it with some exceptions: there is no Santa (so no lists get made) and this year we focused on giving (instead of getting). Deep in my heart I feel like the holidays exist to make the winter bearable and festive. P.S. I got crafty with the stocking.

Slug Bug

There is no escaping a game of "slug bug" when we are in the car these days. This started sometime around the end of summer. At first I had no idea what Anjali was talking about (a sign of things to come) as she was yelling out "slug bug" as we were running errands in the car. Then Ranjeewa brought me up to speed that inhabitants in our car need to call out slug bugs (VW beetle cars) as we see them and accumulate points, of course the one with the most points wins. My observations skills are pathetic, I wont notice if an elephant is sitting on my lap. Anjali and her father, on the other hand are sharp... I mean really. This whole game has gotten so out of hand we cant have a conversation in the car anymore. There are extra points for 'old fashioned' slug bugs, and now includes PT cruisers, smart cars, MDXs and Mini coopers. Anjali can spot any of these cars blocks away and sometime as far away as 10 cars deep on the opposite lane. To add insult to injury the winner sings "I am the champion" (adapted by Freddy Mercury) to the loser. Having felt pity on me for my lack of observation skills, they now 'give away' points to me!

Ain't no picnic

We are parents of a big kid in a real school... or so I am reminded every day. Public school is just overwhelming as a first timer. And the parent involvement is no joke. This is a snap shot of what it entails:

- every first wed of the month is PTA
- There are fundraisers for EVERYTHING. This month its selling wrapping paper, candy and fall bulbs
- There is a committee for the school auction, the school carnival, the school garden, and well just about everything
- there are field trips you could chaperone kids to
- there are clubs and gathering on how to raise your kids
- there is even an inter-generational cross country track meet next week (yes your whole family can run!)

Phew... quite honestly its all a bit too overwhelming. And I have decided to sit back and observe this year since I am a very inexperienced public school parent.

So what did I volunteer to do? Well I am managing the scholastic book club for our class (kids and parents order books and the class gets bonus points to get free books and educational products), I volunteered to organize the sewing of a quilt for the class auction(mmm...hm!), and I am attending a discussion group on “raising our daughters and sons takes a village” moderated by Dr. Kathy Maserie. The rest of the time I try not to get noticed.