Stuff Milind says

A parking lot for all the funny, cute stuff M has said over the past year or more.

These are probably from 3-ish age:
Table car (cable car..)
I definitely...
I probably..
Lets figure out, Mama
Anju Mami - when you drop Naina off, don't forget to give her kiss.
I think maybe is in Papa car - said whenever we can't find something in the house.
I don't do it. Papa do it - all time favorite!!
Kolala bear

Mama said "You're a rowdy!". And M said "What you say, Mama? I'm an Audi?"

M:"What car name, Mama?".
Mama: "Nissan".
M: "Meeshan"
Mama:"No, Nissan"
M:"Meeshan. Like Meeshan mama."
Mama:"Who Meeshan mama?"
M:(talking to me like I am an idiot) "Meeshan mama. He go running with you all the time, Mama!"
Conclusion: Meeshan = Nishant.

You so nice, Mama. You give me gift every time I listen.

Whispering: Papa, if you behave in office I give you gift in the evening. That's the rule.

In response to me saying something along the lines of "why don't you do [xyz]?":
Sure Mama, that's great.

In my office, when he looked up and saw all the ethernet cables in the ceiling & I told him that was so I can use my laptop, he was very puzzled. His question was:
How you sit there and work, Mama?

First sentence to valiyachan when he picked up the phone:
Where my Chappal?

Showing him a boar in a book, I said "That's a boar". And he said "Oh, like boring!"

Mokiiito = Mosquito

fall - small
file = smile

Oppopus = Octopus

Engery = energy

Aminal = animal

Remembering a trip to Ohio:
We go on a plane, then we drive a Ford and go to a hotel. How you manage all that, Mama?

I had just come back from work and M started playing in the Subaru before I got a chance to go in. Asking him to step out of the car, I said "I haven't even said hi to Papa". So he asked "You going to do umma" - making a pouty face and kissing noises :-O

At dinner in a restaurant, when the waitress asked what drink he wanted, he ordered OJ and nicely asked me - you want wine, Mama?

Mama: Milind, you know only one word in Kannada - "idu".
Milind: Ohh, idu is like my big brother. He carry me around all the time when I was a little baby.
Mama: what?
Milind: You know mama, Idu, with Ammu Chechi.
Conclusion: Idu - Sidhu.

Aminal = Animal

We had an impromptu biology lesson, talking about the heart, stomach, brain, etc. and I explained what each of those do. So of course, a couple of hours later, as we were driving around in the car and I was being silly pretending not to understand what he was saying, he says to me:
"Use your brains, Mama!"

There's only one Milind!

Latest report of the day's activities in school:

M: Papa, everybody wants to play with me.

Papa: Oh yeah? (extremely surprised since the last report was "no one wants to play with me.")

M: Yeah, they all say "play with me, play with me". There's only one Milind, you know!

Bicycles are easy

I'll pretend that the 8 month lapse never happened and just pick up where i left off..Too much explainin' to do otherwise!

So anyway, as I was saying we were considering taking the training wheels off his bi-cycle and letting him go at it. Got a "training handle" a few months ago, but never really took him out - (big)part laziness and part busy with dada-dadi. Finally got around to it a few weeks ago. Papa took him out a couple of times and he did pretty good. But then we relapsed and forgot about it. Another couple of weeks, two more visits to the park and voila - off he went! Like a little rocketship. Really. Had me running *all* over the park in my ballet flats. Sure got my workout for the weekend!

Here's a little clip of him back at home, showing off his skills to Papa.

Tri or Bi-cycle?

Not really a post, just a random thought. I'm seeing kids his age still riding tri-cycles and I wonder if he started riding a bicycle(with training wheels) earlier than usual? He's been riding one for the past 7 months now, so he started when he was 2 yrs 8 mos or so.

The last time he was out with it, he was doing circus monkey tricks on it - riding tummy down on the seat, feet up in the air! After seeing that, we've been considering taking the training wheels off and letting him have a go at it. Too early? Only one way to find out :-)

Did you say *car* show?

Our schedule is suddenly filling up with all these random events that ...well, were never on our radar before. Case in point - Vintage Volkswagen show.

One of his teachers from the toddler room is in a band and she was performing at this event. She invited us, so we figured we'd go. Plus, there would be cars so we knew we'd have no trouble keeping him occupied. Of course, by the time we got there her band had packed up and was probably already starting its next gig somewhere else. So we didn't get to see her, but we did see a lot of Volkswagens.

M felt it was his duty to point out the car brand to us, so he was saying "Volkswagen" as we went from car to car to car..He also figured that most of them had their engines in the back, so that had to inspected and verified for each car as well. As you can imagine, i got over the excitement pretty quickly. But there were some pretty cool cars there and M was in heaven, so can't really complain, can I?

Showing Mama how things work:
Re-energizing:
Orange car!
Soaking it all in:

Spring Break

Thought we'd be worrying about spring break only in a couple of years, but this is year 2 of spring break. The Montessori system is taking schooling a little too seriously :-/ But for M, its been a good week. D managed to take mon-tue off. M had been sick, so nothing was planned.

But come Monday morning, he was feeling allright and it was a rainy day, so D and he ended up at our favorite spot - Children's Discovery Museum. They seemed to have a fun day, with both of them collapsing in the afternoon :-)

Tuesday - another adventure-filled day. Papa and M took the train to Redwood City - mama's office. While he was scared by the sounds and sight of the train arriving at the station, he loved being inside. We met for lunch, took a tour of Mama's office and both were suitably impressed(who wouldn't be?). After a mad rush back to the station(with some bawling thrown in), they made it on the train, with M happily napping on the way home and then keeping Papa on his toes by staying up the rest of the afternoon.

Wednesday - Mama was supposed to be off taking care of him. But late Tuesday evening, I found out that I had to be in San Ramon for a customer meeting. And D had to go to Folsom for the day! We were getting ready to draw lots on which one of us would be fired from our jobs first. But then... Enter Ms.Jasmine. Milind's teacher from the toddler class. She was(& hopefully still is) in love with him and had been asking me when she could come by to spend some time with him. Well, I couldn't have dreamed up a better day! She was luckily available and even agreed to show up at 8 AM. She did show up at the agreed time *and* we were all on time. But..Milind was in hysterics when I left him, saying "don't leave me alone, Mama...". That was one of he hardest moments with M - I was almost in tears driving away that day. I could hear him bawling even as I drove out the garage :-( After about 20 mins, I couldn't stand it anymore and called home. And whaddaya know - I can hear M singing in the background, Ms.Jasmine says they finished b'fast and she was debating where to take him to - Chucky Cheese, Toys R Us or the park! When i got back home around 1PM, they had just scarfed down some pizza and Ms.J was opening up a couple of cars(an Audi and Mercedes) that she had just bought him :-O M had even brought a screwdriver from our toolbox so she could get them out of the packaging(!). That day was probably the highlight of his week. He now asks for Ms.Jasmine on a regular basis.
Thursday - Papa stayed home again, but it was a rather uneventful day.

Friday - I stayed home, but had to be out in the afternoon. Papa was busy at work, so now we were on the lookout for a baby sitter again(seeing a trend here..? Mama supposed to be in charge, Mama bails out, frantic search for baby sitter.. Anyway..). This time, enter Naveen Mama. Aanya also had spring break the same week and Naveen and P had been doing the same dance. Luckily, Naveen was home with Aanya that afternoon and bravely agreed to baby sit M and Aanya at their home. This time, Milind couldn't wait for me to leave. He had packed his lil' rollie bag full of of cars, some books, a puzzle and even some Cheerios for Aanya :-) I was still giving poor Naveen instructions on how to handle this hot potato and M was already settled in Aanya's room, rummaging through her toys. I hastily accepted Naveen's offer and scooted out of there before he changed his mind. M and Aanya played, fought, "cooked", fought, ate, fought, watched TV - had a *blast*! Seen here stuffing his face:
He's been asking when he can go back there every day now. Apparently, there was a lot of "Oh my goodness!" and "Let me tell you something, Aanya" from M all afternoon - enough to keep Naveen smiling.

D and I got one thing out of it - M is totally ready to for a baby-sitter! Now all we need is a victim (insert evil laugh here).

Schultüte

Eh, what?

Well, I happened to see a picture of my German ex-manager's kids(on Facebook, of course) holding these huge..cones, all wrapped up with a bow. Had no idea what they were, but luckily there was a comment that referred to "Schultüte". One Wikipedia hit and Google search later, I had it all under control. I knew all about the German tradition of Schultüte and how to make them. Yaay! Now to find a victim.

Milind's graduation from Toddler room to pre-school couldn't have happened at a better time. So here we are, celebrating the "graduation" and welcoming pre-school.

Who cares what its called - its *huge* and looks like its full of ...stuff!
Digging in - Cars, games, his own scissors, crayons, books, candy... Didn't hear a peep from him all evening!
Except for a "Thank youm, Papa-Mama"