Last night the lure of watching a movie won over writing about the boys. And I was very tired. The lunch went fine. The older kids had a good time pretend playing their mommy-daddy theme and the younger kids were alternately granted the role puppies or babies. Disconcerting conversation heard was
"No, mommy doesn't go to work. She stays at home. Daddy goes to work"
The boys were so tired after all the play, they settled down for TV after the guests left. Manav complained that we always watch the same set of DVD's over and over again and there is nothing new. ( We don't have cable TV). This is an eye opener, since I thought they will watch anything and everything on TV as they get so little TV time. So now we need to expand and diversify in our collection and selection. And here is a self explanatory sequence of what happened next.
We seriously need to reevaluate our DVD collection.
Manav then went to his best friends house for a playdate. Arnav watched some more TV but this time he watched brand new episodes of Diego, courtsey netflix and Papa. But then he started missing Manav. We were having mixed feeling having only one kid around which you can understand is a rare event. We actually were listening to Arnav for a change.
"Are we going to Sidney's house?"
"No we are going to a shop and then we will go to Sidney's house." I said
"Oh"
"Where are we going Papa?" once in the car Arnav said
"To a store"
"No, we are going to a shop, not a store"
He was chatting non-stop about the signals, whatever he saw outside and many other things which I don't remember. He had a great time at the shoe store as well. Then calamity struck. On reaching Sidney's house I went to pick up Manav, leaving Arnav and Caunteya in the car . When back in the car Arnav started wailing as he wanted to hug Sidney and that didn't happen.(Its a daily ritual at school) It was so bad that I had to go back to the house again and ask for Sidney. Unfortunately Sidney was in the shower so the hug did not happen and thus the wailing never stopped. Caunteya said
"Sidney is in the shower Arnav"
"Noooo Sidney is NOT in the shower"
"Sidney fell down so couldn't come out Arnav" Caunteya tried again
"Noooo Sidney NOT fell down"
"He is at the doctor's office" Manav joined in
"Noooo Sidney NOT in office"
All this while Manav was wailing as he wanted to watch Diego and didn't get to. Caunteya first dealt with Manav using pure logic, saying he can watch after we got home from the restaurant as there is no TV in the car, for Arnav he said
"Sidney is skating to the restaurant using a different street. There you can talk to him"
"No, I not talk to Sidney, I hug him" Arnav said
I, the guilty party ( for not taking Arnav inside Sidney's house, trying to save another round of car seatbelt securing-unsecuring work) guiltily remembered how Arnav while putting on his red boots had remarked
"Sidney loves these boots Mommy"
Anyways, Manav stopped his whining, Arnav continued on and off. Dinner done, post dinner lectures and negotiations done, kids put to bed - done, we settled down for the movie.
Next morning ( as Arnav says) was usual weekend affair with us trying to sleep and kids trying to wake us up. Manav remembered his promised Diego watch and said
"Papa has work so he is sleeping, so we will watch Diego later" (means Papa worked late last night)
That was very sweet of Manav. Also his sweetness overflowed today, for everything he said to Arnav
"Can you do me a favor?"
"Yes"
"Can you give me the car you are playing with?"
Arnav worked favorably with this changed tactic for sometime then went back to his old ways.
They played with the 'memical' (as Arnav says chemical ) wipes, cleaning the dining table and time and again Manav deliberately showed me he was wiping his face with the wipe but was perplexed at my calm disposition. ( I had given them a paper towel soaked in water, so didn't react to the instigation). Then there was pillow fight and lots of laughter.
"You didn't push me, right Manav" Arnav said
"No" Manav replied
"Yes, it is just a game" Arnav remarked like a grown-up
Pilllow Fighters catching their breath
Then they switched to colors - crayons, markers and pencils all sorted. Arnav said
"These are maimtemam's ( maintenance who comes to fix things in the apartment) colors"
And in the same breath
"I am just pretending"
Manav saw me taking out bread for lunch and he said
"I will eat all the bread. I will not waste any as there are many ducks who are hungry and don't get bread" Very good application of my teaching that they shouldn't waste food as there are many people in the world who don't get enough to eat .
Then he started throwing bits of bread on the carpet and asked Arnav the duckie to come and eat them. Arnav happily obliged.
Check out the super long 'naada' of the shorts Arnav chose to wear.
Caunteya said we are going to Parker station to see some trains
"Yes, there is a park there as well, so it is called Parker" Manav said
"Yes, Packers and Steelers" Arnav said
Manav tried in vain to point out the difference between Parker and Packers to Arnav. There was a little delay in leaving the house as Manav was wearing Caunteya's Nike socks and all other Caunteya's socks were in the washer ( as Manav had been using them throughout the week).
On the way, in the car again Arnav was proving me wrong in my earlier remarks in this blog ( that he is still working on his conversational skills)
"Mommy look there are decorations" pointing to the little flags hung in the entrance of a store.
"And there is a orange flag on the grass. That is not decoration" pointing to the ground markers.
The GPS said 'recalculating'
Arnav said "calculady" and burst out laughing
Manav said " No Arnav its not lady, it is re-calcula-ting"
Arnav said "Yes, Recalculady"
We headed out to the downtown plano station and adjoining Haggard Park and the boys had a great time. This followed by a trip to Walmart and McDonald's for dinner. They had a blast. The notable thing is last trip to this same McDonald's(@Preston and 121) a month or so earlier Manav had to help Arnav climb the individual levels of the play area but this time Arnav did it on his own. Caunteya had already predicted this when I had raised my concerns about the same.
No comments:
Post a Comment