Been 2 days and I’m going pretty good with the no yelling challenge. I’m 95% there 😁(In case you haven’t read my last post, I set myself a 30 day challenge of not yelling at my kids.) Yes it takes A LOT of patience. And the creepy crawly urge just crawls up your brain when you are already past bed time and P still hasn’t even changed. Her cousins have come for their summer vacation so I can’t totally blame her…. but still 🙈 

Her day starts at 6 am and of course the next day it’s going to be the same story at bedtime. So little by little it piles up everyday and by the end of the 2-3 days it’s KABOOM! The meltdown happens coz she hasn’t had a restful sleep. She has always been this way. She can stay hungry but she can’t stay sleepy. She has to have her rest properly. 

Ever since she was a baby I have always been very particular about her schedule. Her sleep, nap, food. It goes by the clock. And by and large she has been a happy child. I have also kept it the same with A. I notice the day even 1 goes off we are in for crankiness and irratable behaviour. 

A lot of times people will tell you and you will be tempted too. What’s there in half in hour. She will pull through. But that half an hour can cost you peace for the entire day. Only after P turned 6-6.5 she can sustain a late night. Or late meal. But like I said earlier , it can’t pile on. 

Sticking to kids schedules is crucial for their proper growth too. Giving them enough sleep and inculcating healthy sleep and meal habits starts very early in life. If in these formative years their body develops them , they will be stuck to it for life. As we all know less sleep can be a major cause for stress even in adults. So why make little kids go through it. 

If your child is behaving cranky and difficult, look out if she has had lesser sleep than she should. The below table always helped me assess whether they are getting the right amount of sleep. They might not be 100% accurate but 0.5-1 hour less than the table mentioned seemed fine for my kids. 

Since the past few days I have been observing how fast my 7 year old P is growing up. Talking like such a grown up kid! Today while putting her to bed I just hugged her and asked her can I be your best friend? And you be mine. At first I think she couldn’t comprehend what I’m saying. As it sunk in she had tears in her eyes and started crying mildly. She said “then you won’t be my mamma?” I had to assure her that I’m mamma first and then your friend. And you also be my friend just like you are friends with your friends in school. I would love it if you shared with me and spoke to me like you do to your friends in school. 

But I was in for more crying and tear shedding! She wouldn’t just stop crying and I had no clue what was going on in her mind. I had to calm her down and then even be a bit stern. I said just stop crying and tell me what you are thinking! And she said the most touching thing ” you don’t have any best friend. Only I am your best friend” and she was feeling so bad about it! Again I had to calm her down and somehow convince her that papa is also my best friend. She was so upset that I don’t have any friends!

It really touched me the way she has observed and come to this conclusion. It’s true I don’t have any close friends here. And I don’t have much of a social life either. We do feel many times that kids don’t care about our feelings but they prove it time and again that they care. They observe every detail of our life and register it in their brains. Kids learn best by example and observing the elders at home. Language, manners, self esteem, culture. All come when they see how their parents are. Parents are the universal teachers. Teachers at school can teach academics or arts and stuff. But true values only come from parents. 

I feel blessed to have P and A as my daughters. I’m glad their souls chose us as their parents. Today I want to make a promise to myself. I will try everyday not to yell at my kids. And I’m setting a 30 day challenge for myself starting tomorrow. I’m going to report back everyday on whether I was able to keep it. Anyone in with me on this? Please leave a comment if you want to take up this challenge too. And everyday you too can put in your confession in the comments 😃

After god knows how long we finally got to go on a date. Husband and me of course, not the kids 😉 it’s really been a long long time coz I hadn’t had a live in nanny since September. So difficult to leave the kids and go. Just got one a month back. 

When I was getting ready, P comes into my room and says “show me your face. Looks like you put make up?” I hadn’t applied any by then and I told her so. She said ” but mamma your face is glowing. How come ur glowing in your new clothes?” I guess when your happy from inside it just shows on your face. I dint have any answer to give her. In fact I was kinda embarrassed 😬 My 7 year old daughter is telling me I’m glowing! I felt like a college girl going a date with her boyfriend 🙈

It’s just the happiness inside us which radiates on our faces. I hadn’t applied make up but she still thought I looked much better. It was just the anticipation of husband and me on a date which had that effect. Imagine if day in and day out we only did what we loved how beautiful we will look everyday! 

As mothers we forget to take care of ourselves. Do things which make us happy. I do believe we can make our family happy only if we are happy ourselves. If we are disturbed and groggy all the time we land up snapping at the smallest things and even yelling at the kids. I know because it happens with me a lot. And no matter how hard I try not to yell, something or the other bothers me by the end of the day and snap! Most of the time it’s sleep and tiredness by the end of the day. 

I do believe we must take out some time in the day to do something we love. It maybe art or craft or reading or just taking a stroll or writing a blog 😉 Without anyone else around of course. It’s just me and my time. No one else interferes and no one else gets to join in. Just some of this everyday makes a difference. Maybe half an hour or maybe half a day. Whatever suits your schedule. Try it and see how happy it makes you. 

A is still recovering from her shots yesterday. A bit of fever and some pain. The pain was more in the morning and much lesser now. Seems almost nil. I watch her from her distance and she is happily playing now. P and she are playing with their toy guitar and camera and doing some sort of dancing show. But that’s not why i call them Drama Queen. As soon as A sees me she starts limping and making crying sounds! When I’m gone she is dancing and playing happily! Can you beat that? I could never imagine a 2 year old doing so much drama 🤣🤣

And now, just as i am writing this, she is singing ‘Kaisi dhakad hai dhakad hai kaisi dhakad hai’….

 
P is no less a Drama Queen. She feels SO sleepy when its dinner time that she wants someone to feed her. Or when she doesn’t want to do something her crocodile tears come flowing down! So it was dinner time one day and she literally closed her eyes and was on the table as if she had gone off to sleep. My MIL was like poor thing she is so tired. Why don’t you feed her. I was in one of my angry moods that day and somehow knew this is all a hoax. I said if she is so sleepy she can go and sleep. Forget dinner. Madam P immediately took the cue and off she went. In another 5 minutes she was jumping around and playing! I told her either you eat yourself or no dinner. That’s the way my rule book goes. 

After i think 4 years of age kids can easily eat on their own. (Although the age for self feeding is much lower in western countries, I’m sure people living in joint families in India will agree with me) But i think they feel they need to be fed forever. A little drama of being tired and sleepy and there goes…. out comes all the sympathy and they are spoon fed. We need to stop doing this. The rule is you eat yourself, seated on the dining table with everyone or you don’t eat. No TV. No iPad. No Mobile. Kids learn most by example. Especially parents and other family members. So it applies to everyone in the house. We all eat at the dining table with our mobiles kept aside. And we don’t have a view of the TV from our table. 

Of course we do relax these rules once in a while. Sometimes we watch a movie together and eat. Or sometimes the kids want to eat upstairs in their playroom. But that’s only sometimes. And they know that. I have had enough tiffs about this and i think everyone is clear with it now. 

When you make rules, stick to them. And make sure everyone int he family is on the same plane. Don’t bend them even ‘just that once’ otherwise the kiddos will know when to take advantage. Like for A this is crucial stage for all this. For P its already established and she knows. That age of 1.5-4 years are important in that aspect. That’s what i fugured.

I had to take A for her immunisation today. Had been long pending. Don’t ask me how long…. I have to go for the next 2-3 months monthly to make up 🙄 I think it’s the worse thing of all…. we deliberately bring upon pain on our babies. First the prick and then the fever. My poor doll is burning with fever and crying with pain. 
I actually dint realise how painful it will get. When the doctor said matter of factly that it will pain for a day or two…. I was like,  ya it’s ok. What can some pain do. And kids should be used to pain also. But what I wasn’t prepared for was the pain I will go through seeing her crying. She kept saying “yahan pe dukh raha hai” and pointing out. But she was also so easily distracted! In between her tears if I showed her some toy did something funny she would just burst out laughing. 

It’s so easy to distract babies and help them get their mind off something. As adults we loose this quality somewhere. When we sulk…. WE SULK! But beware! Some babies are like P, who would NEVER get distracted. If I tried to divert her mind to something else she would cry even louder!! And nothing has changed. Even at the age of 7 she is still like that. 

Once we had gone to a cousin’s house for dinner or something. P was around 3 or 4 years old. She was refusing to leave from there even though she was tired and her eyes were red with sleep. So my cousin told her go home… I have kept a gift for you at your house. Mamma will give it to you. And I was staring at her…. because if you say something to P it’s as good as a patthar ki lakir. You dare not “not do that”. My cousin thought she will forget by the time we reach home ( about half an hour) and will go off to sleep. But NO! This is P we are talking about. She stayed awake and as soon as we entered the house she was like where is the gift bua has kept for me! I had to rummage through my store room at almost midnight to pull out something for her coz she just wouldn’t listen to anything!

There are 2 things here… use distraction when you can but don’t promise things you can’t do. Don’t say I will do this if you do that (especially if it’s something you really can’t) or if you don’t do this I will do that or I won’t give you that. That way the child will slowly loose trust in what you say. Because you say something but don’t fulfill it. It teaches the child to stay true to their word too. Coz they always see that mamma and papa always stick to what they say. It’s a quality you are slowly imbibing in your child. 

Although sometimes I feel even though I try to practice this to the maximum why doesn’t P stick to her word? I promise this is the last time mamma. And the next thing you know the promise is long forgotten. Can someone answer this riddle? Why do children not keep their promises? Is it because they really don’t understand the meaning of a promise? The word is so over used that the true meaning is lost 🤔

Good night! I’m preparing for another sleepless night 😀 coz school has started for P which means my day starts at 5:45 am. And A is running temperature…. need I say any more!

Hi! So here I am writing my own blog. Never thought I would come this way. I’m not much of a writer… but someone’s suggestion a few months back got me thinking. So I thought why not give it a try, and maybe…. just maybe it might turn out well!!
It started when I was talking to a new mom of a couple of months old baby and she was like ” just waiting for him to be 6 months old and then I can get a good nights sleep” and I was like who told you that. Once you are a mom it’s at least a coupe of years until you get a good nights sleep! And she was like what??? No one told me THAT! And I said yes. It’s one of the things pregnancy books don’t tell you…. And many more such things will come up. That’s when she said why don’t you start a blog. You could give tips to new moms. And I thought… hmmm…. do I even qualify for that? I mean I have two children of my own and learning from them has been a continuous process… and definitely plenty of things to write about. And what better day to start than Mother’s Day!! (Okay I know I’m a couple of days late but hey… I have 2 kids remember?)

But am I really a “good” enough parent to give tips. And what is a “good” parent? It’s very subjective. I’m sure everyone is a good parent in their own right. Everyone feels they are doing their best as parents. To bring up their children , to give them good values , to educate them, to maintain a work home balance… phew! That’s a lot of responsibilities. 
Sometimes it’s absolutely overwhelming. You just don’t know what to do when the toddler throws a temper tantrum for the nth time in the day. Or when your child refuses to go for a class(for which you are paying through the nose) because “what if you come late to pick me up”!! 
Sometimes you feel you have the best kids in world. My toddler just ate a banana all on her own! Or my child just did her homework on all her own. My child made me a card. Etc etc etc….
But at the end of the day… it’s all worth it! When you see your kids sleeping soundly with a little smile on their face… it feels like heaven (pun intended , if you know what I mean 😉)