Double trouble

San is in India. The kids are bored.. we can explain.

Have been doing the dressing up the kids and taking them to visit Navrathri golu routine since Friday evening and so far we are on schedule!

There will be a post with all the Golu Photos in a gallery in a couple of days.

Yesterday while visiting a golu, the kids were asked "So how is life without Amma being around?" and the answer was very short..

"Fun!"

There was shock all around at the answer.

Then the little one went on to explain the logic. "When amma is around, she keeps giving us chores to do and keeps telling us what to do all the time. Now that she is not there, we are not all the time being told to do this and do that. So it is fun, but it is also boring! So we miss Amma"

A couple of things to learn from this :

All of San's screamings have been providing pure entertainment value for the kids. So she might as well stop.

As for me, not telling them what to do is not exactly interesting. I am boring. So it is time for me to give them chores...

This morning we had an idea to take photographs of them in their different paavadais in one shot.. They are both protesting on the value of three dress changes for a 30 minute photoshop! In the meantime, I wanted to see how the concept will work. So while they were fighting on the couch, fired a few snaps and merged them.. 

It seems to work pretty well.

Let us see if we can sit 9 people on this couch without an overlap...

A picture is worth... a short play!

Every year Jr. brings this school portrait picture request from school. It is "attractively" priced at anywhere from 28 to 100$ depending on the package.. attractively for the kids that is! 

The photographer in me is never happy with the pictures and the CFO at home says "Didn't we fund all that expensive camera equipment? No way we need to pay for any pictures!" 

This year when Jr. got me the form and envelope told her "how many times have we gone through this? I am not even going to have this conversation. You can have this one with yourself. Face me and act like you. Then face the other way and tell yourself what daddy will say in response and be done with it!"

She thought it was actually a great idea and humored us with the little one edging her on.

The result is..

she did pretty good. At the end she tossed the form and now she gets to spend 14 or 28$ at Target.. depending on if the little one also co-operates and doesn't insist on a school portrait! 

Next year, we do not even have to do this play. We can just review this video. 

Life just gets simpler every year!!!

Creativity to compensate

If you read the previous post on the almost forgotten Tamil, tonight promised more fun.

I ask Jr. "What is the Tamil word for Squirrel?"

She goes into thinking mode, taps her finger to her lips a few times and goes 

"Is it Mara Eli?" 

Burst out laughing. Maram is tree in Tamil. Eli is rat. She called it a Tree Rat. Do not know how she gets this.

The sad thing is that the little one knew the answer to be "Anil" for squirrel.

That answer made me sad first but made me smile a second later.

Sad because Apple : English :: Anil : Tamil

In Tamil you teach the vowels first and it goes a, aa, e, ee.. and the first picture in every Tamil book ? 

A is for Anil ! So the fact that it escaped Jr. is sad.

But my sadness gave way to a smile because it takes a very imaginative kid to go all the way and connect the words for tree and rat and make a creative name for another "rodent?" that climbs trees.. So the imaginative streak make me feel very proud! 

I could not have thought of a Squirrel as a Tree Rat in a million years!

We play a new gave now at bedtime. Anything that anyone has to say to the other two people has to be said in Tamil.. It was hilarious. They actually made an effort and were really good at it too getting creative on using their imagination to compensate for their vocabulary!

Next thing we know.. we will be back to bear and animal stories.. (you have to watch the last few seconds of the first video on this old post to get the reference!)

They never cease to amaze!