Block Printing

We had a fun evening yesterday. Kids were happy block printing on fabric. This was a trial session before we make our own table napkins. They are super excited about making their own napkins. Thanks to Dharu, who lent her lovely wooden block printing set to her God children!

The lovely wooden blocks

It all started a few days back. I have been thinking of some creative activities for kids. Somethings that the kids can make for themselves and use them. As a kid, I used to make almost everything by myself - hand embroidered handkerchiefs for dad, mom, and grand parents. I used to love making clay models in our backyard, sun dry them and then put them back in the dollhouse. Most of my dolls were rag dolls, I designed and stitched their clothes, woolens etc. Those memories are some of the best from my childhood and I want my kids too to have these memories when they grow up.

Kathir enjoys building things, creating things and working with paint. He has a steady hand, and aims at perfection every time. He is upset if at times the paint does not come off the block evenly or the pattern does not appear perfect. I will have to get him off his fetish for perfection!

Kathir at work!

Parth - his best pal at work too!

Gudiya′s work - of course with help!

Gudiya is excited about the excitement all around her. She runs around pulling out paint, trying to clean up, or trying to help Kathir - which he furiously refuses. The activity Gudiya loves doing the most is washing - wash hands, wash the palette, wash brushes, wash the tumbler that has water, and finally wash the fabric thats been recently painted. No wonder her nose resembles a leaky faucet all year round! Gudiya found the sponge pieces very fascinating. She kept brushing Kathir′s cheek with it much to his disdain.

I notice a sea change in the kids since we started our activity sessions every evening. They are happy, enthusiastic, less cranky and clingy, and more even tempered.

We have grand plans of building on our block printing abilities. First, the napkin set, next the table mats, then the table cloth, some T-shirts, and then the kids room curtains. Grand plans! Lets see how we go about fulfilling them.

  

Kathir’s Lego Creations

One of the activities from Mr Maker!

These are some of Kathir’s lego creations in 2010 and 2011. Kathir loves spending tonnes of time with his lego blocks on his bunk bed! If we are out for sometime, he has to get back to his legos the moment we are back. No morning is complete without 30 mins spent with his lego.

I had started this post in 2011 and never got back to it. This is 2014, Kathir is now happily 6 and half! He is growing up really fast. Lots of things are the same and lots of things are changing. His fascination for Lego continues - he has now moved to more complex imaginary creations. Like a flying car or a submarine that can fly, run and swim etc... He has got into detailing his vehicle - some indicator somewhere, a fueling point, a signaling switch, or an fire alarm...things that we think mundane are novelties for the young mind.

He has an added task now. To teach his little sister Keya how to build Lego cars. All that the little sis now knows is to make a ‟dhishu"a small L-shaped structure like a gun. Other than that her primary interest is to fiddle with Kathir’s creations, and get alarming shouts from Kathir about ‟no touching".

Kathir has a friend now who is very keen to partner with him in his Lego creations. That is Parth, our front door neighbor. Parth too is pretty good with his Lego work now. And both of them can spend hours building their imaginary flying-submarines or under-water cars etc.

Keya, Kathir and Parth with Dadu

Sloka - Kathir's new school

Saturday was the first parent-teacher meeting at Kathir's new school - Sloka! At the end of the meeting, I came out of the room with a strange feeling... Do I really know my child?

"Kathir is a gentle boy, does not push anyone, eats on his own, eats everything, loves carrots (!!)" If I heard it right, he is an angel! My my, do I really know my little boy?? Well, he is about to turn 4 so he is naughty and certainly not gentle by any stretch of imagination - even his 4-month old kid sister will nod in agreement to this! He used to eat on this own when he was 2, not any more! He used to go to the toilet on his own when he was 2, not any more! He used to love eating - anything that we gave him - not any more!! So, it was really strange when I heard all those eulogies of praise from his Geetha teacher.

Sloka is certainly not for the faint-hearted. We enrolled Kathir here because Sloka follows a "no-stress" curriculum. It follows the Waldorf philosophy - emphasize on the child's imagination/thinking skills and not literary skills. They do not teach the famous ABCD, 1234 until they are at least 7. It's another matter that Kathir has learned A to Z, 1 to 50 (reading and writing!!) in his earlier play schools - which he is quite emphatic about unlearning now!!

Coming back to Sloka... we got Kathir into Sloka with the utopian thought of letting him enjoy his childhood and keeping him away from the rat-race. If you ask Kathir what did you do at school? He replies: "Main gana gaya, khela aur khana khaya" No wonder, he loves his school despite being woken up at 6.30 am everyday!

Daily routine in school (8.30 am to 12.30 pm)
Morning play (inside class)
Sing
Sand play (outside class)
Sing
Fruit time (we send one whole fruit a day, its cut and fruit salad distributed to all)
Sing
More sand play
Sing
Snack time (every parent takes turn to send mini meals for 20 kids every day)
Sing
Time to go home

Routine for kids at home
- Follow a ritual that does not change (including timings on holidays - coz kids their age do not know the difference between a working day and a holiday - so any change in ritual will stress them out. In short - no sleeping late and partying late on weekends!!)
- No TV - Strictly NO TV (well - it stops creativity in kids!! - esp no cartoon channels, no mythology, no music channel, no animal channels - they can be violent at times, no news - coz that may also color their thought process... In short - throw out your idiot box else your child may turn into one!)
- Dinner at 7.30 and off to bed at 8 (in short - come back from work early, no excuses!) Read out nice fairy tales or tell them stories (no mythological ones!)
- Kids learn through imitation - no cursing, no shouting, no gesturing, no complaining in front of the child, lest they imitate!
- No saying "NO" to the child. Tell them stories about right/wrong (sigh!). I thought my instructional design skills were rusting, and I had to seek alternative career options - no such luck!
- Parents can volunteer to do the class laundry once a month
- Parents must send nutritious snacks, soup (if its cold) and juice (if its warm) etc...
- Parents will organize the Diwali mela, parents will create crafts, parents must take them for nature walks, parents need to read to them everyday, parents must allow them to eat on their own, paint their hands/legs/houses in any color, play with "atta dough"... phew!

Little did we realize that "keeping the kid stress-free meant making the parents stress-out"! I was reminded of the first law of Thermodynamics that my dad had taught me - energy is neither created nor destroyed, it is transferred from one form to another. Do you see it applicable to the "stress factor" being transferred from kid to parents??

Hmm... but finally at the end of the day when I see Kathir happy and looking forward to school, all my maternal instincts take over and I'm happy he goes to Sloka!

Crafts for Kathir

That's a train from Mister Maker! Yes, kathir's mamma had to make it with all the help from Masimoni and Kathir.

That's a pig in the making and a caterpillar in the background...

Kathir's vocabulary

Yesterday, Kathir was being naughty so I threatened to make him sleep in the balcony. He was like - "Balcony mein bahut macchar hote hain - woh mujhe katenge - aur yeh bilkul acchi baat nahin hain - bahur boring baat hai"

Next one - "mamma - 601 (that's the channel on Tata Sky that we have blocked) - lockout ho gaya hai, aur koi bhi channel bilkul interesting nahin hai"

"Agar hum ganda pani mein bina chappal ke chalenge to humare paon ke 'mishan' zameen par dikhenge" - phew!

"Main needh mein tha - isliye galti se bed mein susu ho gaya. Main jaanmuch ke nahin kiya - galti se ho gaya" On still being rebuked, he tells Saraswati - "Tumne bhi to galti se lift ka button 1 daba diya tha?"(Instead of 2 - which is our floor)

Mamma ko bolta hoon - laptop se invite bhejegi

Am sure all parents agree that kids today are smarter than ever before - TV or no TV, they have far more exposure than all the earlier generations of kids had.

Yesterday, my dad called; Kathir was having idly and exclaiming 'yummy' 'yummy'. My dad asked him to send some across to him. To this Kathir replied without batting an eyelid -  "mamma ko bolta hoon, laptop se invite bhejegi."

Whenever he sees us on laptop, he comments, kisko email bhej rahe ho? Yesterday, he asked me to draw a dragon. I asked him to get a picture book so that I could see and draw. He said - "thoda laptop mein search kar lo na..."

These days Ripul is traveling and Kathir is very sure, he can find dad on the laptop or the cell phone. So when a call comes in - he asks - Is that Baba? And of course he knows that cell phones have games - a fact that I didnt until he insisted that I check my phone for some! "Masi's phone has snake games... can u show me some car games on your phone?

Well so much for hi-tech kids!

Kathir's Third 'Happy Birthday'

This year Kathir was very excited about celebrating his birthday. He and I kept planning it months in advance. This was our favorite bed time plan - how to celebrate Kathir's birthday. He was very sure he wanted a cake, candles, and ALL his friends. He wanted to burst balloons and get lots of gifts (read cars).

So finally the build-up to his birthday was an eventful occasion. His Abuji and Dadi were in town but as usual his poor parents had left everything to the last minute. We were also planning a visit to Singapore and celebrate his b'day there but somehow that got pushed to a day later. So there we were - trying to figure out a cake that would reach his school well in time (by 11.30 am) on Friday and then the invites that should reach his friends in time to plan a Saturday eve with us.

Finally, like a one-day cricket team, we pulled ourselves together! Dadi and mummy got the cake from the cake shop and toffees and landed at school 10 minutes before 11 am. All the kids ran out seeing their teacher come out. One tiny little girl's face lit up when she saw a square box in her teacher's hands and exclaimed - wow happy birthday cake hai!

We came back happy. The next task was to send out the invites. I had always wanted to add a personal touch to his b'day celebration and wanted to do something with my own hands. I used my long lost origami skills to create some paper frogs and write out the invite on colored papers.

I love the party!

Am loving it too!

Froggy invites!

My guests tonight!

Kathir loved his frogs!

Poora parivaar...

Thrilled to be with Abuji & Dadi

Dharu's got me my dream car!

Dharu & mamma smothering me with hugs...

Ripul and I went out to handover the invites - 8.30 pm not a very good time to go calling on parents of young children - but that was the earliest we could. :) So out went the invites and the next task for me was to plan the menu for Saturday. Ripul was very clear - chips, cake and coke! I was aghast - it cant be all junk! So there I was looking up 'healthy' sites to plan a good well-balanced menu for Kathir and his friends. This is how the menu looked:
- Cake
- Cheese Sandwiches
- Finger fries
- Fruit skewer
- Jelly pudding
- Juice

Finally, Saturday came! Dharu landed up for lunch like Santa Claus - with a bag full of goodies - not just for Kathir but for the entire family!! We had a good nice home cooked lunch, but no time to laze.... All afternoon - Abuji, Dadi, Dharu, mamma, and masi ran around decorating the house with streamers, balloons (that refused to inflate) and his paper frogs!

Finally, at 6, little tots started filling in with their moms and nannies... and the excitement began. A quick game of blind man's buff, burst the balloon, and Gems' rain set aside all the initial shyness. Soon kids were howling, screaming, running around and it sure turned out to be a nice fun noisy party!

Cake was cut and everybody took turns to blow the candle and took a stab at the cake. Finally, food was served, moms/nannies had a tough time feeding the kiddos who were eagerly waiting for their return gifts! End of the day I had a very satisfying Kathir's birthday and as for Kathir.... he could not believe the day was over. He was all over his gifts and very seriously told me that we should celebrate his birthday the next day as well and invite all his friends over again!