Hello!

Sameer has learnt to shake hands, or at least extend his hand when we extend ours to say hello. Rahul used to play with him and entertain him by holding his hand and shaking it. He would say, "Hello, how do you do?" each time. We don't know when he realized this, but now each time we extend our hand and say hello, he'll also extend his hand.

People used to keep telling us about the latest tricks their child had learned. Some one's child, barely a couple weeks older than Sameer, can now do the twinkle motion with his hands when they sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Most kids his age can clap their hands and also respond to the game: How big is baby? (कितना बड़ा?) He enjoys it when we raise our arms to show how big Sameer will be but he never does it himself. Kids his age are also supposed to be able to wave goodbye. Well, he hasn't shown much interest so far.

I guess my point is while it probably does not matter either way whether he learns these tricks or not, its just really cute to see him extend his hand each time. In fact, I think we derive more pleasure from it than he does. Every time he extends his hand, I get so happy and excited and then Sameer will look at me curiously and give me a puzzled smile.

Ichak Dana Bichak Dana

Now that our son, Sameer, is over 10-months old, we are trying to get him to sleep without rocking and milk. Our goal is for him to sleep through the night without getting up for milk.

We are now in week two of our efforts. Things have really improved. He gets up perhaps once or twice a night. He does not get milk till about 4:30AM. When he would wake up in the middle of the night, with Ruchi, he would not stop crying as he expected to be fed, so I tried putting him to sleep. The classic children's song from Shree 420, "इचक दाना बीचक दाना," (Ichak Dana Bichal Dana) has come to our rescue. I have been successful in putting him back to sleep when I whisper/talk (more like rap) the song to him. I repeat each line a few times. He usually falls asleep within 5-10 minutes.

Textures

Its true when they say that an infant cannot make out the bitter taste. I guess their taste buds are still developing.

The other day I tried giving Sameer an orange. I peeled the thin membrane for each slice and offered the fruit to him. He tried it and then refused it. He started playing with the orange peels and then put one in his mouth. Oh how he loved grinding it and would have loved to eat it if it were at all possible for him. Another day, I was trying to offer him a banana. He used to love bananas but these days they don't interest him as much. Well, he had two bites and then tore off a thin sliver of the banana peel. Again he just loved mashing the peel in his mouth. I have tried giving him चीले (eggless pancake), but they don't hold much of an appeal to him. He liked veggie burger. It was a portobello burger with some melted cheese on top. We have tried giving him both white and brown rice -- brown rice has has more texture than white rice, but so far I'm still trying to figure out what to feed him other than Cheerios and Crispy rice. Yes he'll eat dal and on some good days maybe yogurt too. But that's about all I can count on him to eat.

Another habit that he is getting into, something joyful and sometimes a bit frustrating is he wants to feed himself. He can easily feed himself Cheerios, now he wants to grab the spoon and put it in his mouth on his own. And there are times when pretty much anything that we offer him has to go through his fingers first.

I love Toons

We have been trying to make Sameer watch cartoons on television. We tried some Baby Einstein DVDs, but he has not shown any interest so far. So we tried some on cable. We have OnDemand as part of our subscription. Till now, I never realized that they also carry cartoons that you can see for free, no purchase required. You can pause them and rewind and fast forward them, as you would with a DVD at home.

There are so many options, PBS Sprout, Disney channel and almost 10-15 others. I had no idea they carried episodes of "Winnie the Pooh" and then there is this wonderful series called "Bob the Builder." I had seen some toys in stores for Bob the Builder, but never realized till now that there is a cartoon series as well for that character. Sameer hasn't shown much interest in the cartoons so far, but I love watching them :-) I now remember the line from the Bob the Builder show: Can we build it? Yes we can! Can we fix it? Yes we can! Being a parent may mean a lot of responsibility, but it also gives you the opportunity to rediscover the child in you.

We also saw Disney's Jungle Book this weekend, but we did not enjoy it much. Infact we found that the one they used to show in India was much better and the lyrics for the title song are so much nicer:

जंगल जंगल बात चली है, पता चला है, चढ्ढी पहन के फूल खिला है, फूल खिला है।

Sameer Indrayan ko hansi kyun aati hai?

Today evening while we were in the car, it was raining. We were returning home from the restaurant (read previous post) and the road was dark for the most part except for the occasional streetlights. Suddenly Sameer started laughing. Both Rahul and I did not know why. He quietened, but again he burst out laughing and that's when we figured out the reason. Every time we passed a streetlamp, the car would light up for one or two seconds and then it would get dark again. He found that interesting and he would laugh each time it repeated. उसकी प्यारी सी हंसी सुन कर हम दोनो को भी हंसी आ गयी।

Sameer at a restaurant

Now that Sameer can easily sit up straight, the three of us can eat out. Today we went to the local Udipi Restaurant in South Brunswick, NJ. He enjoyed playing with the dosa pieces, which he could reach out and easily tear. Needless to say, the restaurant staff have their work cut out in cleaning up the dosa pieces that our betu left there. :-)