Not a good weekend....

Last weekend was filled with a string of bad news...they kept coming and did not stop until the very end.

It started with my sister telling me about their friend's 6 month old son, who got diagnosed with kidney cancer. Just 6 months old - can you imagine? A kidney has been removed and chemo is to start shortly. The young parents have no family around, and I'm sure they must be in the trenches with their emotions.

I also made a tough phone call to a neighbor.....they lost their 17-month old daughter last month while we were away. She was such a precious, healthy little child....and it was a very sudden loss. I am yet to meet them...but I'm sure I will be at a loss of words when I do.

I recently attended a cousin's wedding in Bangalore. It was such a happy event.....I really enjoyed spending time with all my cousins and came back with happy memories. We found out last weekend that my cousin's mother-in-law, a very sweet lady who always wore a smile on her face, got diagnosed with breast cancer. Not even a month after her daughter's wedding, which the family hosted with such pride and fanfare....they have to deal with this difficult situation.

These news were coming in on Saturday, and by the end of the day, I was emotionally spent. A friend visited us with his soon-to-turn-1-year old and he brought his cousin along with him. One look at the girl and you could tell something was wrong. He told me she was assaulted earlier in the week by some black men. I won't go into much detail but it was a scary, traumatic experience. I'm glad she is safe with us now, but an incident like this is enough to alter a person's life.

On Sunday, we had another friend visit us. They are a couple I adore, and I've known them for a very long time. They mentioned about their cousin's son who is battling an allergic reaction to some drug and has been in ICU, on a respirator, since the last two weeks. My friend has been sending care packages to them every week and she had just finished sending a big package before they came to meet us.

Although none of these things have affected my immediate family, does it really matter? The empathy and sorrow that I feel towards these friends and acquaintances is the same. I can't just shrug off their thoughts from my mind easily.

I keep asking: how can I help? why them? why children? I look at my kids and wonder what if something happens to them? Sometimes, its just plain luck. But no one is always lucky, right? Someday, it will be us, and it will directly impact us.

It's just shaken me to the core - this string of bad news. Once I find a way to reach out, and help - in some way or the other, I'll feel a bit better.

Till then, please pray. For strength and for healing.

Weekending

The last few weekends were filled with activities....garba (3 times), pumpkin patch outing, Halloween trick or treat events (4 of them), apple hill visit, etc - it involved lots of dressing up....driving around town.....clicking pictures.....resulting in happy times and happy memories.

The daughter absolutely loves garba now....she dances to garba tunes every morning and evening in the house....she keeps singing "Sanedo Sanedo lal lal Sanedo" all day.....and this mumma of hers could not be happier to see her daughter share her passion for garba :)!

Here are some pictures from our various outings....

For our annual pumpkin patch outing, we picked a small local pumpkin farm.....the kiddo at first did not like being there....but after the hay ride she warmed up and liked the place....she did not seem too interested in petting the animals or the pony ride....

We went for Garba 3 times.....by the third outing, she was hooked....the music, the colorful outfits, the dancing in circles, sanedo, chhuk chhuk gaadi for kids - she loved it all....

R does not like to wear dresses or Indian outfits at all - her favorite outfit to don is her pajamas or shorts with tees....so for this girl to willingly put on her chaniya choli that matched mine perfectly and let her dad take our picture is like winning the jackpot....these pictures are even more precious for that reason.....

My little man stayed home this year....we managed to dress him up for a few minutes at home and click these pictures....he is too little to be comfortable in such outfits and started crying right away, so I didn't even try to get him to smile or make him sit upright in his carseat (which I usually do to get him to pose).....but hey, this is good enough for this year :)

The same thing happened with Halloween....we tried to put on an outfit and he was so uncomfortable....I could not even get him to stop crying......he had several choices of borrowed outfits, out of which I tried putting on a robot one. Maybe after a week or so I will try again and see if he co-operates :).....

The daughter dressed up as Snow White - and we hit our second jackpot when she fell in love with her dress. She wore it for all her trick or treat outings......and enjoyed looting all the candy.....out of all her loot, she enjoys munching on her N&M's the most :)!

R's camera "happy face" below - if you say you want a picture so give me your happy face, you get this - LOL!

We also managed to go to Apple Hill for our annual apple picking outing.....the last few years mom and dad have always been here with us and they enjoy it more than we do. This year we went to an organic farm (after all, apples are part of the dirty dozen) and it was a good decision....the farm is small, and well managed. It was not crowded, and it did not have any other marketing distractions that other popular farms do. Here are a few pictures.....

That's all for now.....gearing up for the baby's first Diwali and the holiday season here!

Weekend playtime - a photo post!

I like weekends that are not too busy. Especially with a toddler in our lives, we need more unstructured playtime as well as downtime to unwind from the week. I don't know how people can keep up with large groups of friends, and attend gathering after gathering every weekend with young kids in their lives. My life has certainly taken a U-turn in that respect, and I'm actually quite enjoying the way things are at the moment :).

Since I switched to a reduced work week, I have every Monday off from work. Every weekend is a long weekend, and I look forward to spending all that time with my daughter :). We've managed to find a play-date and activity to do every Monday that I have had off so far....and it has also helped hubby and I manage our other responsibilities in a somewhat relaxed manner. We also usually keep the baby home on Fridays, so that she only goes to daycare three days a week; on rare occasions she would go for 4 days. Ultimately, I felt that I needed to be a mom first, then an engineer, atleast until our daughter starts preschool. I'm lucky and blessed to be able to figure out a schedule that works in my favor. Of course I need to thank my hubby and manager at work who supported me unconditionally and is extremely sensitive to how I feel about leaving my child in someone else's care while I come to work.

So this past weekend, I declined 3 party invitations - 2 birthdays and 1 Halloween party. I just was tired from the previous 2 weekends where we had Diwali gatherings (which are once a year) as well as festivities going on during the week. The celebrations were fun, but we needed a break. So we spent the weekend by ourselves, just the three of us, and we had an awesome time!

On Friday evening, right after feeding dinner to Ruhi, we went to the new Whole Foods that just opened in Palladio Mall. I had gone for a sneak preview tour but had not visited after it officially opened. We loved the store, and shopped some real good stuff - including organic fruit for Ruhi. We got this huge organic Mango grown in California - it weighed close to 4lbs, and cost $3.99 each. I cut it last night and it was delicious. Ruhi loves mangoes so I'm going to get a couple more before they run out of stock.

Saturday morning was her usual swim class, which she always enjoys. We got home, and spent all morning/afternoon either playing with Ruhi or cleaning the house. We played with our stacking cups - Ruhi loves swirling them with her fingers, and she is quite good at doing that.....

Then we did bubbles.....

In the evening, I took her to play with our neighbors boys. She had a blast, as always! At night, she enjoyed some juggling from daddy (he is quite good at it).....

 Love this pensive look of hers in the photo below.....

Then she tried some juggling herself....but failed (which is OK :))......

Then we had some cuddling time with Mommy....and some giggling sessions....and some laughing bouts.....

Sunday morning, we went to the Sacramento Children's Museum and had an absolute blast out there....

In the toddler section....

At the waterways section.....

 In the Art Studio.....

 Artist in the making.....

 Rocking her No-No-No-No-No.....

 And doing an impromptu dance.....

 Enjoying the lights before finally leaving the museum...

We came home, ate and napped. And then in the evening, we read by the fireplace.....

We did animal sounds (this is doing the Wolf - but Ruhi knows cat, dog, owl, wolf, lion, snake, horse, octopus, fishie, etc)......

 And here we are doing the "small" and "big" signs - we have a Pocoyo book which explains this pictorially, so I am doing Pocoyo (who is small) and Ruhi is doing Ellie the elephant (who is big).....

 We gave tons of kissies to daddy.....

 And the weekend was over....

It was loads and loads of quality bonding and playtime....and it was fun n relaxing as well!

I had a day off today too, so we had a play-date with my friend's daughter Bree who just turned a year old, and we went to MyGym for a class. We love the Monday instructor Caprice - she is the most fun and her classes are always very enjoyable....Ruhi played so much she dozed off on the ride home!

Now I can't wait for the next weekend and our next set of adventures!