18 Months Old Today

Today is Dhruvi's 18 month birthday.  I can't believe my little baby is  a year and a half old!  It is bittersweet to watch him grow so quickly.  After our trip to India, Dhruvi has blossomed into a little man that can hold his own and in many instances bully both Mandar and me.

I took a little trip down memory lane today to reminisce our chunky monkey's past six months.

Month 12 -  Our baby turns one!

Month 13 -  Dhruvi loves the beach.  We took this pic on Mandar's birthday trip to Cancun Mexico

Month 14 -  This was a special month for Dhruvi when Pallu (Dhruvi calls Pillu moshi) visited him for the first time.  We were hanging out in the backyard just before we went out for dinner

Month 15 -  I love this picture because I see myself in my baby boy.  Dhruvi drinks a lot of water just like me and is obsessed with my water bottle

Month 16 -  Dhruvi's debut trip to India.  He really had a blast and was so happy to be surrounded by his family.  This picture is Dhruvi sporting his first pair of Kolhapuri Chappals

Month 17 - We have a duck pond very close to our home.  Weather permitting we often go to the pond to feed the ducks.  It was an unusually warm day in the month of January and our little duckling is thrilled to be outdoors.

Month 18 - 18 month old going on eight. Bundle of energy, loves an adventure, spontaneous hugger and kisser, and the joy of our life!

Today being Dhruv's birthday, I wanted to do something special for Dhruvi to celebrate this big milestone, but being a weekday was restricted in what I could do.  I settled for making his favorite dish - Shrikhand and stuck a candle in the bowl. Dhruvi kept calling the Shrikhand cake.  I think he was confused because of the candle.  Dhruvi enjoyed eating the Shrikhand and making a mess.

I let Dhruvi do pretty much what he wanted today which was to watch TV and see the Chipmunks perform Bad Romance on YouTube, not once, but 4 times!.  Dhruvi was also allowed to play for 10 whole minuted on the iPad and pummel Talking Tom .  All in all I think he had a good birthday.

Happy V Day!

Valentine's Day is now one of my favorite Hallmark Holidays.  Mandar and I have not really cared much about V day before.  Okay, I lied.  I have "claimed" to not care much for V day, but would be very upset if Mandar sticks to what I say and not buy me flowers on V Day.  Having Dhruv in our life makes this day very special.  It is one more day to remind us how much he fills our heart with love and joy.

I was really excited about this Valentine's day because Dhruvi is at an age where he probably understands that this day is different and involves flowers, balloons, and sweets .  Oh, and did I mention cute picture opportunities?  Here are a few shots that I captured right before V Day.  Dhruvi was thrilled about wearing his Papa's tie, being constantly kissed by his mamma, and eating a rose :)

My favorite one from our photo shoot

Mandar loves mishti doi ( a Bengali sweet dish) , so this year instead of doing the traditional chocolates or cake, I experimented making mishti doi for my two boys.  The verdict?  Mandar loved it and Dhruvi promptly spat it out :(  Mandar thinks Dhruvi's palette needs to mature.

We spent the evening celebrating with our dear friends Ashwin, Sav, Aditya, and Arjun.  All in all it was a great day and we feel lucky to have baby cupid in our life.

Story Time

We love story time.  Every night before our little munchkin goes to sleep he will very sweetly point to his books and say "mamma book".  What he means by that is can you please read me my four favorite books:

1. Curious George

2. Good Night NY City

3. Baby Animals

4. The Little Train that Could

We have no idea why he prefers these 4 over others.  These are not the most visually arresting books, nor do they make any sounds, so it must be the way we narrate the story. Dhruvi knows some of the words and pages in the book very well and will often skip to that page and say the words he knows.  A few days back he picked up his baby animal book and said "Ackoon" which means Racoon.  Out of all the animals Dhruvi had to pick the Ackoon.  My theory is that the dark circles remind him of Mandar's dark circles :)

But I digress...Today's pics are not about reading him his 4 favorite books, but reading books on the iPad.  In the spirit of full disclosure, the pics are about me testing my new camera's low light capabilities.  He actually does not care what we read to him on the iPad, he will happily watch the screen as Mandar gets his daily dose of CricInfo.

It started off reading a real book under a blanket fort and a torch...

And soon we settled on the iPad.  This one is my favorite shot from today..

And we finally ended up in bed snuggling with Papa..

Dhruvi loves all electronic gadgets, but the iPad by far his is most favorite, like father like son.

Cupcake Mess

Mandar and I always bicker amicably about which side of the family Dhruvi represents.  Is he a carnivore Puranik that prefers savory and spicy foods over sweets? Or does he have the decadent Bapat sweet tooth?  The truth is he is perfect blend of both ( at least that is my official story).

Dhruvi never really cared for cake earlier, or so we thought until we went to India over the winter break and discovered he really likes icing more than cake.  We had a cake smash for Dhruvi on his first birthday, but despite the encouragement he refused to indulge.   This weekend we let Dhruvi have a cupcake and loved the mess our little munchkin made.  We are really looking forward to his cake smash on his second birthday.

The Beginning

Let the Mess Begin....

Yummmmmm

Papa to the Rescue

Here Papa, Your Turn

Sugar High

Finished

Done, baassh (means finished in Marathi), no.  Dhruvi's way of telling us he is done having his cake and eating it too!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow....

Today was the second snow of this season.  The first one was on Christmas day, since we were in India we missed the wintry wonderland.  So lucky for us that we had another snow day in the big D.

This was Dhruv's first experience with snow, and I was really excited to see his reaction. A picture speaks a thousand words....

Once he saw the snow he was curious to touch it and put it in his mouth :)

We don't have the right snow gear for Dhruv, so I really did not want him playing in the snow for a long time , but could not resist the temptation of making a few snow balls for him.  He had a quizzical look on his face at first...

Typically when Dhruv throws something on the floor it is an edible product or the "bone" (iPhone), and this act is quickly followed by Mandar or me saying "no Dhruvi... we don't throw whatever it is on the floor".  He did not hear those known words and appeared confused initially. 

He quickly realized I was encouraging him to throw the snow balls and found it rather amusing.  I am really thankful for the flexibility I have with my job and the ability to work from home.  It really gives me an opportunity to enjoy these precious moments with our little monkey.

Dhruvi's First Aquarium Visit

One of our family goals this year is to go on at least one family outing per month.  And no, eating out does not count :)  The whole point of this goal is to spend some fun times with Dhruvi doing an activity which we normally would not do on the weekend.

There is a Sea Life Aquarium opened up in a mall very close to our home.  Prior to having Dhruvi, we wouldn't even think of visiting an aquarium in a mall, but with a rambunctious 18 month old  and 32 degree F weather a small indoor aquarium close to home sounded like a good idea.

We were very skeptical about this place, but were pleasantly surprised to find a pretty cool aquarium with sharks, sting rays, manta rays, and a fish petting pond.

At first,  Dhruvi was a bit nervous.  He had never really seen fish in such close vicinity before, but quickly warmed up. His new favorite word is "sark".  Despite the neon lighting and reflective surfaces... I managed to capture a few pictures to capture our resident "sark's" first trip to the aquarium.

Happy New Year

It is a New Year, so it is time to hit the reset button and not dwell over what you could have, should have, or would have done last year.  It is time to make new resolutions and resolving on achieving them!

We just got back from a lovely trip to India.  This was Dhruvi's debut trip, so we were really excited to share our bundle of joy with our friends and family in India.   Needless to say he was the star of the show and captured everyone's heart. One of my resolutions this year is to do a better job updating this blog, so our family and friends have a window into Dhruv's life other than the occasional iPhone photos, or links to YouTube videos.  Static pictures and dynamic videos can only do so much to give our family and friends a window into Dhruvi's world, so wanted to provide some more context into our little munchkin's Dhruviverse.

To start off this New Year here is a picture of our little boy on New Year's Eve.



 It was the next year in India and we were calling our family to wish them a Happy New Year.  In India Dhruvi picked up the word "Happy Happy".  He typically says that word when he sees a candle on just about anything, or will repeat the word if prompted.  This was one of the many phone calls to our family where he was cooing "Happy Happy" on the phone sitting on his throne.  So here is wishing you a Happy Happy New Year and a toast to new beginnings.

Cheers!