The Tree of Love

The kids have been asked to get valentines for their classmates next week for their respective class parties. We bought the little cards from Target, the kids wrote their and their friends' names enthusiastically and attached candies. I had not planned on making anything at home for the same because of the sheer volume of work that meant. Its hard to keep the kids interested for very long and instead of a fun activity, it becomes more like a 'Come here and at least finish what you started' activity. However, once I saw the great crafts going on at the blogs in the blogosphere, it was hard to remain uninspired :) I loved the Magazine Tree of Hearts at Putti Prachanda and when I showed it to Chica, she wanted to try making it too. So I started cutting out the pink and red hearts from sweaters and towels and blankets of the same color in old magazines. Chica tried too but she could only manage triangles or trapezia :) She could however cut out big hearts if I drew the outline for her.

She then started sticking them on a plain white paper. The trunk was made from putting her hand on a green paper in the magazine and then cutting it out.

That's the ready tree. It felt very white on the top and bottom of the paper, so we decided to add some grass and sun and clouds.

  

Now this is how it looks on the front door spreading the love as Valentine's Day approaches. The craft on top is something Chica made at her preschool with butter paper and melted crayons. That too looks very pretty.

We loved it so much that we decided we did have some energy and patience to make miniature versions to be turned into cards for teachers and some friends from the apartment complex. We are yet to stick them on red card stock (which we make out of red poster board which sells for 50 cents at the Dollar Tree - we make about 9 medium sized or 12 small sized cards from one poster board).

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About leg pains and what to do?

I had this discussion with some friends on our google group and I thought I'll share the information that I learnt from an extremely beneficial session with a physical therapist at Vansh's school recently, here as well.

She began by telling us about flat feet. Babies and toddlers typically have flat feet and the arch in the feet develops with age, typically between 4-6 years. If the arch doesn't develop well, it
is associated with pain in legs or feet. I would like to mention this here, though I asked the PT at a later stage, that Vansh does complain of pain in his legs after he has had a tiring day and though its not happened for a few months now but starting at about a year back, there were some times when he would even wake up crying at night complaining of the pain. Discussing it with the triage nurse over the phone had led us to the conclusion that since the bones grow, a lot, at this age, especially during growth spurts, the muscles stretch to keep up with the bone growth leading to pain and that its pretty normal. At his 2 year well child visit, the pediatrician had pointed out that its common for children at this age to have flat feet and the arch takes some time to develop but neither of us had talked about its implications. It was when this lady was talking that I remembered having flat feet myself and complaining of severe leg pan often till the age of almost 9 or 10. She said that growing pains usually happen between the age of 5 and 8 and before that it usually is flat feet which causes the pain.

She talked to us at length about what can be done to take care of the flat feet or more specifically to speed up good formation of the arch.


The first thing to do is simple balancing exercises. When you put the socks/shoes on your children, ask them to stand up, put one foot on the palm of your hand (easier while you are sitting down) and let them be like that for a few seconds. Make a game out of it where they
cannot lean on/hold you or something else for support. Increase the length of time gradually.

Ask them to hop on one leg and then change legs.

The second thing she emphasized was the importance of a correct pair of shoes. A lady in our class said that her daughter's pediatrician had told her that it didn't really matter what kind of shoes the child wears because their primary function is to protect the foot from weather, dirt et al. According to the PT, this was far from true. She had gotten an actual foot bone structure with her and showed the bones a good shoe ought to provide a good grip on. Don't quote me on this one because she was showing us the bones without taking the names but according to the picture on the left, they were the Calcaneus Cuboid (the heel) and Cuneiforms and the Tarsal-metatarsal joints (the middle portion of the foot). And the shoes that do that the best are the good old shoes with laces. Also if you look carefully, you would find shoes with an in-built arch (usually all running shoes do). Compare the two shoes below and you'll know what I mean.

Slip ons or shoes with Velcro or even sandals are okay occasionally but not on a regular basis. Its good to let children be barefoot at home or wherever possible outside but when they do wear shoes, its important that they wear the right kind. And the right shoes doesn't mean expensive shoes, just carefully chosen ones. Although I had no idea when I picked up Vansh's Osh Kosh shoes from a discount store for I think 11 dollars, but I was so glad to find out that they did fit the description pretty well.

Last but not the least, she asked us to be extremely watchful about the preferred sitting position of the child. They must be discouraged to sit in the W position (click for what it looks like). Its very common in young children but the PT emphasized several times that it MUST be
discouraged. It can lead to severe orthopedic problems later on. It was surprising for me because it looked somewhat like the aasana in yoga in which you put your heels underneath the hips in a sitting position but with a difference that the heels are not actually underneath but turned out. And try doing this yourself - first sit in the aasana position and see how much control you have over your trunk -the range of movement that is and the area you can cover when you stretch your trunk muscles and your arms and then in the W position and try to pick up things slightly out of reach - the trunk gets locked so to say and in kids that translates to those muscles not getting developed. As also feet problems later on.

Here's a pretty good link for more info

http://www.pediatricservices.com/parents/pc-22.htm

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Cultivating Values

At times, some casual conversations with Ashwini or with friends take such thought provoking turns, I wonder how it actually started. The other day, we found each other discussing the importance of inculcating the right values in children and the uphill task that its becoming in the world today. It almost scares me, in a horrifying kind of way, to think what if I fail. I know (and I hope) that it'll come to us with time, but at this point I wonder how you talk to your kids without over preaching or in a way that makes sense to them about differentiating right from wrong, one of the core values, what many other values boil down to.

One of the values that we talked about in length was the value of money or your belongings, of what you have. Many a times, I find myself thinking about my own childhood. My parents. struggled, in their own ways, to run the finances of the house. They decided early on that they wanted for me to have the best possible education and would strive hard for that even if that meant, and it did, cutting down on other expenses. They sent me to the best private school in Delhi and they were not the ones who thought that duty ends at that. They invested a great deal of their own time in me as well.

Now going to the best private school meant being surrounded by kids whose families were much better off financially than my own. So while the other kids were picked up, during exam time, in cars, many of them chauffeur driven, at that (thankfully the majority still used the school bus during regular school days), I asked my dad to meet me a block away from school on his two wheeler or better still I tied up with a friend who could drop me on her way home. Or when I traveled sandwiched between my mom and dad on the two wheeler, I beckoned each and every God from heaven to not cross my path with any of my class mates. However much my parents explained to me and I never fought with them because I very well understood that we just couldn't afford it at that time, still the embarrassment that a 12 something year old faces in situations like these is hard to take away. But now when I look back, I think I learnt a lot of lessons in my life from those times. I learnt that my 'friends' still continued to be my friends unfazed by my economic status; that those who didn't want to be seen hanging out with me weren't really my friends after all. I heard, at that time, but realized much later the meaning of the words my parents oft repeated which meant that desire is never ending. You have a scooter, you want a car. You have a car, you want a fancier one, a bigger house after that, does it ever end? Does that really make you happy? What makes you happy is coming to terms with reality, being at peace with what you have and what you don't.

Now 'car' is a relatively big thing and there wasn't much I could do about it at that time. Barbie dolls, like always, were the 'in-thing' with 8+ years girls at that time. I was made to work really hard academically, always within limits and according to my capabilities, to be a proud owner of those dainty little things. And even then, it didn't mean I would get each and every accessory and playset that I would ask for. So while it was okay to buy a doll and a couple of dresses (Rs 300 for the doll + Rs 80 for the dresses - no paltry sum at that time by any standards), the dollhouse which cost 600 bucks was obviously out of question. Once again, many around me were playing with those things and I don't mean spoilt brats but decent down to earth friends of my own. But I am not sure whether they felt the same sense of accomplishment that I did because I had actually earned my reward by working very hard for it.

And this continued well into the college years and beyond. I had to cook Sunday breakfast twice to earn Rs 1000 to be able to buy those Levis jeans for that trendy look in college. Even my B.Ed. degree, the last educational degree that I worked for - the two options were working hard to get into Univ 1, pay a fee of Rs 21,000 or working harder to get into a more prestigious Univ 2 with a fee of Rs 3000 and utilize the remaining balance of Rs 18,000 to buy a new color TV, I had been pleading so long for, to replace the 15 year 'old is gold' remote control-less EC TV set.This still makes me smile :) Of course that was not the only reason (or so I like to think), I did make it to Univ 2.

Well that was then. Not too much money, automatically one realizes its value. What lies ahead is the fact that money is not as much of an 'issue' as it was then. Or rather is it the other way round! My brows started to rise, my jaw to fall in shock when a co-parent in ECFE shared that her 6 year old son asked for an iPod for Christmas. Her reply "I don't even know what that is" cracked me up and helped soothe the worrying being that was me. Kids being targeted like never before by ad makers, peer pressure at its worst, video games and gazillions of other hand held electronic devices finding their way into more and more hands and increasingly smaller ones at that replacing the good old playing cards or even the pebbles and marbles or stamps and coins that we so fondly collected. First hand stories of grade 9 students chipping in to gift a cell phone to the only girl in class who didn't have one (and this I am talking about New Delhi, India 5 years ago); grade 7 students shouting "let's stock up on colas and chips" after being kept away from those for just 2 days while on a confidence building camp; statements like "I don't miss my mom and dad as much as I am missing my servant" on the same camp literally sweep the ground from beneath my feet.


Is it "all about the money" from so early on these days? And like I said the worry is that money is not an issue now. My parents said No to the dollhouse for the simple reason that they couldn't afford it. But being able to say No when you know you can afford it is the tricky part now. Its not easy, not at all. I recently started a 'stars' and 'crosses' chart with Vansh where in, we worked together on a list of 'good'(red) and 'bad'(black) behaviors. A 'good' behavior like not disturbing mom or dad while they are talking on phone for a few minutes or with each other, talking softly without shouting for an hour, etc are rewarded with a red star while shouting at/pushing Jiya or visiting friends, interrupting talks, acting naughty during meals and so on get him a black cross. By accumulating 3 successive stars, he earns himself 15 minutes of TV or laptop time where in he can play at starfall.com, one of his favorite activities. A cross means he has to start again. He is way too excited about racking up the stars and does his own little jig when he 'earns' the TV/laptop time and pronounces it proudly to dad when he returns from work. Now that he understands simple concepts of waiting before doing something, getting appreciation for doing something good, I am hoping to start him on what it means to 'earn rewards for self', 'valuing what you get', 'delayed gratification' (another extremely important one - the right here, right now world that it is increasingly becoming; whatever happened to 'We'll eat out on your birthday or may be even on the weekend'. A delicious meal is just a phonecall away as soon as you feel like it.) Anyways, the point I was making was saying No even when you know you can afford saying Yes. As a mother, I feel bad at times when he has not been able to earn 3 stars before his favorite show 'Doodlebops' begins and have a tough time holding myself back from switching it on and looking at that twinkle in his eye. I feel bad when I say No when he says he wants to own a Fire Truck, his latest craze. Thankfully Ashwini is much better than I am, especially when it comes to toys and other material possessions. Doting - yes, indulgent - no. So even as Vansh wishes to have a fire truck (fortunately he is not yet a stage where he demands that we buy him something), we look for books in the library about those to bring back home and read together, we pretend, much to both the kids amusement and laughter, that we are fire trucks running crazy in the house with sirens blaring and he can of course play with those at ECFE or a friend's place. We'll probably wait a couple more months till his birthday to gift him one, by which time, there's a good likelihood of the craze having changed.

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"Baby Dot and Stop"

We did this simple craft last night. Vansh enjoys using the scissors to cut. He's not yet perfect at it but he's surely getting the hang of it. He puts his thumb and fingers in there right but has to be reminded to keep his wrist straight and not tilt it sideways. And I pre-cut about 2" wide strips of colored construction paper which he then cuts into small pieces. We then took a tree template and started to put glue on the branches and the tree trunk and in order to avoid its over use, we kept repeating the phrase 'Baby dot and stop', Vansh's version being "Baby says Stop!" :) and then we stuck the leaves - green, yellow, orange and red and the brown pieces on the trunk. In the end, we had a lovely colorful tree and a beaming jubilant Vansh.

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Happy Dusshera!!

Happy Dussehra to family and friends!! Time to celebrate the goodness in the world, the victory of good over evil. To explain to Vansh what the festival means, I showed him a video clipping of Lord Ram killing the demon Ravan. As a result he spent the whole day reciting to everyone who cared to listen "भगवान जी मार दिया।" In the evening, we lit some sparkles and got nostalgic about the childhood days back home.

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A few illnesses and then ...

Vansh came down with a bout of illnesses the past week. First it was the stomach flu accompanied by fever and then a short (thankfully) stint with a cough and a cold. While reading about the stomach flu on babycenter.com, I realised that the American Academy of Pediatrics has done away with the BRAT (Bananas, Rice, Apples and Toast) diet for kids who catch the flu because because "it lacks protein and other vital nutrients. Studies show that reintroducing a standard diet soon after acute symptoms ease can actually shorten a child's bout of gastroenteritis by half a day because it restores nutrients to the system that are necessary to fight infection. On the other hand, if the bug kills your child's appetite and she misses a few days of good nutrition, don't worry. As long as she's hydrated, she'll be fine." So basically it was lots of water and lots of rest which helped Vansh recover. Milk and chapati were making him throw up immediately. And he totally lost his appetite which resulted in once again switching on the idiot box in an attempt to feed him something.

Salt and pepper paranthi with soup, Maggi noodles with vegetables for lunch and a mommy made vegetable pizza (with whole grain bread serving as the pizza base) for dinner on Sunday helped refresh his sluggish taste buds. Ginger juice mixed with honey and given a quick boil, as always, did the trick for the cough and cold. Vaporiser switched on at night with a quick rub with Vicks on the chest took care of the slight congestion. Bundling up for a short trip to the park lifted the crabby spirits.

Pampered with all the attention and having the control a 2 year old so craves for (read switching on a favorite movie when he wanted us to); this week is being spent on getting him back to his usual routine without the TV. Never before have I found the idiot box so idiotic. One day of over exposure (and that too just about 2 hours) totally knocks off Vansh's attention span and willingness to play independently. Every 10 minutes or so he'll come and ask me to switch on the TV for him. The outings are also limited now owing to pretty cold and mucky weather outside. So we are trying to do lots of activities together to keep us happy and playful. There are no short cuts I have learnt when you want our strong headed little guy to behave right. He needs quality one-on-one time and loads of it to keep him from wandering into rough terrain!! His latest favorite - making every possible thing in sight - rattles, washcloths, soft toys, cars, pass the basketball hoop test :)

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Apple tree craft

We hosted an apple tree craft activity today for our MOMS club friends. A couple of my friends and their kids were over. The big old forgetful one that I am being these days, it struck me that I should have taken pictures only after they left. So I engaged Vansh once again and took a few :)

We used -

- a tree template

- Tempera poster paints (I got a great idea of mixing some liquid soap in the paint to make it easily washable from clothes, etc)

- small sponge pieces

- clothepin to hold the sponge pieces

- duct tape taped to the end of a pen to paint small apples

And here's what we got :

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About the SHIELD meeting

The meeting with the SHIELD nurses on Monday went off pretty well. SHIELD (South Hennepin Interagency Early Learning and Development) is a planning, coordination, and evaluation service provided by Bloomington Public Health in conjunction with the south Hennepin County public school districts to determine eligibility of children birth to three years of age for special services. You can call them if you feel your infant or toddler may have a developmental delay in the areas of cognition, communication, social/emotional development, or motor movement. The reason I had called them was not out of worry but to get a formal assessment of particularly speech development in Vansh. He has been labelling new things everyday but was still not putting together 2 words in the right context, so to say, when I had called them. He would add 'आया' to everything and say phrases like 'पानी आया' or 'दुदु आया' when actually what he meant was 'पानी चाहिऐ' 'दुदु पिया' etc. He had just begun, so I knew it was okay but nevertheless its better to have my peace of mind, I thought.

A public health nurse and a speech pathologist visited us for an hour. The PHN spoke with me for about 20-25 minutes and then both of them played with Vansh, showing him various soft animal toys like cat and horse and monkey and asking him what they were; showing him a picture book with pictures of everyday things - foods, clothes, etc. Vansh enthusiastically joined in the play and did pretty well at naming those things, also throwing in 'meow' and 'neigh' for special effects. Vansh is doing just fine and doesn't need any speech lessons, they said. Had he had a speech problem in the nurses' opinion, they would have enrolled him for speech classes probably twice a week. They said if a new 2 year old can label about 20-25 common objects like his body parts, animals, food items,etc he/she is doing just fine. Vansh was also imitating pretty well whatever they were saying. They also addressed my concern of him putting together 2 words in the wrong context or not using the correct verb/descriptive words and they said that it will happen once he has a vocab of more than 50 words or so and its okay as long as he is making an effort. They were pretty happy with all his other skills like fine and gross motor, personal-social, etc. They also gave me some tips for concerns I had about his behaviour with other kids as he has been shouting and hitting (not violently but hitting nevertheless) off late. Being consistent, not letting him have his way when he does one of these and also the 'time out' technique I have been using are some of the suggestions they gave. The same night I also read step by step directions about applying this method in the book 'Supernanny: How to Get the Best from Your Children' (the same article is also available online at their website).

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