ME AND MY MUNCHKINS!!!

Aradhana asked me about a year ago whether I would be in town in February and I immediately replied that I would make sure I was here if I was needed. She then went on to give the details of a wonderful family holiday they were planning to Antarctica and of course the children were too young to go so she wanted to leave them with me if I agreed. I of course jumped at the opportunity of having my two youngest grandchildren stay with me as my other four grandkids have grown up and are busy with their studies and their friends and the hundred and one other things children at this age do. You can’t blame them….they are growing up and developing interests of their own and as long as they catch up with me every now and then I am happy. Now the thought of having Aryaveer who is 4 years old and little Avaanya who is 2 years old all to ourselves was very exciting so I jumped at the chance! They are both anyway used to popping over and spending short spells with us but Avaanya is still a little shy and takes a while to open up so I thought this would be a great time to bond with them. 

There are 2 empty rooms on my floor which used to be my mother’s room and Rashi’s room so these were ideal for them. Avaanya’s nanny immediately booked the bigger of the two rooms claiming that being a girl she needed more space! I didn’t get into any of that and let them do what they wanted. 

‘D’ day minus 3 and suitcases and bags and boxes and cartons start coming and the 2 Nannie’s would come whenever they were free to set up the rooms. It is amazing how much stuff they need. Right from their clothes and toiletries to Avaanya’s dressing table to their study tables and even their book shelves and of course boxes and boxes of toys. That is the joy of living across the road…don’t take any chances…when in doubt just take it. Oh I forgot their bicycles, tricycles, cars, scooties…we set up a full garage downstairs. 

The children were staying for just under three weeks and Aradhana sent me the full schedule for their various activities which range from taekwondo to gym to dancing to painting to drawing. Basically one activity every day after they have their nap. Then with various birthday parties thrown in they had a busier schedule than I did so on many  days I was sitting at home twiddling my thumbs waiting for them to come home! It was such a delight sitting with them and I really felt old the first day when I tried to sing nursery rhymes to them and little Avaanya said no Nani… tell Alexa to play APT. Now I had never heard of this so I had to get Siya to give me a crash course on how one is supposed to dance to this. It used to be exhausting keeping up with them! Earlier they used to be happy with ‘round a round the garden’ and ‘this little piggy’ but now they wanted to do disco every night!

They are only allowed very limited screen time at the weekend but Vivek is incorrigible and insisted on having movie nights a couple of days a week and him, Neha, all 4 kids and Lex would be piled on his bed watching something on the TV. He made me buy chips and popcorn, chocolates and lollipops… the works so he obviously became known as Chocolate Mama and was the firm favourite. Initially I tried to instil some discipline in their routine but when I saw mayhem left right and centre I figured that why should I be the bad person so I also relaxed. However after the first week even Vivek realised that the kids would fall ill so better sense prevailed. 

I used to love going in the morning to wake Avaanya up. She would be snuggled under her duvet and I would go and lie next to her and she would say “Good morning Nani” with a big beautiful smile on her face. Oh it used to melt my heart every day. 

My favourite time of the day was when Avaanya would just finish her bath and her nanny would bring her out wrapped in her towel. I would love to hug her still wet body and just breathe in that lovely baby smell young children have. I would tickle her and she would laugh and laugh!! 

Aryaveer used to come down for breakfast all ready and bathed and he would then go into the kitchen to make his eggs. He always makes his own scrambled eggs and it is lovely watching him do it. He very proudly told me he only makes the eggs in a special pan which he brought from home.  

As most of you know I am a bit OCD with my sofas and cushions and tabletops and general cleanliness. The first day with the babies I was running behind them picking up crumbs and replacing thrown cushions and tidying up only for them to be messed up again half an hour later. I realised that I would go mad and I had better just relax and enjoy the children so that is exactly what I did. They would jump on the bed and make a house out of the cushions and I even taught them how to spread the throws over the cushions to make a tent. They used to be thrilled and seeing their happy faces made me happy too. Mind you… Vivek and Rashi complained that they were never allowed to do all this and that I was strict with them… well my only answer is that now I am a grandparent and we are supposed to spoil our grandchildren so live with it!!!

I went to pick up both of the children from their respective schools quite a few times and the smile of surprise on their faces was a sight to be seen. I then took them to the local grocery store to stock up on items for their tiffin. It was hilarious as Avaanya was just grabbing packets of biscuits from the shelf and putting them in the basket and I was quietly removing them from the other side. She would pick up something and say “Nani…I love this” and then say the same thing for 10 more things!!!

Both the children were a little scared of our lab Lex so poor thing was banned to his room for the first day and then Vivek decided that we had to find a remedy to this. He started with Ari first and took him and showed him that there was nothing to be scared of and in the end Ari was feeding Lex carrots and playing with him for hours at an end. So much so that one day Vivek took Lex to pick Ari up from school. Ari was delighted! Avaanya was also fine after a couple of days and got used to him wandering around. 

It never ceases to amaze me just how different two children born to the same parents and living in the same house with the same upbringing can be so different. Ari is a typical little boy… very inquisitive and wants to know how everything works. He is going to be an engineer when he grows up. Always trying to put things together or pull them apart and can play for hours with his cars, his dumper truck and various other strange looking vehicles. Avaanya on the other hand loves dressing up… she sits patiently for hours whilst her nanny combs and brushes her hair and puts multiple different coloured clips in it. She chooses her own clothes and accessorises them perfectly. She looks like a little fashionista when she toddles off to school. Then she loves playing with her dolls for ages talking to them a dime a dozen! 

I never realised just how much one has to talk to keep children amused. It is just non stop from morning to night and in the evening when they went to bed I would just want to sit quietly and talk to no one. We also realised that we could never watch television so our screen time reduced drastically because as soon as we switched it on one or the other kiddos would come running into the room. Ari would  say… “again you are watching tv “ in a very accusing voice and he found it most unfair that he could only watch at the weekend and we could watch whenever we wanted. The first day I told him that when he gets as old as us he could also watch it. Now he picked up this word ‘old’ and would bring it into conversation whenever he could. We would be sitting and he would suddenly announce that I was old and would soon need a walking stick!! He also asked if I still had my own teeth!! Then one day after a long bout of dancing I sat down and said I was tired he immediately pounced on me to say ‘yes because you are old’!!! I really asked for that one!!

We all really enjoyed having the children stay with us and I think each member of the family put in that extra bit of effort to make time to spend with them. Vivek would always come to my room as soon as he came home from the office looking for the babies and would whisk them off with some promise or the other. Neha loved talking to Avaanya one on one and would send her nanny out so she got her undivided attention. Rashi would find out when the kids were free and pop over to spend time with them. 

I was delighted that Aradhana and Harsh and of course their parents felt comfortable enough to leave their treasures with us and took that as a huge compliment. The amount of joy, pleasure and laughter these little beings gave us was unparalleled and I’m happy we could manage without any great disasters. My only prayer was that they stay well, don’t miss their parents and mainly be happy and other than a slight temperature with Ari right at the end all was good and we look forward to the Dalmia family going on another holiday… maybe the North Pole this time… just a suggestion!!!!