Ryan and Kirin go to the farm

Retrospective blooging kind of goes against the principles of this form of publishing, but as Johanna pointed out, "It's our blog and we can do what we want to."

I had meant to post this picture from our trip to see the Gills of Heston/Southall, and Johanna reminded me to do it this morning. Ryan, on the right, is a lovely kid who knows more about mobile phones and cars than most adults. On this occasion, he also did a great job of entertaining and taking care of Kirin by reading him Jack and Lily go to the Farm. How cool is that?

Water baby 2

Hey, who is that talking to my mate Sophia?

Hey dad, nice sideburns

You're not my mummy (it's the instructor)

Good lord - I'm wearing Speedos

I'm supposed to be kicking - but I still can't believe I'm wearing Speedos

Optimist or pessimist?

The last month has been a bit frustrating for me as well as Kirin. At times, I have felt that we weren't really making any progress. I see other babies sitting up, starting to crawl and gulping formula from a bottle and the competitive edge comes out. Come on Kirin, you rolled over at Christmas, surely you must be able to sit up or crawl by now! I feel bad about this harsher side of me and as special K and I spend so much time together I probably don't miss some of the changes that other people see in him.

Last week my Mum visited. We had a lovely day, walked over Hampsted Heath on the first sunny day in ages and had tea at Kenwood house. At home, we worked out a new seating arrangement for Kirin with his "bouncy chair" sitting on top of a dining chair rather than on the table, which made giving him milk from a cup easier. Miracle of miracles he managed to empty about half the contents of his cup and I think most of it went down his throat not this front. This is the best progress in a long time and when I look at the cup now it's definately half empty - which is a good thing.

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Ravi/dad adds his bit:

The competition thing is an essay in itself and it really does cause all sorts of problems for new parents. Everything is geared towards comparison with other children. For example, in the UK at least, the height and weight of babies are measured by health visitors in percentile terms, meaning that a correlation is made between age and the averages for most British children.

So, when your baby is on the lowly 9th or 10th percentile, you find yourself wondering whether he is a little slow, not developing properly or, worse, whether your parenting is contributing to the situation (i.e. not getting him enough food which, in the case of a breastfeeding mother, can be more stressful because it makes her worry that she isn't producing enough milk). Of course, this creates a vicious cycle - you get more stressed which could lead to parenting being harder which creates more stress which can affect milk production...

I am not a child psychologist or behavioural genetecist, but it seems to me that the reality of human development is rather more complicated than that. We all grow at different speeds and, generally, things work out for the best in the long run for middle class, first world families like ours.

In my own case, apparently my dad was a bit concerned about my development because I didn't start speaking until quite late compared to my brother and sister. He even took me the doctor to be checked out (admittedly, he was in the process of doing his PhD in child psychology at the time, so he was probably looking at a lot of research). Today, as anyone who has played volleyball with me will attest, I am rarely lost for words.

The reality is that Kirin is a generally happy, alert and curious baby and is eating well. In other words, I think we - and especially Johanna - are doing an ok job so far. In truth, we have absolutely no idea but we just try your best and hope that all of the good things we inherited from our own parents and family, and have observed in our friends rubs off.

NB - As if the above weren't enough, there is a theory that a child's peers have a stronger influence on how he/she will turn out than parents. This idea and much more is discussed in a fascinating article by New Yorker writer and fellow Canadian Malcolm Gladwell (click on his name to go to the article). The piece also includes a great quote: "Infancy is an experimental research program, and the parents are the lab rats."

Water Baby

Sunday was Mother's day in England. Not only did Kirin write a lovely card and get some photos of himself framed for me but he also had his first swimming lesson.

Undeterred by the tiny speedos he had to wear or the fact that his nappy swelled to enormous proportions as soon as he got in the pool, he took to it like a very hyper duck to water. He loved it and I have never seen so much splashing. He was slightly shocked when he was dunked under the water but I'm sure he'll get used to it.

The first pilgrimage

From left: Auntie Bimla (my dad's younger sister); Rishi (Usha's son); Bobson (cousin); Avtar (Usha's husband); Usha (cousin); Bindi (wife of Nanak, who wasn't there, holding their daughter Leah); Nikki (Bobson's wife - they have twins who weren't there); and, standing at the front, Ryan (Nanak and Bindi's son)

It turns out even more people want to get on to the blog (see Uncle Avtar's comment). A couple of months ago (yes, it's been that long), we went out to Heston/Southall, in west London, to visit my Auntie Bimla and her family. The explanation of who's who may be a bit confusing but if anything defines the branches of an Indian family tree, it's confusion. (Bear in mind that my dad has six other siblings and my mum has three brothers, not to mention more cousins than you know what to do with.)

When I arrived in London in 1997, the first place I lived was in Southall with this auntie and her kids. And a few years before me, my brother Sunil stayed with them for a while, too. They have always been good to both of us and they were pretty damn kind to Kirin and Johanna, too. Among the many gifts offered to our son, was a passport holder - it appears my son is more posh than I am.

Not only will we be forever grateful, but my auntie is one of the best cooks of Indian food (along with Auntie Nirmala, my mum and my sister Neena, and the Jogia women) and makes the best tandoori chicken you will find anywhere, and a pretty good biryani, too.

Six months and counting

Yesterday, Kirin achieved a milestone - six months of life. Amazing that it has gone so fast, that we are still sane, that he continues to entertain and confound us.... It merits a long blog entry but work and life are rather too busy to do that just now (this is also the reason that I have not updated the site for so long - sorry about that but things should improve).

This is Kirin's buddy Sandro, who is a little bit younger (I can't quite remember how much younger but at least a month). We met Sandro's parents, Giovanni and Hanna at our ante-natal class way back in August, and have become pretty good friends. Fortunately, they also live just up the road from us, in Archway, so we hope that our boys will be spending a lot of time together over the next few years. The north London posse awaits you Lyova!

The pictures are from a lunch we had at their place a few weeks ago. For the first time, Kirin seemed interested in another baby/child - up to now, I think he has been a bit too young for it to really click in. Or maybe he was just admiring another man with good taste in dungarees/overalls.

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On another note, my good friend Harmeet, who was held hostage in Iraq for four months, was finally freed yesterday. Good news all round.

The daily routine

One of the things everyone tells you about raising a baby is the importance of routine. It makes life easier for them - they eat and sleep effieciently and at the right time - and as a result it's easier for you - they eat and sleep efficiently and at the right time, ideally the former during the day and the latter mostly through the night.

We (well, mostly Johanna) have managed to establish a few markers to the day: mealtimes for solids, once in the morning, once in the afternoon and once in the evening; massage and bath from 6pm; and bed at about 7pm.

Another of the few certainties to our day is that Kirin and I get to spend a little time on our own in the mornings. I take him from about 6:30am-7am until about 8. It may sound a bit early but no matter how tired I am, there are two things that make it all ok. First, invariably Johanna is infinitely more tired than I am and it would seem a bit insensitive of me to complain of fatigue. Second, and even more important, when you go into Kirin's room at the start of the day he is always excited, smiley, and generally happy to see you. He especially likes it when I say, "Hello, good morning!" like my mum does (i.e. in a slightly Indian accent).

We manage to do a lot in that time, from playing in the gym, reading a story and doing some exercise to putting everything into our mouths, making breakfast and ironing my shirt (he watches, I press). And, occasionally, taking the odd photo.

Mummy and me

Gratuitous photos to show how cute I am and how gourgeous my mummy is.

Frustration

The word of the day is frustration. It has to be one of the most annoying human feelings out there; utter helplessness in the face of a problem and the sense that there is nothing you can do about it.

It's all around us. It started last week with my dad (Kirin's dadaji) who fell on some ice and badly tore some ligaments in his right knee. He is having difficulty walking, can't drive for six to eight weeks and, just as difficult, my mum (Kirin's dadiji) is in complete control of his life.

Well, dad, your grandson feels your pain. For the past week or so, the serious urge to crawl has reared its head and Kirin certainly feels frustrated when he doesn't manage to propel himself forward. The routine goes something like this: we either stick him on his tummy or put him on his back and within five seconds he flips himself over; he pushes his head and shoulders up with his arms and looks ahead of him to see what toy he should be reaching for; and then, with all the strength he can muster, he goes for it - he sticks his little bum in the air and starts moving his arms in the manner of a breast stroke or doggie paddle; and after a few minutes, he hits the "wall" and begins whimpering, until we pick him, turn him over and the cycle begins again.

The frustration doesn't end with him. For us, as parents, we want to show him how to do it. "If you stick your bum in the air," we want to say, "don't drive your head into the ground." Instead, we just tell him to keep on trying and, for the time being, he seems to be willing to try, try again.

Of course, frustration is a pointless exercise and Kirin knows this better than most. I had thought the picture for this post would be of Kirin's face contorted like a raisin after he has unsuccessfully tried to crawl. Instead, he simply looked up at the camera with curious, doe eyes just to prove that however tough things might get, he wasn't going to sully his blog with negative vibes. That's our boy!

Music group

One of the tricky things about being a father in a patriarchal society like ours, is that you end up missing a lot of the fun stuff that goes with being a new parent. Every week, Johanna and Kirin are at one activity or another - from the 'Mummy and Me' yoga classes (very north London media types) to walks through Hampstead Heath and tea with other yummy mummies and babies in the neighbourhood (hi everyone).

On Thursdays, it's the music group. This is one of those great intitiatives funded by the government as part of the SureStart programme. A group of mothers get together to sing songs, dance, tap on tambourines and drums and get their kids generally into music.

Having heard so much about this weekly event, I decided to work at home last week and spent my lunch hour with a lot of mothers and their cute little kids. Unfortunately, on this occasion, our little kid wasn't that happy about the whole experience. Kirin seemed more content to stick the drum stick and mini-maracas in his mouth than to shake his booty. Still, he offered us a couple of nice pics.