Birthday pictures

Here are Kedaar's birthday pictures.

Fun conversations

Coming back from work around 6 PM
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[Daddy]We need to take Corn for the ThanksGiving lunch at Kedaar's school
[K]Daddy, its not lunch, its luncheon. I will wear a turkey hat
[D]Can we go to Costco
[K]Costco is closed now
[D]But why Kedaar
[K]because its so much raining, costco is closed. Its finished. But daddy, Target is open, we can go there, there are so many toys :)

Before dinner, daddy is playing with Kedaar. Kedaar tries enact as his teacher (that is his regular routine now, he stands on the fireplace base and acts like teacher)
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[Kedaar gives some work to Daddy and tells him] do your work and I will come back and check with you, Ok?
[Daddy]Kedaar , can I get some help?
[Kedaar goes little away from Daddy]ok, you need to be quiet and then raise hands ok
[Daddy raises hands]
[Kedaar]ok, tell me now. This is the way to do it, OK?

After dinner, time to do some puzzles
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[Mummy]Kedaar, do you want to do some Thomas puzzles
[K]Yes (comes closer, but exactly then mummy's laptop is running out of power and made some beeping sounds before it shuts off)
[Mummy]oh, No, power is almost gone
[K]I can help you, I can get a charger for you
[Mummy]How do you know about charger?
[K]Because I am a big boy, thats why I know. Mummy, you like me, I good boy too :)

Loose bag

Kedaar's class teacher does "Sound of the week" based on the Alphabets (Aa, Ba,Ca,Da etc). Each kid takes some items from home that start with that sound everyday and they all together learn those new words by writing them on board and also share them friends. They call it as "Sharing toys". Each kid needs to get their sharing toys in a loose bag (ziplock or some bag) so that they can take it home in the evening in the same bag.
Kedaar is very particular about his sharing toys and preparing his loose bag. This week's sound of the week is K(ka). Since last week, Kedaar started saying that "next week's sound is K, K for king, K for Kangaroo, then K for Kedaar, its me, you can take me also in a loose bag too" :)

Halloween 2009

Kedaar had a lot of fun in this Halloween. Kedaar's school teacher started teaching kids some Halloween related songs starting 2-3 weeks before itself. So he really understood and started thinking about his "Costume" much before. We got a "Curious George" costume for him this time. He used to say "I have a monkey costume, I will act like a money oooo aaaa" everyday. He also told us lot of monster stories something like "Dont go into the haunted house, monster will be there reading a book, sleeping. usshhh, dont make any noise (with whisper), talk slowy otherwise monster can getup" etc etc.
Finally the day has come. Kedaar wore his costume, went to school. He got little scared looking all kids in costume and started crying in the beginning, later he slowly started to enjoy. The school conducted several activities for kids along with "trick or treat'. After school fun, Kedaar & Chandra came to Microsoft to join Halloween celebrations in the evening. Kedaar collected lof candy and had a lot of fun there as well. After coming home, he literally told about each and everyone's costume in class.
Here are some pictures from the occassion.

Kedaar explaining Vocanoes

Kedaar explaining volcanoes with excitement


His school teacher is telling them about Volcanoes , Washington state.
Here are some more things he told than what is in Video already
1. George Washington is our first president (he could show the George washinton picture on the $ notes)
2. Scientists go near Volcanoes to learn about them.
3. When Volcano erupts, yucky smokes comes first, then Lava comes and then magma can cone. magma pushes the yucky smoke

Kedaar's compositions

Kedaar has some new talent now. Instead of listening to music,rhymes and enjoying, he is coming up with new lyrics/customizing lyrics for the tune of other famous songs.
Here are the lyrics he came with in the tune of "If you happy and you know, then you clap" song :)

"Thomas and the train going on the track, ta ta
Thomas and the train going on the track, ta ta
If you thomas and the train, if you thomas and the train, if you thomas and the train going on the track, ta ta" ., the the same thing with another train name like
"James and the train going on the track" ........

If we ask him "who wrote this song", he proudly says "Kedaar wrote this song" :)

My name Nandan Kedaar

[Daddy] Are you thunder
[Kedaar]Noooo
[D]are you wonder, are you blunder, are you grinder
[K]no, no, no
[D]then, what are you
[K]I am Nandan Kedaar daddy (pronounces as KeDaaaar), Kedaar is a nice word, Nandan is a nice word

Happy 3rd Birthday Kedaar

Today is Kedaar's 3rd birthday. We celebrated Kedaar's birthday on last Friday at his school with his school friends and today at Seattle Children's museum with family friends.

We did school party with balloons and cup cakes.The teacher showed how Kedaar looked like at 1 yr and 2 yrs to all his classmates as part of the "earth goes around the sun, one year completes" rhyme, where Kedaar carried a globe and went around a chart with months. It was interesting and educating for kids.

For Today's birthday party at museum, we chose Thomas theme, a natural choice for Kedaar :)
Kedaar got Thomas balloons, Thomas Shirt, Thomas watch (shirt, watch got from Northwest railway museum store), Thomas Carnival themed cake , Thomas plates, cups etc etc, full of Thomas. We got all the birthday party supplies including goody bags from birthdaydirect.com and it worked well. After the party Kedaar and most of the kids played in museum for lot of time and had fun. With all uncles, auneties, Kedaar nicely answered to the "How old are you" question saying "I am three years old, I am a big boy" :)
In the evening, we went to Balaji temple in Redmond and did Archana on Kedaar's name. Kedaar liked sitting in temple and reciting the stotras told by the priest and ecnouraged mummy & daddy to do the same when they were just too lazy :).
One statement he made when we were in template stuck in my mind and I thought I should porbably write it. Looking at "Shivalingam" in temple
[k] Mummy, who is that.
[M]Kedaar, its shivudu , this is called "Shivalingam"
[K}mummy, is Shivalingam happy or sad
[M]Deva (god) is always happy naanna
[K]oh, just like me (says with smile)
How innocent kids are, how happy they are, I always wish how nice to be so pure and happy like that and how beautiful childhood is.
Anway, Kedaar's birthdaywent very well and created a great memoral experience for us.

Dreamy dreams

Since childhood, I remember Kedaar smiling, laughing some times during his sleep. I dont know what beautiful dreams he got then. It continued as he grew bigger. Till some time back, he used to say once in a while "Thomas", "Percy", " I want to get James mummy" etc in sleep or as first thing after he gets up from sleep which probably aligned with his fascination for trains. Most recently, his dreams are about school . In sleep, I saw him laughing once in a while, saying sentences like "Excuse me rakesh", "can you pls come here Ms Indu", "Atharva, dont scare me" , "Atharva is my best friend" etc :)
It is so interesting to see that kids get attached to the activities they do, people they spend time with and actually build some dreamy land around it.

My birthday is coming soooon

In the past week, we are pretty much focussed on Kedaar's birthday plans in evenings.
We ordered the blog book in the weekend and we got the book by Tuesday this week. This is amazing, last year it took more than a week for them to even print it. I really liked the blurb.com web site, you can create wonderful memories with their software.
The blog book looked great in print. Its more beautiful and all the effort we put for the details (like borders around photos, background color, full size photos, choosing proper layouts etc) really paid off. We think the book turned out to be the highest quality work compared to the previous years birthday books.
Next thing is venue. After lot of research, thinking , discussion, we decided that we will celebrate Kedaar's birthday in Seattle Childrens Museum and we made the reservation accordingly.
We still have to plan and order the party decors, party favors etc. Kedaar is super excited about his upcoming birthday and thinks about it, talks about it atleast once per day and we are excited too. Years just fly by...., our little one is turning 3 sooon.

Kedaar's blog book

In the past week, I & Chandra worked to make Kedaar's 3rd year blog content + several photos we took in various occassions into a book format. We did this using booksmart software from blurb.com and ordered a copy of the book. We did this for his first year, second year as well for his birthday.

The preview of the book is at http://www.blurb.com/books/917203

Story telling & reasoning

I find Kedaar very imaginative when it comes to story making & telling. Even when he is playing by himself, he would hold 2 trains and he makes story around them and talk as if the trains are conversing with each other.
Generally in the mornings we need to tell him some stories while he finishes his taking bath, brushing etc.
Here is one of such funny stories.
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[K]Mummy, can you tell me the crane the story
[M]Ok, Anaganana there is a crane, crane's nose is long, it wanted to drink water and went to lake. can you drink water with nose Kedaar?
[K]Nooo, you cannot drink with nose, you drink with mouth in a glass. you dont drink with nose, ears, eyes,head. If you drink with nose, fishy , shark can catch you. you cannot eat fish with nose. you cannot eat jelly fish also. Only turtle can eat jelly fish. remember that? Turtle can eat 10 jelly fish (this is from a Diego episode). Turtle is not dangerous. Only crocodile is dangerous. Is crane dangerous.?Crocodile can hold your leg like this and pull into the lake. Crocodile pulled the leg of an elephant also. Then deva can come and help the elephant.Mummy, can you tell me the story of the crocodile & elephant (this is the Gajendramoksham story)
[Mummy]Ok, sure , kedaar.
Thats how my crane story ended :)

Some other funny things to mention.

Kedaar was brushing

[Mummy]You should open mouth and brush. Otherwise your mouth is like germ's playhouse.

[Kedaar starts brushing] Noo, my mouth is not a germ's playhouse.Its a small good crushing mouth. It chews, no black spots. its a nice little mouth.

Kedaar finished bath. Mummy came out of tub to get a towel. Mean while he put some more water on himself and came out. While I was wiping him, he says

[K] After you leaved, i put only 2,3 (counting with hands) times water. Then I leaved the tub too . now mummy, cover me and give me a hug.

Kedaar looked at the tree outside the house when coming out of the house
[K] . "The tree has no leaves. Not even one. The rain and wind take away all the leaves"

In the car

[K]Daddy, i want to listen to the song.

[Daddy]ok, and plays "Its a small world song" (that they in "Its a small world" in Disneyland)[Kedaar, with a face lit with happiness] I know this song, I went in a boat when this song came. The boat was going slow like this and I watched so many things. I saw animals, sheep,dance..

Fun stories

A couple of interesting things to share on Kedaar's knowledge improvements after going to school

• 2,3 days back, on a typical evening,as usual mummy is busy with cooking, daddy is trying his best to engage Kedaar. Then Kedaar built something with Legos and wanted to show it to Daddy. He called "Miss Indu" (his school teachers name) by mistake. Chandra laughed and said "Am I miss Indu", then Kedaar says with laugh "Nooooo, you are Miss Daddy". Seeing us laugh so much at this, he is using this now a days to grab our attention, he says "Miss Daddy", "Miss Mummy" :)

• Last weekend Chandra and Kedaar went to a grocery store. As this is Halloween season, they put some ghosts, skulls etc in the shop. Looking at the skull, Kedaar started telling various body parts pointing at the skull. He named skull, Eye bone, nose bone, ear bone, neck bone, Ribs, Thigh bone, elbow, knee bone and all other body parts followed by a "bone" word :) We then realized that he learned those at school recently and started applying that.

• In Kedaar's school, they are carving pumpkins and painting them for Halloween celebrations. Kedaar learned this word "jack o lantern" from that I think. So whenever we go out, his main job now a days is to see around and shout "daddy, there is a jackolantern" if he sees one. I didnt even know this word till today and I ignorantly asked him in car "what is it Kedaar, can you explain". He explained to me "Mummy, that is you carve the pumpkins nicely and then you paint, then it is jackolantern. Remember that ! I want to put a small one at home too" :) I am impressed with his ability to explain to me.

• Last week on one of the evenings, Kedaar's school had pumpkin picking for kids.I asked Kedaar the previous evening "Kedaar, do you want to a small pumpkin or a biiig pumpkin". First he said "I want a biig pumpkin, after a second he said "No mummy, I want a very small pumpkin (showing with hands) like this so I can lift it" :) I remembered this funny thing his teacher told me at that moment. Apprently one day, she asked kids to draw a pumpkin. Lot of them drew very big pumpkins that went beyond the board, paper. Then she said, "this is too big. Draw small ones". One of the kds (not sure if it is Kedaar), drew a "." it seems and said "this is a very small pumpkin Miss Indu" :)

Fall colors

Fall colors in Seattle are beautiful. The most beautiful places I enjoy are the place where we live(Issaquah Highlands), on the way to Microsoft grounds(and my office).
Here ae some pictures of this years fall colors.

Mothers day gift

This is Kedaar's gift to me for this years mother's day. I was thinking of taking a picture of this and put in his blog for long time and finally did it now.
The day care lady (nanny) made this with the foot, hand prints of Kedaar. This is a great memory for Kedaar to remember his Nanny's day care friends.