It’s All About “HER” -

Gianna is a toddler now. I still remember when I used to sing my self-made lullabies to soothe her in my lap. But now, she doesn’t even sit for five minutes in my lap. She just wants to run and run all over the house. She has become more playful now. She runs fast to her “papa-jii” whenever she doesn’t want me to cuddle her tight. And I love chasing her.
The day passes by keeping up with her. She keeps herself and me busy with her shoes, her dresses, her toys, her utensils, her toothbrush, her books, her wagon car, her favorite finger foods, her youtube videos, her combs…the list goes on and on.



If we go out for shopping, no kids shop remains un-browsed. Despite of having so much stuff, we still can’t resist buying whatever that looks appropriate for her collection. Plus, there are so many things for girls in the market that it becomes really difficult to refrain from buying.



Shobhit makes silly faces for her and sings songs with meaningless lyrics that sound funny to her ears...and she smiles, giggles, and laughs, and then we laugh.



I believe that parents never get tired of silently admiring their kids, be it anything. Even a scribble on a piece of paper or filling up her scattered toys back in her store box, or wiping spilled water on floor, recognizing animals in her book…as a mother I just love praising her for everything.



Believe that’s how we encourage our kid and make her build confidence.

“Minneee” Mania

Our visit to Niagaras was a good break for all three of us. After coming home there were lots of home activities due - cleaning the house, buying groceries, meeting doctor, unpacking our baggage to name a few. Gianna has developed some new interests since past few days. She likes to cook food when she is in the kitchen and pluck leaves while she is in the park.





She has developed a special love for Minnie mouse which has increased so much in past few weeks that she likes to see “mickey mouse clubhouse” while eating, carries her Minnie mouse when she is sitting in car, she likes to see only “minnie’s” pictures in the “minnies-mickeys” books, and in fact sometimes call everything that she wants, with this name “minniee”. That’s too much of “Minnie” everyday and everywhere.



Gianna turned 18 months on 22-June-10. We took her to the Bronx Zoo to celebrate her special day and to make her meet some new friends. She enjoyed seeing the lions, snakes, monkeys, giraffes, however she was more amused to see the turtles (even the fake ones ;-) )



She is due for her 18th month regular medical check-up, and this time it includes her vaccination also. It gets very difficult to see your child bearing the pain which starts when a needle in inserted in such soft skin. It becomes all the more difficult when I have to take her all alone (no papa along).



Gianna and her “Papajeee” aka “Pappi”



Shobhit always wanted our first baby to be a girl :-) Shobhit and Gia share a chemistry, a chemistry of “naughtiness”. Today the credit for all her “shaitanis” go partly to her dear “pappi” aka “pappaji”. When shobhit is not working on computer, his favourite passtime is to click Gianna’s pictures and talk to her. On weekends, when Gianna finishes eating her food, Shobhit is the first person she looks for cleaning her mouth and for getting her out of booster chair. She tries to emulate him. She waits eagerly in the evening for her “pappi” and when she hears the door bell, she goes to the door to greet him.



Shobhit, as a father is very careful and protective for her daughter. He like any other father wants her to get the best of everything in this world. She wants her “pappi” to play hand puppets with her. He likes to make bubbles for Gianna. They play peek-a-boo and hide and seek, and sing rhymes together.

May 2010, An eventful month!

Like every year first four months of this year have passed so quickly. With lots of resolutions yet to start, lots of ideas still in mind, I try to accomplish the maximum on a daily basis. It’s been 9 months since we came to USA and during these months of my stay, I met some of my close cousins and my best buddies. America is so organized unlike India and I enjoy being here. New Jersey, the state where we live in, is known as “The Garden State” and the natural beauty, gardens, greenery truly justifies this name. I simply admire and appreciate the effort these people put in to maintain such beautiful plants and trees.

Month of May was quite eventful. There were so many birthdays, anniversaries, and catching up with friends and relatives.

It started with Shobhit’s birthday. We celebrated it with pastries, flowers, yummy food, and ice cream at Baskin Robbins. I had to keep Gianna out of the room while I was decorating. She wanted to touch and take each and every flower that I had put on the table as a part of décor. Such a curious cat!





Gianna has started going out in the park now. She loves to play in sand, likes to sit on swings, pluck flowers, watch other kids playing, touch other children’s sand toys and what not! She is now getting familiar with some of the faces regular to the park. This li’l swthrt is very very observant. Her sudden unexpected moves, activities and thinking astonish me almost every day. I think the kids of this generation are really smart. Everyday our house is a mess and I clean it almost every hour.







We had some wonderful time with my cousin, who visited us for two days. Gianna took a day’s time to be-friends with him. For him, Gianna is a complaisant child, but before he could see Gianna’s true colours - her shouts, her climbing up and down on sofas and tables, throwing remote controls and cordless phones now and then, sitting in her wagon car, scattering all her toys on the floor and many more - he flew off to DC.



Gianna had her very first visit to the sea beach last weekend on 15th of May. Thankfully, it was a perfect sunny day. Edison is a place where weather is so very unpredictable. One day it’s sunny and other could be full of heavy showers. One has to refer to weather channel and forecasts before making any plans for holidaying. The sea looked vast and deep blue. Some people were sun bathing, while others were enjoying their private yachts rides. Kids were playing with their sand toys, and my Gianna was dazed to have a very first view of the ocean. To our surprise, Gianna was not scared when the waves first touched her feet. The water was ice cold but little Gianna was enjoying it to the full.



The beach has a 2 mile board walk renowned for its vast array of amusements, shops and eateries. There were numerous game shops along the beach boardwalk and those cuddly stuff toys hanging in there were the inspiration for us to play those games and win to collect more and more of those plush toys for Gianna. She was thrilled to get so many toys all at the same time.






We had our fourth marriage anniversary on the 22nd of May. Such occasions are good excuses to buy expensive gifts from your husband without them asking any questions…hah! All three of us went to New York and Gianna was very cooperative this time unlike our other trips where she had thrown all her tantrums. She got a good change from her same toys, same rooms, same furniture and of course the same mumma



And finally, in the last weekend of May, we planned a trip to the beautiful Niagara Falls.



Despite of some of our concerns for Gianna’s eating (as she doesn’t eat properly once she is out of home) we planned to visit Niagaras with alacrity. Sunny weather, eminent windmills, dense forests, small lakes, magnificient mountains, beautiful valleys, boundless pastures, meadows and farmlands. It was breathtaking beauty and an aura of freshness all along the way to NIAGARA FALLS. The falls were pristine and were beyond my imagination. A great delight and feast for eyes. Loved each and every moment of it.









We wish to visit the magnificient falls again...!!

Motherhood to me

April, a month thought to be started with pranks and making each other April fool was not so fun for us. Gianna was down with cold and fever and stayed unwell for full one week. It was a painful time for us as her parents. This was the first time when she had a very high fever. Shobhit and I were very worried but by God’s grace she recovered soon.
Gianna completed 16 months on 12-Apr-2010. She has become more curious and likes to explore things. Her ways of interacting with us has drastically changed now. She carefully examines each and everything that is in her reach. She is very fond of chandamama and loves to feed the birds every morning.



One of my very dear friends asked me as to how I feel now, after stepping into mother’s shoes?
I think, “parenting” is one of the biggest challenges in one’s life (in all good sense). One learns to be more patient, more dedicated and more observant than ever. Personally, I see myself as a much more responsible person now than what I was a couple of years back.



Everytime when one task is accomplished another comes into place (for instance, now that she has started drinking milk from glass, another tasks in pipleine are her potty training, stop making her watch you-tube while eating, introducing her to more books, introducing her to more surroundings outside the house, etc). Motherhood is like mastering a queue of numerous tasks which keep coming at different stages one after the another. I maybe careless in taking my medicines on time but am dutiful when it comes to Gianna’s. I have become more alert and watchful mentally and physically. I keep a track of Gianna’s moves, and if I don’t hear her voice for a long time than I set out to check on her. I am accountable for her do’s and dont’s. I want her to eat right and grow right. We as parents want that Gianna acquires all great qualities of her grandparents.

Gianna with her Grandparents

Gianna with her grandparents-



Gianna had a great time with her grandparents during their stay for almost three months with us here in New Jersey. If she has some memorable moments with her dadaji (like sleeping in his lap, playing with him, listening to bhajans, learning some new words from him and many more),



she has some cherishable ones with her dadi too ( like talking to her, playing hide and seek with her and many more).



She would call them dada-‘ee’ ( to dada ‘ji’ ) and daa—di. She wud sleep cozily with her dadaji during the afternoons. Gianna and her dadi were two kids together :-) . They would run around in the house, give food to the birds, play “jhulla-jhulla” on her lap and play peek-a-boo.




She is surely going to miss them a lot when they return to India.

Gianna’s First Birthday (Looking back at 12-Dec-2009)

This day had been the most awaited one for me. I was looking forward to it with all my creative ideas and plans. Seeing your baby growing with all new activities each day is full of pleasure, happiness, and surprises. She makes me feel our importance in each others life. Looking at her want me to admire her innocence, her smile, her playfulness and what not!









Her grandparents and tauji-taiji came over at our place to celebrate her birthday. Shobhit and I had put all our imaginations towards decoration and we were quite happy with the outcome. Her birthday cake was delicious. On the whole, it was a beautiful ensemble of everything.

Blissful Motherhood

“We smile when she smiles

We cry when she cries”

Hi to all,
This blog is something that I intended to create long time back but due to some reasons couldn’t start it earlier. Now I want to regularly update it to make it a timeless keepsake for near and dear ones of Gianna. I am attempting to note down all I can remember about Gianna, so that when I grow old, I have some beautiful memories to recall! I want all of you to keep checking it and post your feedback and comments..:-)


About Gianna:




Gianna is a name with Greek origin, and it means “God is Gracious”. We were blessed with our beautiful daughter on 12-12-08. Gianna has turned one last year.


Stepping back a year makes me remember my visit to the labour room, when I was counting every second to get over with the process of operation and pain. I was relieved when I heard Gianna’s first cry. Also, I was nervous during my pregnancy about my role as a mother and well being of my child but once I stepped into mother’s shoes, everything kept coming naturally.

She has always been a playful and active baby and as she is growing older, we are losing count of her innocent acts. She reads our expressions while doing mischieves and reacts accordingly. Quite smart huh!

When I am cooking , she often comes from behind and starts tapping at my legs.

She has started drinking milk from a glass now but believe me it’s a big task. It takes me almost quarter of an hour to make her finish half a glass of milk which involves us making all kinds of sounds, countless videos played on Youtube and running around the corners.

Gianna likes to listen almost all popular children rhymes. Her favorite and the very first was “ baba black sheep….”. She also loves to listen one of the animated German song “schni schna schnappi..”

These days she babbles few words like “ aada,meeme, taada, daada, bau, mumma, nunna”. This is how she addresses us. But she has a special name for her all time favorite Mickey Mouse plush toy, so she call him “EEEE”.

Gianna started her first step on 28th of October ‘09, when she was ten months old. We’re glad that she never looked back to crawling on her knees and hands. She now runs and peeps into every nook and corner of the house. She is a social baby and smiles almost at everyone. She likes to watch birds and call them ‘bur’.

She is scared of the loud noises such as that of a pressure cooker, mixie, so she sticks close to me if she hears any of these.

These days Gianna has developed some new interests. She likes to step up on the suitcases that we have in our room and enjoys sitting there.



Gianna is very fond of her two books – The first one is “Dora The Explorer” and the other is “A Collection of Nursery Rhymes”. She is delighted if someone reads the books to her. She loves seeing the pictures of her favourite nursery rhymes characters in these books. She has started pointing out Humpty Dumpty, Baba Black Sheep, Mau Billi, Rat, Monkey in these books. She is so much fond of these books that when she is not playing, she likes to hold them and take them along to whereve she goes.

And how can I forget to mention here, her most favorite person on the TV. He is none other than some not-so-popular astrologer “Mr. Prem Jyotish”. Even the jingle of this ad is so catchy to her that she tends to go closer to the TV for a better view of the ad no matter how much engrossed she is in some other work. But believe me guys the ad is very irritating.

We have a fortnightly visit from cleaning dept. and the spanish guy who comes to clean our house calls Gianna by saying ‘muchacha’ to her. She likes this and smiles back at him.