Spice of life..

Yesterday as usual on the way back from her daycare, I asked Anoushka how her day was. She told me several things and also told me how three of her classmates told her that she was a small baby. Well, to begin with Anoushka is the one who walks around telling everyone that she is a big girl. (Becos I told her that when she started her preschool.) And the girls whom she is talking about have moved to that class long before her. So technically they were right. Anyways. But that did trigger a whole chain of thoughts of when I was a kid. I played with everyone but always had one best friend whom I hung out with all the time and was very possessive about. Every little thing that anyone said or did bothered me and I came home to tell my mom how bad I felt and how I was right and so on. Slowly, I learned to get over things and not get bothered about what others felt about me.

And one day in my college(in India), a friend of mine made a racist comment about me and another friend. My friend got very offended and told her how it was not appropriate to say it. I, on the other hand, very cooly ;) told her that it was her opinion and I could not care less. I still remember the look on her face. LOL And ever since I have had so much fun because nothing seems to deter me from doing what I want. So when my gym class instructor says "10 more crunches for those awesome beach abs. Lets all go to Santacruz this weekend", I am thinking I can go to the beach without those awesome abs too.. Heck I dont get paid to look good! I dont care.

But I must confess I thoroughly enjoy looking at awesome abs and the gossips of people who care! LOL I think that is THE best entertainment and its free too! If I am getting bored, I know exactly which neighbor to talk to hear the neighborhood gossip (I am told that my next door neighbors are nudists.. too bad I did not find it out myself LOL), whom to talk to at work to get the scoop and if nothing else there always are 'tantrum queens' (or kings or couples). There stories are like tequilas- straight to the point and potent. And more than likely, you actually have a big role that you play in that, which ofcourse, you find out later. Anyways, thank god for that. I just realised I miss the budweiser radio ads - Real men of genius .. we salute you!

Solvang

Solvang was a different experience altogether. Its a Danish town with very interesting stuff and like I said for Cambria has a character of its own. Their website is funny too and says "no passport needed to visit this Danish town in CA". And describes it as, "The gentle rolling hills, windmills, quiet streets, horse drawn carriages, family bicycles, golf courses, horse ranches, wineries, Danish bakeries, authentic Danish costumes worn by some shop keepers, Danish morgaasbord restaurants, museums of racing and Solvang history, in the Danish atmosphere and architecture" is what you get to see. We had really good lunch buffet at this place shown in the picture. Everything was yummy. Too bad I cant remember any names. And those shoes are a little too big for Anoushka. no? They had wooden shoes her size which she wanted to buy. I wonder how they feel. wooden shoe? And then the best part was the cycle ride with everyone.. We raced with another family and it was totally fun! The town is bigger than Cambria but the main area was still very small. We saw old Danish architecture buildings etc and stopped to eat the famous dessert 'Aebleskivel' which tasted even better after riding the tandem cycle. This was a day after the inspirational Hearst castle trip and Anshu says to me, " This is so cool. Why dont we do something like this?" Just when I started to feel really proud of him for thinking 'out of the box' (now the swirls as he joined Nvidia) he says, "buy a small store in the town like this." I was thinking more in terms of creating a small Indian town like the Danish town. (Not something that was so mundane and doable) Talk about thinking big!

Hearst Castle

I can't seem to get over my Cambria vacation still. Though not intended to be so, my blog has become a travel blog more than a personal blog. But there were so many wonderful things that I saw and I want to capture that I cant help but write about those.

And then I want my blog to have some nice pictures (eye candy. becos I know no one really reads the text anyways.)

These are famous swimming pools at Hearst Castle. Views from here are breath taking as the castle is on the top of the hill. The story of this castle and the guy who built the castle is as interesting as the things in the castle itself. WR Hearst, the guy who build the castle really pursued his dream. He collected art from all over the world and transported it over the tiny, dirt road to the mountain top. The best part of this was the fact that he loved to share his dream and entertain all kind of people notably Hollywood stars and all the whos-who of that era. His guests were seated at the table based on how much he liked them and if they were fun to hang out with. I was thinking to myself how lucky all those people were who got invited to that wonderful place. For the people whose ancestors did not accidental find silver ore, there is another way to enjoy the luxury and share the fun. And that is to befriend the ones that have..

And I am thinking in my mind- Go Foundry Go!!

In tandem..

We did kayaking at the San Simeon bay. Water was beautiful and being the week day, we were the only ones in the water. We asked the lady at the store to take our pictures. I was not too hopeful about her taking good pictures but given that we did not have many choices we just figured it was better to have that than nothing.
When I saw the pictures I was extremely pleased. (And by no means am I easy to please :) ) Since I was in the front I never knew if we were doing it insync or not.
As I browsed through the pictures a very calming and soothing wave of satisfaction rose in my mind. Just like when I had seen the picture of us snorkelling together at keys west in Florida. Though it was a simple thing in itself just doing it in sync is like reassuring the togetherness and renewing the faith. (LOL) Just like the one when you see two kids (your own) playing with each other. By themselves, they are fun to watch but together they are extraordinary.

That made me think about other things that we managed to do insync. One thing that amazes everyone including us were our business trips to India 3-4 times a year for last 3 years. And then there were several others like well timed common desires and food cravings, first time parenthood ( LOL but its possible to not experience it together) and other wonderful moments.

Cambria experince-Part 2

After indulging in variety of cool deserts and candies at the local shops, we explored other stores like the book store and the nursery. Not surprisingly, this small town has exactly one of each type of a store. And more interestingly, each store has really unique stuff and offers great selection. The bookstore had this book in the showcase that was written by Hollywood director Richard Taylor after he moved to Cambria. I almost bought it and asked the seller if it was all fiction or had anything to do with real Cambria ghost citings. Wrong question. She promptly replied telling me that _all_ ghost stories are fictions. That really was brutal and snapped me out of the wonderful imaginations of seeing ghosts hiking alongside as we drove at midnight on the deserted highway 1. (oh and when I told Anoushka about the ghosts, she took it a step further and told me how ghosts drive the car!) So this book store had good activity book and everything else like preparing for SAT, GMAT et al.
The nursery was another such place. I have NEVER EVER seen a nursery which such variety and beatiful layout of things in there. It had a lot of different types of succulents and Cactus. It has all types of native and other flowers, fruits etc. It was just so relaxing to walk through the different sections and look at all the amazing selection they had. We got a stone studded tortoise and a colorful mushroom. I think numero dos needs me so I got to go. more later.

Cambria experience- Part 1

Long time no post.. That's because I was thoroughly enjoying every second of the vacation time. Not that blogging is not fun, its just lesser fun than actually living the fun. :)

When we booked a week long vacation in the small town of Cambria, everyone wondered what we would do in such a small place. (excluding me becos I can never get enough of Anshu and the lil ones and could be on an isolated island forever!)

Cambria is beautiful and has a lot of character.

In my previous post on frogs, I kept on wondering about significance of frogs in Cambria. Sure enough after a little bit of googling I found out that it indeed has frog fascination. It has something got to do with the Artifacts Gallery, the favorite gallery of the famous “Frogman” artist, Tim Cotterill.

So what did we do in Cambria.. We went for walks along the beach and other beautiful trails.

Oh and the city ordinance does not allow any chains like Starbucks, Kmart, Safeways etc. No wonder the experience was like going to a foreign land.

How far can you drive without hitting a McDonalds or Burger King? Main St is lined with beautiful local stores with local art. So just walking on the Main street was a great experience. We bought a lot of interesting art work.

And there was the famous olallieberry pie at Linns and the fudge. Stay tuned!

Home away from home..

When we were deciding to go on a vacation, I went through a long list of vacation destinations - in Italy, France, Spain, Mexico etc. The list quickly reduced given that we had a 3 and half months old and a 3 and half years old! (And the soaring gas prices that made tickets twice as expensive) We were looking for a change(and ofcourse in a good way) .. but then with the kids the question was 'how much of a change?'

Because--

When I order a $20 main course in a restaurant and my snob daughter refuses to taste it, I am not sure if I should feel bad for her being hungry or about the wasted food!

When I wake up in the morning (or should I say when I am half asleep) and have to leave the room for a breakfast that I dont really enjoy . (Other than Mc Donald's sausage biscuit on the way to Tahoe before skiing)

I dont want to spend more money on cabs than I spent on the air ticket but I cant walk for miles with little ones hanging on to me.

And most importanly becos vacation was meant to be relaxing!

So I concluded that a kitchen is a must and started looking for vacation rentals. After looking through pages and pages of really grand villas in Italy, Spain, France and Mexico, I was totally disappointed by the fact that I could not go there. And, air fare was least of the problems. They were all booked! (This was 2-3 wks in advance.) So I started searching in US and in California specifically with an intention to drive. Imagine not having to pack up everything in suitcases of certain size and number or waiting for the cab to show up or to worry about missing the plane, running through the lines of security and having to throw baby milk as if it would explode! (Having done that for our quarterly business trips to India, we had enough already.)

Anyways, I bumped into the listings of Cambria which I had never really heard of. Not all listings had the calendar online so I copy pasted the standard email that I had written. It started of saying, "Your house is beautiful.." I was trying to impress the unknown reader to give me a chance. So long story short, we got this beautiful home in Cambria. Its a (did I say beautiful already?) gorgeous 3 bd 2.5 bath with view of the ocean and newly built! (My nightmare was going to a house not half good as my own and paying for it too.)

The interior is asthetically done with all the necessities including a pack and play, crib, castle home, hide and seek tent, booster chair and walker for the kids. Anoushka was thrilled to see all the 'new' toys and Sania got hers along so both of them were very happy. I wake up with the usual steaming hot cup of ginger tea with toast. Anshu can bath for an hour in the jacuzzi tub and has plenty of room to throw his clothes around in the big walk-in closet. so everyone feels at 'home'. :-)

Us

This is walking back from Cambria in the evening.

At the beach playing with Anoushka.

Sania - peekaboo ss

As usual Anoushka refuses to be part of the picture. Model tantrums!

Exploring Cambria in my favorite sling. This is a ring sling and my favorite one.

Frogs- Highlight of the day

The first day in Cambria what really caught my attention were frogs! (or Cambrian's love for them). I was thinking of Kimber and how much she would have liked those. So I figured I would take pictures of all the ones that I saw.

There was kid clothes store and it had frog sound 'ribitss ribitss' as the ringing bell at the door. Froggies is a store for kids stuff. The next one was outside a home on our way to the beach.

This HUGE artwork was on the street.
The next one was at a nursery where we bought similar turtles. (stone studded).

This is from a store called Wind dancer. This had all sorts of chimes etc.

This is again from the nursery. Its a beautiful fountain.

This is really cute art work. Just sitting outside a shop.

Anoushk-io Nadkar-ni

(as in Giorgio Armani! )

Dressing up my tiny ducklings always made me happy but it is another thing to see ducklings have an opinion about dressing and a good one too! One would have expected that beliefs and choices in early childhood are completely influenced by parents, but apparently not.

I pretty much grew up like a tom boy with more guy friends than girls and with marginal interest in dressing up so its even more interesting to see how opposite my little one (s?) is.

When she was less than 18 months old, she colored her face red (not red really mauve-brown-pink something) with the lipstick that she removed from my purse. She smeared it on her lips and around while I was in the kitchen for 10 mins getting her dinner ready. (I have pictures of that in my palm but I have no idea how to get them out from there.)

Anyways, when she was around 2 , I left her alone for a while and she put my black liquid eyeliner on her eyes lids. This time it was slightly better job for sure and she had managed to not put any in her eyes which was a big relief!

And her favorite is a pedicure. She gets one everytime her mom gets it and she religiously waits for it to dry completely. The day she gets a pedicure, she NEEDs to wear open toe sandals. Which 2 year old stands in front of a parlor in the mall refusing to walk becos she thinks she should get a pedicure? (and says so too.)

So the other day I was looking through 'Allure' magazine June 08 pg 150 and I thought something on that page looked very familiar. Instead of turning the page, I started reading it and it was pick of the season for different cosmetics. The picture they had for nail colors had two colors in it. I thought I had seen them so I read the specifics. Then I came home and looked at the colors which the highness had chosen and they were right there. Not only were the colors (as in shade- fuschia and orange something) identical, the makers OPI and Nail xtreme in those very same bottles!

I was really stunned and since then I think ten times before I pick up clothes for her to wear to the daycare.

(If you have tried picking up a nail color from the wall full of colors in a store, you will know what I mean! )

What's in a name?

Today I bought water treatment system for our water pool. Equipped with all the information I needed (thanks to Marlyn's research work), I walked into the Swimming pool supplies store and told the guy at the counter that I wanted H2O2 water treatment kit. The guy looked at me disappointed and told me that they dont have it. I was really sad to hear that. But I did not give up and tried again, "Do you have anything that does not have chlorine for water treatement?"
This time the guy look happier and promptly took me to the shelf lined with different bottles labeled as Algcide, Sanitizer and Algistat, Oxidiser et al.
This was 'out of syllabus' becos Marlyn never mentioned anything about algicide and algistat and what the hell was an oxidiser?
So I asked the guy, " so for the small pool that I have, what should I buy?"
He said " you need algicide to kill the algae and oxidiser to oxidise the debri" or something to that effect.
I translated that in my mind as " you need to spend $$s and you need to spend more $$s"
And Marlyn's advice was ringing loud and clear in my mind and I was not ready to give up and buy something that had was not environmental friendly, non toxic, organic, green etc.
So I just repeated whatever I had read about H2O2. I said to guy," This H2O2 is supposed to be H2O and extra O for oxyzen".
Very hesitantly this guy says, "But H2O is water. Right?"
I was rolling my eyes in my mind (Sylvia style) and was like, " Yes, ofcourse. so that is what hydrogen peroxide does is that it turns into water."
At that moment, the guy jumped up and said, " Oh, that is what this is!!"
Then he said, "The active ingredient for this solution is Hydrogen Peroxide." and it was!
So we had landed with the right stuff but took a longer route. but yeah whats in the name?

On a lighter note..

These are the pictures from the front yard. This one is the picture of tree laden with pears. They are hiding in the leaves. Only if they could hide from nasty squirrels, it would have be so much better.

The flower is from the vine that is called 'Krishna kamal' in India. The vine came from our neighbor's yard. It has really pretty, intricate flowers. The flower has five stamens which are supposedly 'five pandavs' and several (supposedly hunderd) gynaecium which represent '100 Kauravs'.

I tried to take a picture of the vine clinging on to the pear tree. I thought it looked really cute.

Who knew it could be me!

Disclaimer: Any resemblance of current affairs to events mentioned in this blog is purely coincidental!

The other day I was at the gym and my heart was pounding really fast and it was not due to the kick-a$$ workout but because of the article that I was reading. It was Times magazine with a cover story of Disaster recovery readiness or some such. The article was about how humans react to a disaster analyzing mob mentality. It had a mention of ship Estonia that sunk with nose first and disappeared completely in less than 30 mins. One of the survivors gave an account of his experience. Apparently, with a sudden dip the ship tilted and people got thrown off and kept sliding down. He had expected a lot of shouting and cries for help but, to the contrary, people were strangely quiet. Dumbfounded? They refused to react to the situation. One person that this guy remembered was smoking a cigarette on the deck. It was part denial and part intense fear that pushed the brain into a the state of shock failing to send any response. As I read the article further in utter disbelief, it said how during evacuation due to a fire at a wedding a guy ordered a rum and coke to go! The article talked about people freezing in the face of imminent danger similar to a deer in front of the head lights of a car. Some people who survived that were the ones who tried hard to move and get into the lifesaving boats et al. And yelling seemed to have gotten some people out of the stupor. Not surprisingly, I got reminded of the scenes of N. shymalan's "The happenings".
It went further in explaining how you train the mind in an event of an unlikely event and how air hostesses are trained to shout in case of a disaster.
And I woke up this morning feeling like one of those people who waited on the sinking ship in anticipation. WHY did I not jump ship? And no there are no obvious signs of panic from others either. Everything seems to move in a queer rhythm as I say to myself-

I'm a new soul.
I came to this strange world hoping I could learn a bit ‘bout how to give and take.
But since I came here…..felt the joy and the fear.....finding myself making every possible mistake.
la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la...
This is a happy end. 'course you don't understand.
Everything you have done...... why's everything so wrong?

Laa laa laa laa laa laa

I'm a new soul.
I came to this strange world hoping I could learn a bit ‘bout how to give and take.
But since I came here…..felt the joy and the fear.....
finding myself making every possible mistake.
la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la...

This is a happy end. 'course you don't understand. Everything you have done...... why's everything so wrong?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YUxbDEPFiM

Gardens of Shadygrove

After we bought our first house in 2002, I spent a LOT of time watching HGTV. It was a whole new world of possibilities of the things you could do and CREATE in your backyard. Its something that needs to be planned as the changes could be fairly permanent. I and Anshu worked on the backyard ourselves and created a pond with 7 gold fish and water lily etc. And a lot of it is got to do with being patient and be able to see the future (weeds). LOL

When we moved in this house two years ago, we knew better to not rush into things. With the whole outdoor-indoor living theme, our atrium was the focal point for all the creative experiements. Its really very tempting to spend time, energy and dollars on it. This is what we have today.

Water garden:

This is the beautiful water garden that we bought and set up. We put it in the middle of the atrium. I did not get the plants that I was really looking for but that is ok. I got some Hyancinths, floating hearts and some new plants. No fish this time :(

Vegetable garden:

And this year we planted a lot of vegetables- tomatoes, beans, carrot, cilantro, cucumber, serano pepper, capsicum-bell pepper, egg plant and corn. This is the picture of our vegetable garden. We have some in pots and some on the side yard.

Flower bed:

I have some annuals and perenials in here which I planted based on the amount of sunlight they need. There is a beautiful orange Bouganvillea on the side yard and plenty of Geraniums as well that are not in the pictures. Most flowers that have vibrant colors need plenty of sun, which is what we dont have. Pines trees and redwood that we have in the backyard provides shade throughout the afternoon.

Succulents and Cactus:

These are my all time favorites. I like to plant them in different containers so I can move them around in the house. These I made over the weekend when I bought new containers. Eventually I want to build a japanese style rock garden where the annual are now. On my wish list are a Dragon red Japanese Maple for that. And what I also need are some (more) fruit trees. Loquat is number one on my list, followed by Guava, Cherry, Plum (or its variants), Peaches. We have Apricots, Orange and two Pear trees.

Water, water everywhere!!

On the long weekend, we played a lot in water. I got water balloons from one dollar store. They were exactly like the balloons we used in India for holi. When my friend in DC told me about it, first thing I asked her was if they were safe. I remember they were sort of banned in India. Anyways, she said these ones are really thin and do not hurt so I figured I will try them. I told our guests to get extra pair of clothes which made everyone wonder about my intentions. And kids LOVED it!! This is the picture of Anoushka holding a water balloon before we started playing. I had all the intentions to take NICE pictures of it but once anyone gets hold of those, there is no time to take any pictures.

The next stop of our water party was the pool. We had cleaned and moved the pool a day before so kids could play in it at the party. It is 12 ft wide and 3 ft deep. But the water is a little cold even on a really hot day.

Both Anoushka and Annika (her friend) loved it.
And their dads got in the water as well.
And we had my favorite tea with ginger, cardamon, clove and black pepper as we dried ourselves in the backyard.

Long-long weekend!

There are days when you actually feel like going to work and today was one of those. Years ago, my boss was chatting with me and told me how he comes to work to relax because his weekends are so hectic! The day at office is to sit in meetings or in front of the computer for 8 hrs, go for a lunch break with your buddies and discuss critical issues in the coffee room over a cup of freshly brewed Columbian roast. I did not truly understand what he meant until I met his wife. She was in her late 40s but had energy of a teenager. (Actually I should clarify that to of a 21 yr old since that is the legal drinking age.) What I mean was just she had unprecendented amount of energy. After bar-hopping and dancing till 4 AM in the morning, she was apologetic for having to leave because her husband wanted to go home! So we had one of those fun-filled, busy weekend. What should get (or not) a mention was the long due fix in the bathroom (things like this give long lasting or ever lasting sense of accomplishment). The other discovery was the fact that our home was the best place to watch city fireworks as it was closer than the park we intended to go to and the comfort of the outdoor patio sofa! (instead of the lawn littered with dog poop! eww) The fun part was the 4th of July BBQ we did at our friends place who lives in Santacruz moutains. After driving for 10 miles through the hills, we figured that the car was soon going to run out of gas! The only consolation was the fact that one of Anshu's friends was driving with us so he would at least push the car, if the need be. So the whole day was filled with a lunch at friends place, BBQ dinner in the remote Santacruz mountains and the awesome fireworks that we enjoyed from our home.
But where is the hectic part you think. Well, part of it was assembling the swing which I did pretty much alone. Its the same one that Anshu was happily sitting on. Then there was changing water from the outdoor pool in the picture. We cleaned it and shifted it to the side yard. And other things. ( if you read my other blogs you will know! (I am tired of typing already!)