Getting friendly

I'm so happy to meet new friends

Raghav has really started communicating. Since we went to London in April, Raghav has been very friendly. He laughed and played with the ladies sitting behind us on the plane for the longest time. They played peek-a-boo with him, and he was thrilled, calling them with 'aye, aye' when they stopped.

Even on trams and in supermarkets when I'm buying the groceries he calls people out with 'aye, aye' sounds till they look at him.

On the tram he tries to catch the attention of any person who is in his vision, irrespective of whether that person is looking at him or not.

He's fascinated with dark sunglasses and probably thinks they're a game people are playing with him. When he first saw me wearing them he started laughing as if I'd cracked a joke. Now he laughs at random people wearing sunglasses in trams.

When we'd gone to Italy with him, we noticed that he suddenly wasn't too willing to give out precious smile to everyone. When we met people in the lift, he would look at them suspiciously and sometimes they'd have to work really hard to get a smile out of him. Perhaps he was just unfamiliar with his surroundings.

Back in Geneva, he has again started smiling at anyone who's within his vision.

When he fell ill with a viral fever and we had to take him to the hospital, he was really tired and very very sleepy by the time our turn came to see the doctor. In fact, he'd even fallen asleep several times in the pram and then in the doctor's room. But when the nurse finally came to weigh him and take his temperature, he immediately forgot about his bad mood at not being able to sleep in his cozy bed and started literally hankering for the lady's attention, calling her out with his 'aye, aye' whenever she looked away.

He did the same with the lady doctor. He was first very upset at being woken up and poked and prodded and started crying hysterically. But soon after he was calm, he again started trying to get the lady's attention by calling out to her and smiling cutely.

Open your mouth. Quick!

He also goes on diligently with his babbling, testing out every syllable he can. There's ba-ba, da-da, ta-ta, pa-pa, and other slightly indiscernible ones. He looks very carefully at your mouth when you make various noises, and sometimes then tries them out himself. He's currently fascinated with the existence of the tongue, and often reaches into your mouth to hold it.

He is often touching our faces to know what each part is. He's grabbing on to daddy's nose, or scratching daddy's eyes and inspecting the insides of daddy's mouth. He often holds on to my jaw while I'm talking, as if to see how I make that sound, and then to test whether he can make it himself.

The food monster

Mashed banana all over my face

Raghav has developed a roaring appetite, touch wood. He fell ill twice in a row and had almost stopped eating then, but since he's recovered, he has also more than recovered his appetite.

From the moment he sees his food being prepared, he starts getting excited. He will call out and utter sharp screams so that it's ample clear what he wants. When you sit him down in his high chair, he starts jumping excitedly and then banging his hands on the table; sometimes both hands for greater effect, and uttering his short sharp screams like he's scolding you to hurry with the food.

When he starts eating he continues with the jumping, banging fists and calling out between bites. Once he did that to Nalin even though he still had a mouthful of food.

When you go to get seconds, he starts crying and trying to get out of his highchair. Once Nalin was feeding him while I was preparing the second helping, and his first bowl got over but the second wasn't ready yet. Nalin hid the empty bowl from him and started feeding him with an almost empty spoon, with just wisps of food stuck to it. Raghav carried on eating for a couple of bites, but figured out quickly enough there was no actual food reaching his mouth. He then started trying to peep at his bowl which Nalin had hidden and calling out to Nalin for more actual food. Till then I arrived with a new bowl.

You can't eat any more with him around. He wants what you're eating. We've had to feed him everything from icecreams, to plain boiled rice, to shredded chicken and pastas... and then he cries when that gets over. You have to then divert his attention, which isn't too tough.

He doesn't stay quiet now if he sees anyone eat, whether it's on a train or in a restaurant. He makes his sharp calling sounds to show that he'd like to have what they're having, please.

You give him a tough piece of bread and he can occupy himself with eating it for 20 minutes.

It was when he was sick and not eating much that he started wanting to hold the spoon and feed himself. Although I wanted to encourage him to feed himself, I didn't want to do it then because he was hardly eating anyway. But I think he also tried to do that then because he was sick and didn't want to eat much and just wanted to play around with his food.

Nalin let him feed himself once and he pasted his whole face, head and ears with mashed bananas!

Standing baby

Let me see how I can get closer to the TV

Raghav has been trying to stand holding on to things. He started with pushing up with his legs when I propped him on Nalin. The next day he held himself up holding a drawer handle in the bathroom while I was there, and tried to eat the handle. By the evening he was trying to get inside the dishwasher, holding on to its door which lay open.

When I put him in his cot that day as soon, as I turned away he was holding on to the railing and lifting himself up on his knees. I had to immediately take him out of the cot and lower it to its lowest level.

And today when I looked up from the computer, he was standing on both his feet holding on to the TV cabinet, looking into the TV. 

Cute as a button!

Thrilled that he's sitting

Raghav the traveller

Eating bread, yes papa!

Taking to Dadaji

On holidays

At our hotel in Nice, Raghav is frolicking at 10pm.

Raghav has become incredibly curious. He doesn't rest his curiosity a second when he's awake. That obviously interferes with his sleep when he's outside of his usual routine. When we went to London a couple of weeks ago, Raghav refused to sleep whenever we were outside. He was just busy taking everything in.

When I knew he was really really tired, but still refusing to sleep in his stroller, I had to carry him in the sling and block his view by putting my stole on his head and over his eyes, so that he wouldn't be able to see everything and then just get bored and sleep. It worked each time.

We were staying at Divya's house in West Hampstead, and I had carried a travelling cot for Raghav to sleep in. We put in on the floor next to our bed and I put him to sleep and went outside into the livingroom where we were having beers. Before I knew it, Raghav was in the corridor, gleefully creeping towards us. He was so full of energy at 11pm, it was as if his day had just begun.

I tried to put him down to sleep two-three more times after that, but once he knew how to climb out of the cot, there was no stopping him. We finally decided to eat our dinner quickly and take him to bed with us.

He also became so social during the trip to London, calling everyone out "ae" "ae" and then smiling at them. He was super friendly with Divya's son, Neev, holding out his hand to touch his face. One time when Raghav tried to do that, Neev cried out to his mum, "Baby attack!"

With Madelaine in London, that's Raghav sleeping under the stole.

He was also super social on our flight back to Geneva. He was standing in Nalin's lap and kept calling out to the ladies who sat behind us. They played peek-a-boo with him, and he smiled and laughed throughout. When the flight took off, the ladies went back to their music or their books, but Raghav still wanted to play. He still kept calling out to them and trying to catch their attention. Nalin had to tell him not to disturb the nice ladies.

He was super curious even during our trip to Nice and to the French Riviera. We had a cot for him in the hotel room, but he thought it was a play pen, he kept turning round and round in it exploring everything. We had to finally put him to sleep in the bed between us, literally forcing him down so that he wouldn't start crawling away.

Twice, in fact, we thought he was finally fast asleep when he woke up and just started crawling again, trying to eat the computer I was working on next to him or creeping up to feel the bed headboard above his head.

He slept for two straight days when we got back from our holidays.

Raghav goes "heeee!"

Two shiny teeth.

There is nothing Raghav likes more than crawling and getting anywhere he wants. When you hold him in your lap, he's always trying to get away. Gone are the days when he used to put his head on your chest and be content with that. Now it's impossible to get him to stay still even for a second.

His creeping has really improved. He's been so thrilled since that he can get anywhere he wants so quickly that he creeps about making gleeful noises. He comes creeping behind you as soon as you leave the room, and then more often than not gets distracted with wires or shoes on his way there. You can keep calling him from the other room, but he will not leave those shoes/wires alone.

We have also started putting him in the stroller, as opposed to the pram with the bassinet where he could only lie down. When he used to be the bassinet, after five minutes of being outside he would start calling out, or sometimes even get very upset and you had to pick him up and carry him in the sling. He loved to watch all the activities happening around him, and would get upset because he wasn't able to see anything if he was lying down in the bassinet.

Chilling out in his stroller

But now with the stroller he can see as much as want, and really really enjoys it. Earlier I had to give him a rattle or a teething ring to keep him occupied in the bassinet, but now he plays with his toy for just two minutes before he casts it aside and starts looking around at the world passing by, both his tiny feet up on the bar in front of him.

In fact, he's so quiet when he's in the stroller that we have to keep checking to see if he's asleep. But he's usually just transfixed, watching the world go by.

He used to gnaw at this small bookshelf in the living room, till I started feeling it's going to come crashing down on him one day. So I moved it behind some furniture. Sure enough, Raghav spotted it first thing the next day and tried to squeeze into the gap between the furniture to get to the bookshelf. He even got stuck between the two couches, but still kept going, determined not to call for help.

He got his Tetanus shot the other day, cried loudly but briefly, and then got distracted when the doctor and the nurse started clapping and cheering after it was done.

The doctor wanted to see how he crawls, and as soon as I turned him around on his stomach, he bolted towards the doctor's pad and paper. Even when I massage him on the changing table, as soon as I turn him around to massage his back, he's off, trying to jump off the table and into the tub of water.

We left him for a little while longer in his tub yesterday, and he tried to hold his feet through the water. He was a little confused at how his foot was appearing closer than it was, but he kept exploring. But as soon as I got his bath toys in, all the exploration went out the window and he picked up one toy and started chewing it immediately.

Watching a recipe show with Mamma

We were talking to Nitin the other day on Skype, and for the first time Raghav responded to him despite the laptop, which he's always mystified with (Why are Mamma-Daddy telling me to smile at the computer? And how is Dada-ji's voice coming out of this machine?). I had made him stand on his feet, holding him with both my legs. He was constantly trying to jump and is always thrilled when he's standing. Then Nitin whistled to him, and he went "heeeee!" Every time Nitin whistled, he jumped a little and went "heeeee!"

He also did this whole lap after the computer, chasing it while we kept moving it further and further away from him.

Creeping all round the house

That's his favourite place

Till the beginning of this week Raghav was just curious about Nalin's books lying under the TV cabinet. He would creep up to them and pull them down to the floor. But once they were down, he'd creep away, having spotted something else. But two days ago, he pulled one of the books down, flipped the pages and then tore off the first page! He was really going at it when I grabbed it away from him.

I have had to baby proof the house a little bit now.

He seems to like room corners and also loves to creep under the table. Sometimes he gets under a table and then lies there thumb in mouth, tired with the effort that has taken him to get under the table.

He's been chewing bookshelves and creeping behind tables to get at TV wires.

I took him with me to the kitchen today (because he can't be left alone in a room anymore) and he crept straight to the radiator and started chewing the radiator pipe. Thankfully the heating is off nowadays, and the radiator isn't hot.

Rolling around in the cot

I also leave him on our bedroom floor in front of the mirror when I'm getting dressed in the morning, and he gets very excited looking at himself in the mirror. But that excitement lasts a second, as he moves away quickly, trying to chew my boots that lie there or towards the bookshelf and starts pulling down papers from it.

He crept out of the living room the other day. He's never left the room on his own before. I guess he came looking for me. But then got distracted with the landline wires lying near the door. (I really must baby-proof soon.)

Whenever I lie him down in his cot, I go to check on him after five minutes and he's in the exact opposite direction, playing with his cot bumpers. They've been a waste. Most times when Nalin goes to get him in the morning, he's bumping his head on the cot wall, trying to go forward. Or he's playing peek-a-book with the cot bumpers. Or having a meaningful conversation with his blanket in hand.

I had washed his sleeping bag (which he always wears to sleep) one day, and while it was drying I was just putting a blanket on him while he slept in his cot. But every time he'd wake up, and I'd go to pick him up, the blanket would be off and he would be trying to literally climb out of the cot.

Raghav seems to have sworn never to sleep when he's out of the house. He screams and gets very high-pitched and hysterical, indicating strongly (and very loudly) that he's sleepy, but the moment I try to put him to sleep his cries and screams increase 10-fold.

We'd gone to Rebecca's place for drinks and dinner, and he refused to sleep even though his screeches told me he wanted to. But we went for dinner to an Indian restaurant the other day, and he was happy just sitting in my lap the entire time. Even on our walk back, we could tell he was really tired, but refused to lie in his pram and wanted to be carried back. Finally, he was so tired that he did ultimately nod off in the pram.

"I love it here!"

He also refuses to sleep on his back, like a regular person. Even though he knows how to turn and lie on his stomach (which is the most comfortable position for him to sleep), he doesn't know why he's getting irritated and keeps screeching and calling me so that I would put him on his stomach. The moment I do, it takes him two seconds to fall asleep.

Raghav gets so excited seeing his bowls and his food now. While I'm warming his food in the microwave and mixing his rice cereal and water in it, he's already banging his table and calling out. And when I do sit to feed him, his mouth is already open before I can scoop out a spoonful.

He always gets very upset when the food gets over, no matter how much he's eaten. I have come to a solution of handing him the spoon after his food is over, so that he thinks he's still eating.

He ate a biscuit all on his own yesterday, although I constantly worry that he's going to take a big bite and then not be able to swallow it.