Margarita and iPad

Adi playing with his iPad and enjoying a "virgin" Margarita ( fancy name for nimma rasam ) when we went to dinner at a Mexican restaurant.

HBD IS

Happy birthday Srinivas.

I am digging it!!

This morning for breakfast I made perugu dosa (perugu+wheat flour + Rice flour etc). See the height of liking curd, he had perugu dosa with perugu :) . In fact he is compensating for the lack of consumption of curd by me and Vijaya pinni.

Btw - since morning he has been chanting "attah attah" :)

NO CONTROVERSY----But.

Mrudula says her Akkalu,BAVALU,Annalu , VADINALU and Chellellu are the best and greatest.
But I attribute the qualities to the PEMPAKAM of my Akka,Bava,Annalu,Thammudu.maradalu and VADINALU.
Infact I feel I have no akka or vadinalu. but all ammalu.

Raghav's videos

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EIuEbNRPqw&feature=g-upl&context=G270a024AUAAAAAAAAAA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMO01w1hvCU&feature=g-upl&context=G2f88200AUAAAAAAABAA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubshx8ECYFU&feature=g-upl&context=G2371504AUAAAAAAACAA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhTjLXBEwxI&feature=g-upl&context=G2dfa61eAUAAAAAAADAA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEfux0qI5mI&feature=g-upl&context=G2aef541AUAAAAAAAEAA

Shaivite or Vaishnavite?

Raghav's 1st birthday

The day: Raghav's mom decorated the house with baloons a birthday banner and rangoli outside the door. Raghav received very nice gifts:
- a pram from Krupa and Seenu Sr.
- a walker from Seenu, Sudha
- a dining chair from Sasi, Madhu, Amma and his little sister
- an Amazon gift card from Bharatakka and Bhanu bavagaru
- a birthday cake from the Singampallis in California


He also got a lot of mails and phone calls wishing him, blessings from elders and a special greeting from his brother, Arjun.

Raghav wore a new dress given by his babai. He did puja with his mother, refused to eat the nice payasam she cooked. In the evening, he had a virtual birthday party: Lavanya (Neeraj & Gauri's daughter) was feeling sad that she was missing Raghav's birthday- so she invited her friends to her Pune house, we all got on Skype, and then while she cut a cake which said 'Happy Birthday Raghav', all the kids sung Happy Birthday to him on Skype....and then they all enjoyed the cake and pav baji made by Gauri. 

Here, Raghav cut the California cake a bit later and we all had a piece of it- it was delicious. He then went with his parents to eat guacamole at Chipotle (a restaurant here).   

All in all, a good day for him and a very memorable milestone for us. On the weekend, we are going to visit a Ramulavari gudi here in Plano. 

Photos here:

https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/118410535114405744743/albums/5709980499692086305

Greetings, Greetings

As I am going to be traveling for the next couple of days, here is wishing Atta and Mama a happy anniversary, happy birthday to Srikanth and a special marriage day wishes to Sasanna and Madhurima.

HBD RAGHAV

Have a nice and happy birthday bujji!

Knickerbocker Glory and Pavlova

While strictly not Aussie, I had a chance to sample two popular desserts not typically found in US,

The Knickerbocker Glory (They ate in the zoo restaurant, and when Dudley had a tantrum because his knickerbocker glory wasn't big enough, Uncle Vernon bought him another one, and Harry was allowed to finish the first. )
http://www.ice-cream-recipes.com/knickerbockerglory.htm

and

The Pavlova.
http://www.exclusivelyfood.com.au/2007/12/pavlova-recipe_22.html

The Knickerbocker Glory was an interesting mix of flavors, with Jello, Custard , Fruits and Icecream. I was a bit surprised at the custard. It was very thick, a bit more than Shrikhand's consistency, and not very sweet.

The pavlova was an even bigger surprise. I have had Meringue cookies before, but they are typically small in size and very crumbly. This was quite big, about the size of a large mango, yet it was crunchy on the top and very light and soft inside. While it was an interesting flavor, I did not quite relish the texture and satisfied myself with finishing the coconut icecream and the mango slices. The passion fruit puree on top with seeds was tasty as well, slightly sweet and slightly sour.



Mummy don't preach!

Now a days Raghav is interested in playing with all the things which have got ICs(integrated circuits) or a black wire. Check this video, he is destroying 3 things in parallel, he switches on and off the TV (knowingly), keeps pressing the "find" button on the cordless phones -that makes all the 3 phones beep in the house. And if that was not enough he found a tissue paper roll and rolled it out! Check the video -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCiSfrRY9PI&feature=youtu.be

That beep noise in the background is from the same cordless phone.

I tried to teach him meaning of "NO" while he does all this - total failure!!! First attempt - he keeps looking at my left eye then right eye and stares back at me. Second attempt he tried to scoop out my eye balls. Third attempt - he came and ate my nose!

Not my day..........

Jet lag in full force
Walking in ill fitting shoes
Severe allergies with sneezes and cold

Forgot laptop at the office. Don't have key card access to get into office. Flying to Brisbane early tomorrow, so need to get the laptop tonight.....asked colleague for help.

Walked down Pitt street looking for food...started drizzling...no umbrella...

Ordered veggie pizza from pizza hut for dinner...waiting 20 minutes....pizza full of garlic, completely inedible.....don't have energy to wait another 20 min...so decide to order curd rice from room service

Get to the hotel, key card not working...floor phone to call front desk not working....went down to get the key...still not working...go down again and get another....still not working...asked hotel manager to come, opened with master key

Called room service, no curd rice, ordered pizza again, super hungry, waiting............................................

Oz Again

Off to Australia for a 10-day business trip tonight.

38 hours non-stop!

I love birthdays...(actually any occasion to celebrate actually)
This year my birthday was extra special!

• The first girl in the next gen shares her aunts birthday! How cool is that :-)
• No. of hrs and my birthday - 24 (2 yrs ago) to 35(last year) to 38 (this year)...No complaints whatsoever!
  

Thanks everyone for wishing me and blessing me. Special thanks to:

Seenanna for the cake and the party!

Sudha vadina for decorating the house..i seriously dont know how she managed something like that with arjun around :)

Kuppakka for making it to the cake cutting. Seenu bava gets half the credit here for taking care of adi :)

Vidyakka and Madhav bava for making the party lively and extra special :)

Celebrations in California

As we got together to celebrate Mrudula's birthday today, right after Madhav 's birthday dinner last week, I started thinking about the spread of events and the opportunities to gather and celebrate. Here is the list.

Jan - New year; Madhav Bday
Feb - Mrudula Bday ; Srinivas Bday
Mar - Our wedding anniv; Arjun's Bday
Apr - Vidya and Madhav's anniv
May - Vidya Bday
June - open
Jul - SSV Bday
Aug - SSV and Sudha wedding anniv; My Bday
Sep - Aditya Bday; Sudha Bday
Oct - open
Nov - Thanksgiving holiday break and black Friday shopping
Dec - Christmas break and holidays

Now we just need Vidya to have a kid on Oct and have Mrudula either marry in June or marry someone born in June. Then we are all covered.

Welcome Baby Girl Singampalli

Congrats Sasanna and Madhurima. Unable to reach you by phone, so here are the wishes.
From Aditya, Krupa and Srinivas

HBD MRUDULA!

mANY HAPPY RETURNS OF THE DAY!

Happy Birthday Sasanna!

My experiments with bread - 2 Dinner Rolls