Bright colours and beautiful smiles…. that sums up Rakshabandhan for us this year.
It started off with N getting to make her very first rangoli. She’d been nursing this ambition for months now and, scared of the mess, I’d been holding her back. Finally, I showed her the ropes and she did fine.
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| Not perfect but good for a first one |
When H saw N in the midst of all that colourful mess he quit the television and set up a howl of “I NEVER get to do anything”. I set him to segregate coloured pebbles and we came up with this flower arrangement. He spent hours measuring out the flower stems till they were all the same length. He was a bit upset since flowers didn’t come in his favourite colours, blue and green and had to be mollified with a ‘pebble’ rakhi.
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| H hard at work |
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| This is what it looked like |
Then we decided to dress up a thermacol plate as the puja thali.
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| N at work |
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| H takes over |
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| .. and it’s done |
Then of course everyone had to dress up even though we’d decided to have the Rakshabandhan in the evening since The Husband and the sis-in-law had full working days ahead. Do check out N’s hair :-).
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| Managed to get them to pose sensibly. It’s quite a task, I tell you |
We then went shopping for their gifts. H wanted a kitchen set – he’s still in the “I want to be a chef” phase. However he wanted a “boy kitchen set”. On being explained that kitchen sets, like real kitchens, were not male or female he asked why then were they all pink. To which all I could say is that colours too weren’t male or female only to be looked at incredulously and dismissed as someone unaware of life’s realities. Finally we settled for a kitchen set and a football with joint ownership. Didn’t I tell you gifting, in our home, is tricky business?
By evening the house looked nice, the kids were washed and changed and the food was done. I went in to change and came back to find the house …… all pink. Apparently Naisha decided she’d had enough of the rangolis which had, by then, been stepped into many times over and had lost their charm. She poured water on it and the neighbour’s three year-old decided to play a pink Holi and walk all over the house.
Yes I threw a fit. Yes I chased the entire bunch out and set out to mop yet again.
Just as I’d finished and made myself a cup of calming tea, entered The Husband, like the police in Hindi films, right after all the action was over and done with. Even as I was still fuming he handed me a gift.. a gift for me on Rakshbandhan.. and I’m not even his sister! Yay! There’s really no better way to stem the fumes of a fuming woman than to hand her a gift.
The festive spirit was restored. The banished kids were called back and the neighbour’s kids asked to stay for dinner. The sis-in-law came. Everyone tied rakhis to everyone and there was more mithai than all of us could handle.
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| It’s Chhota Bheem all the way |
We stuck with our mutual resolution of token gifts for kids – as in nothing elaborate or expensive or exclusive. Yet, they were thrilled. A big Thank You to the SIL for understanding and agreeing. Oh yes she got me something too. That’s right, it’s okay to bring on the elaborate, the expensive and the exclusive for adults.. heh heh heh.
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| The delinquents at dinner |
Learnings
– A bunch of imperfect things can make up a perfect day.
– Over time, men can be trained to do most things.
– Leaving kids around colour/glitter is suicidal.
– The quickest way to clean dirty footmats is to turn them over.
– and for the nth time: Kids don’t need expensive stuff to make them happy.
