Iron Man mask cardboard

     I made an Iron Man mask made fully with cardboard It was awesome! The reason I made a cardboard mask is because I was very bored since we weren't allowed to go outside. I first made the chin part, That was very easy.It took me three or more hours to make the chin part although it was easy. I was watching my favorite show on Disney plus, Jessie I used to watch this show when I was 4 yrs old but then I stopped so I am watching It now. I also added some toothpicks so it would be pretty strong. My sister Sara ( 4 yrs old ) wanted to do something with me so, I cut out some hearts on a piece of paper and gave It to her so she was working so hard cutting them out so perfectly. After I made the chin part I decided today's work is done Since, I already took three hours to finish.

    This was the second day of making the Iron Man mask. This was the longest day in my whole life I spent almost 6 to 7 hours completing the rest of the mask. I started off making the top part of the mask, which took me about 30 minutes. Then I made the back part were you needed to repeat the same step three times. So since I knew what to do I did that pretty quick I did it in 1 and a half hours which was pretty quick compared to the other parts I did of the mask. Then this was the longest part the sides it was very long one side took me 2 hours since there was a piece missing on templates. I got so confused so I decided that I will make the piece by myself and it worked. After I finally finished the sides I did the main par the face this was very easy it took me only 10 minutes. After I made that I connected the face part to the chin part then it really started looking like iron man. I added some Velcro and some lights to make it real. Finally I was done.

The iron mask was really cool, I hope I will make something else like that. 

i m coming back ...

Its almost two years that i didnt have time to write about me in this blog. Everytime i open my blog i have lots of things to write, but ended up writing something and i dont want to publish that, it clearly shows my confusion. 

Confusion starts .. where it starts, why i m so confused, why i m not clear, what blocks my thinking, who ll make my thoughts, i got answer for everything now. 

My mom passed away during 2014, i was totally upset and felt so guilt that i wasn't with her during her last breath. Then, i felt like i want to be with her for some more days and i prayed to god that i want my mom back, all my thinking and focus only saying "i want my mom back" . I lost my temper i lost my patience, i never know where i lost my smile, it takes me one and half year to get back my smiling face after seeing my daughter Sara's smile. 

I ensure that i shouldnt do that mistake again in my life so i spoke to my dad daily to make him feel confident and though he has some critical health issues, he spoke to me without showing his pains. Nobody in this world understands me more than my appa (father). The word "appa" i like it so much , from my childhood i love to call appa everytime, its not only a need to call him but i used to call more than 100 times in a day "appaaa"

I never knew appa can do all work to a daughter, till my second standard he helps me wash my hair weekly once and dry it and make sure i never get head lice often.He use to clean my bicycle, iron my uniform, wash my whiteshoes, prepare my favourite dish, and much more. I always fail in tamil exam i will only get 22 marks i cant get more than that nor less than that. But in all subjects i use to get above 70 and my teacher called my appa and told to send me to tuition. 

I m really scared of tuition to my tamil teacher because she use to scold me very badly if i dont write any words with kuril and nadil (that means short vowels and long vowels) properly. so much confusions in tamil as both my parents are working they wont find time to teach me, one day i cried to my appa that i want to pass atleast this tamil exam, and i cannot go tuition to tamil teacher, cried a lot, i know my appa likes tamil so much he use to write jokes, poems in tamil in his diary. 

My appa use to sit with me daily one hour at night after his work hours and teach me tamil and make me confident to wirte my tamil exams, first time in my exams in 3rd standard i got 82 marks in half yearly exam and from that day onwards i always use to get above 80 in tamil and my appa encouraged me to write tamil poems and stories. i use to write a lot in my diary and keep it safe. 

i always been a lazy girl at my home, my mom and dad get up at 5:30 am daily and my brother gets up by 7:00am , and i m laziest gets up by 8:00 am, my mom always scolds me for this.My appa never scolded me he sets alarm and keep beside me and i gets up switch off the alarm and sleep again, so he use to call me for a morning walk in race course (coimbatore) which i love to go, so he makes a habit of getting early. 

He always encourage me to study further, he never see me suffering coming in bus in peak hours, he takes his bike and come before half an hour to pick me. He likes me so much but i didnt understood till the time i got married. 

so much to say about my appa,its really hard to accept that he is also not with me now, i reached Bangalore on May 12th 2016 and my appa recognized me and my kids Sarvesh and Sara and spoke to me well before he was admitted in hospital in coimbatore. I never saw him with so much pain, he suffered with liver cancer, in that pain, he asked me "did you eat ma" i cant control my tears how my appa is like this and he also left me alone on may 24th 2016. 

Nobody is better than my appa in this world. I ll not get him back, because he never leaves me he is with me all the day talking to me and makes me to go in right path. My mom born again as my daughter and she ll live her happy life with me. 

I ll not lost anymore, i came back, i got my smile back that is my parents wish. They want me to live a happy life, and make my family happy and make others happy. 

Sarvesh Kindergarten Fun

I still cant believe that my Sarvesh goes to a full day school and he manages his own task by himself, and everytime he makes me feel that "Mummy I m so independent". His love is slowly going down because he is interest in so many new things around him. He learns new habits, he tries to exhibits whatever i have interest. I love to dance heavily whenever i am depressed and sad, I sing my favourite song and i try to play my music in keyboard and learn to try out a different dish. Similarly Sarvesh dance heavily after coming from school, he loves to practice maths in a different way, he dont like to follow same method, he has his own easy method to learn addition and subtraction.

When ever i feel like something is going wrong with him, i use to talk to him more to find out his problem, he talks and talks like a English radio station, finally tell his problem and become normal. He loves to read books, loves to talk (mostly in English), loves to teach me so many new words and pronunciation. His way of interest changes everytime, he started liking so many science fiction movies.

He told me about the dreams that he imagined in his dream, whatever he learns in his school, he tries to recollect and imagine while dreaming. He use to tell me "Mummy you know i dreamed a cowboy in a batman costume, i dreamed that we were in Chennai snow, dog with white and grey dress, wish to have a room full of toys of batman, robo" He loves to draw something, he draw a curve and with that he tries to make a dinosaurs, draws a line and then tries to draw a car, take a self video of him talking about his friends and happenings in his class. He shows so many interest to check out a new book of his choice in his school library and likes to read by himself.

when we got his report card, i was so eager to view it, mostly he got a S grade, which means Secure. I asked him "How did you feel when your teacher asks you question or ask you to write something" He says "Mummy, very simple and easy, Miss Vazquez is sooo cool, but one bad thing is she is not giving time for me to finish my answer". I remember my old days, i use to fear a lot for a exam, i am not so friendly to my class teacher. I love to feel the confidence of my son. Sometimes he cries for unnecessary things, but loves to find the solution for a difficult situation.

He asked me some questions, which i don't have answer, i use to google it or show a video of it in youtube, he likes to learn how our planet is arranged, what happens to Sun during night, how mountains are formed, how in US its snowing, how heavy things are made, why you named me Sarvesh, Why i don't have a brother or sister but all my friends have their own siblings, Why halloween is coming for only one day and why summer coming for so many days, when i can watch a 5D and 6D movies in theatre and so on. He knows very well that i google and tell a answer for his some questions, so now a days he grab my phone and ask me a question.

Everyday when he starts his day to school, he use to tell me " don't give me rice for my lunch" and he started thinking of what others think of his own traditional foods. After some days of eating Bread nutella, pasta, bread omelete, sandwich, salads, he feels so bad that his stomach is not full, then he decided by himself, and told me "Mummy Never again give me bread and other stuffs, give me fried rice, veg rice, curd rice, and all rice" I am so happy that he likes to have whatever he likes and doesn't bother about others. Its really made me so proud that he behaves like me, i don't even bother about others, i cant eat in spoon and fork, though i have to, i hate to eat, i feel my fingers are more clean than a spoon or a fork.

He enjoys going to his white eagle school and become a wolf of the week that means he behaves very good at class. He got two awards within first month of the school, he s awarded as a best rester, this award is given to him because when the teacher says you need to take rest for 5 minutes in class, he didnt disturb anyone and was resting quietly for 5 minutes, all other students were playing and talking. He awarded as Wolf of the week - that means he is a obedient, behaves good at class and so friendly to all. I am so happy to see his name in the first month school newsletter. 

Sarvesh US life

When we started our life in US last year , I really felt that my son won't like this place and he will  definitely want to go back to India. But after winter was over in 2012, he started mingling with kids here. He started his schooling in Kensington preschool. Whatever he learnt in his LKG, he has to unlearn here, but he already shined as a star in the class. Slowly he developed his communication skills by watching other kids and watching nice educating animation series like curious George, caillou and so on. I m able to see the improvement in him day by day. He always trys teach me, thought that I didn't know anything. Whenever I asked him "shall we go to chennai back", he immediately say a big NO.  Even though I don't like this place to survive, I learned from my son that how to adapt to new environment. He makes himself all day busy, he runs, jumps, plays cricket, cycling, walking and gardening.

It's very difficult for me to sit idle for so long days. I don't know my path to come up in my life but I m so happy that I will make a good path for my son. Love makes me to sit idle and the same love showed by my son cheers me up. He makes me to think differently all the time, whenever I feel so depressed, I talk and play with him, that gives me more energy. One day we were watching tamil debate in TV, he asked me "mummy, in which language they are talking" (they were talking in senthamil). I was really shocked that makes me realize "why I didn't teach our native language". Then I included tamil as one compulsory subject for him to be teached by me or Hari. We always make a schedule to teach him maths and English daily.

I started teaching tamil letters, tamil poems and Thirukural. For the first Thirukural, he showed so much interest and then he learned a few. Then that makes me realize that why I m not at reading Thirukural now a days. In my school days I love to read "dhinam oru kural" during morning session, I beg to my tamil teacher that I want to read it because I m so impressed how thiruvalluvar able to provide good thoughts through 7 words. I still remember that I got a thirukural book from my tamil teacher to encourage me. That's how I started reading it daily for at least 20 minutes.

Though he likes this place so much, his love for his grandparents is not changed. When we were in chennai, he was so much attached to my neighbors and he accepted them as his grandparents. Daily morning, he calls his grandma and talk for at least one hour. I thought that I m always a best friend to my son but he makes me feel that grand ma s the best friend always.

Sarvesh US life is so high class life, even for a fly, he s saying "yuck ..mummy fly", if he sweats he immediately says "Oh man, its sooo hot here " though the temperature is 55 Fahrenheit. He loves for a pizza even he likes appam and idly soo much, he started acting to his friends saying that "i love pizaaa sooo much"
i use to call him as Peter boy.

my 5 yr old big boy

whenever i call my Sarvesh, i call him as "baby" , "ammu kutty", "chella kutty" and what kind of kutty coming from my mouth. He seems to be more irritated when i call with these nick names in front of his friends. when i call him as baby, he immediately shout at me "Mom, i am not a baby, i m a big boy because i am five years old, don't call me baby again .. hmm". It taking me so much time to realize that my boy has grown up so big. Though he is 5yrs, i m still thinking he s a small baby to me always. Love he pours on me, make me forget this world at times. whenever i worried about my aged parents and feels like missing them so much, he gives me strength and confidence and make me smile all the time.

If i feel lonely and sad, he calls me for a walk and talk to me about his school friends and other things which changes my mind. He is so much matured and he cant see my sad face any time. He cant even able to see me sit idle. whenever i sit idle, he calls me to dance with him and his friends. Slowly he started forgetting Tamil, the way he talks and the way he teaches me English is always fun.

There is always a big argument between me and Sarvesh about God and religions. He wants to celebrate Christmas, loves to keep Christmas tree in our house. I don't want to impose any religious thought to him. But at the same time, i don't want him to follow any kind of religious habits.I always teach him to obey elders, follow rules, accept his faults, faith in God, sharing, and love all the kids. After so many arguments he cant accept that there are so many gods to worship, but still he s able to understand that we cant place christmas tree in our house.

He got very good Indian friends of his age and other american friends, one big doubt he always have in his mind. One fine day, he asked me the doubt, "mummy, why there are two kids in one family, all my friends have sister or brother, but i don't have a elder brother or younger brother" . I am trying to give a best answer for his doubt :)

In all the situation, he is proving that he is a big boy and not a baby. 

Trip to St Louis Gateway arch

I was not so much excited to go for this Saint Louis trip, and not even sarvesh was educated well before going for the trip to view Saint Louis Gateway arch, Missouri and Meramec caverns. I definitely don’t have an idea of what we are going to see and I don’t have time to educate Sarvesh on what we are going to see in this trip. He was so eager to know about the place that we planned to go. Previously we have a plan to go for some water theme park, so that sarvesh will enjoy the trip, but for some reasons we dropped the plan and went to St. Louis to see the monument of arch.

First day we went to a grant farm, there we saw some farm animals and we missed elephant shows and parrot shows. Sarvesh enjoyed feeding milk to goats using feeding bottle. When he tries to give the milk for one goat, so many goats grabbed the bottle from him, and then he scared so much and dropped the feeding bottle down. But he enjoyed it. He was so happy, playing, roaming and talking with his friends about the animals. He saw some common animals that he saw when he was in India – cows, goats, buffalo, hen and much more. Before going to the grants farm, we went some of the zoos in Chicago, he saw so many animals but he worried so much that he didn’t even his favorite elephant in the zoos. But this time, he was so happy to see the African elephant in Grant’s Farm, that was so un expected for me. Overall Sarvesh enjoyed watching the animals in the Farm with his friends. Then we planned to go for the Gateway arch in Saint Louis for the rest of the day. 

I am not so much happy that we are going to see a beautiful arch. For me its just a building, whats there in it, not so excited, its just made out of bricks and stones. After we reached there, I’m so surprised, its so tall – 630 feet and 192 m, we all were trying to take photographs along with the kids standing near the arch. But its very difficult to cover the whole arch with the kids in the photo. Anyhow, I managed to take some photos of my son and husband. When we enter into the arch, sarvesh started asking a “n” number of questions, are we going inside the arch, and how we will reach the top of the arch. Even I donno what to answer, now I m so much eager to know how we will reach the top of the arch. When we enter in the arch (below the arch), there was a museum, which has some historic things, and there were some postings of happenings from the year 1820 till 1845. I was so much interested to read, but it will take one day for me to read the whole history. There was a cart, which can be pulled up by humans in the museum. Sarvesh showed so much interest to pull the cart, so the museum person allowed the kids to pull the cart from one place to another inside the museum. Sarvesh and his friends enjoyed pulling the cart and he asked to sign the book. Sarvesh wrote his name in the book.

Then we took the ticket to go to the top of the arch, we took south tram, I have no idea of what a tram  and how we will reach the observation deck of the arch. Before entering into the tram, they provided yellow cards for each of us, in that card, some number was mentioned, for us it s “6”, and I thought it would be like a lift and for each lift we have to wait and go. They played a movie on the gateway arch and EADs bridge which was build on 1867 that connects the St Louis and Illinois. The movie s casted for 15 minutes, it showed some historic happenings why the EADs bridge was built and they experimented the  bridge safety using an elephant, it seems that the elephant cannot step on any unsafe surface. 

Finally they showed why Gateway arch is built, it is the part of Jefferson National expansion memorial of st. Louis. In 1947, there was a national wide competition to design a monument in Saint Louis. It was Eero who won the contest with his gateway arch design, that’s how it started implemented in the year 1963 and completed in 1967. There was some mathematical calculations provided by Eero to prove the design. Sarvesh showed so much interest to see the movie about Gateway arch but I have no hope what he understands from the movie, and he was asking so many questions on arch to his daddy.

Then we went inside the tram which is numbered “6”, it’s a six seated, looks like a box or a lift, we sitted in each seat and enjoyed the travel from bottom to top, Sarvesh watched the steps and shouted, “mummy steps are there, can we go via steps” its very nice to travel in tram. And we reached the observation deck and viewed the city St.Louis , it looks so amazing in the night lights, I enjoyed viewing the river from top and sarvesh was so excited to view the buildings with lightings and he watched some police vehicles with blue and red lightings on the top of it from the observation deck and called us to watch it. It was so amazing for me that how he founded the police car from top. It is 630 feet high and 192 m. while we wait for the tram to get down, I felt some shaking in the arch, and even everyone felted the same, its all because of the air, its shaking and I enjoyed along with Sarvesh. There were some stunt happenings in the arch in 1980s and 1990s. when we get down from the top, I asked Sarvesh how it is, he told me that “we didn’t go to the top of the arch, you just made me fool, we went into some lift, no where I see the gray buidlings, its all black marbles inside.” Arch was gray outside and black inside, I told Sarvesh we went inside the arch , but not even listen to my words. I hope one day when he reads this blog, and he will understand where he went and what he enjoyed, that day is not so long.  In my next blog, I will post some happenings in meremac caverns, that I enjoyed with Sarvesh.

First visit to Niagara Falls

I am so excited to see one of the amazing places of the world with Sarvesh. Before starting to Niagara, I have to learn facts about Niagara to answer my son’s questions. Where we are going and how far it is from, what we are going to see, why it is called Niagara. My son is filled up with lots of questions of new place we are going to visit. We have planned to stay there for 2 days, snacks, water, cool drinks, and everything is packed well in advance. But Sarvesh asked why we are carrying all these, won’t we get these items in Niagara. It’s about 11 hrs. to reach Niagara from Chicago, Sarvesh thought it’s like travelling from Chennai to Coimbatore. Everytime he sleeps in the car while travelling, he asked me that if he can see Niagara after he wake up.

Sarvesh enjoyed the travel; worst part he didn’t like is to sit in the car for a long time. But he likes to talk to his friend – Akshaya for a long time, they both were talking for about one hour continuously, eat snacks for half an hour, and sleep for one hour, and fight for 2 hours. This becomes their routine tasks throughout the travel. I enjoyed watching Sarvesh each and every minute of his actions in the car, because this is the first time for me to travel with him in car for a very long time. We stopped at some service area for dinner and break, whenever we stopped in the service area, he asked “is this is Niagara?”

Sleeping, chatting and playing, we have travelled about 12 hrs and reached a beautiful place near Niagara Falls, a cottage near a lake, a lonely independent cottage near a very wide lake. We hardly seen one or two people in that area, if the kids shouted, it’s echoed with the water sound, such a nice place to stay. Sarvesh enjoyed the new place and climate and played happily with his friends.

We got ready and happy to see the beautiful Niagara Falls, once we reached there; we were allowed to see a short film on Niagara Falls – Niagara Adventure Theater.

Sarvesh was scared while watching the film, because they showed boat falling from Niagara Falls. He asked me what will happen if we fall from Niagara Falls. Hari explained the story of Niagara Falls to him; Sarvesh enjoyed hearing the stories and joys of Niagara Falls. I was so impressed with the Maid story and history of the Niagara Falls. I just try to remember some facts– European, French and then British. Finally 1885, Ontario government establishes Niagara National Park.  

Then, we were about to watch the Niagara Falls from the Observation Tower. Sarvesh was so much excited to view the falls from Observation Deck. He was so surprised to see Canada buildings, and asked me Canada is very near to US, Shall we go once. How can I explain the difficulties to reach Canada?

Then we showed him the rainbow bridge which connects two countries – US and Canada. Even we are so amazed to see the two country flags together in the rainbow bridge.

Then we went in the cruise to see the American Falls and Horseshoe falls. Sarvesh enjoyed the drizzling of the falls while travelling in the cruise. He told me that he felt like roaming in rain, and he was scared so much when the water falls heavily on him. He was so happy and enjoyed each moment during the cruise journey.

Then we went to watch the cave of the mist, there we saw American falls nearby and we enjoyed in the falls, Sarvesh was happy to see the rainbow dwindling in the falls. Rainbow mixed with the falls and it looked so wonderful, we missed to take a picture of that amazing nature dance. i didn’t even imagined that I will go to Niagara falls with my best pal – my son Sarvesh, and so happy to be with him in Niagara

Finally, we spend so much for a helicopter ride, first time helicopter ride for me and sarvesh. Helicopter view of Niagara Falls looks so awesome. 15 minute of flying in helicopter is a wonderful experience for us. Awesome Niagara trip with Sarvesh.