Saturday, July 9, 2011

Two become One!

...that is to say, some people's twin sons have turned a year old!

And the blog has not been updated with that momentous happening for a whole week. Sacrilege! Oh well, I'll get over it somehow.

Pickle and Papad, the most amazing little men in my life turned a year old last weekend. As is the firm belief that Vijay and I hold, one-year-old's birthday bashes do not make any sense whatsoever since the babies themselves don't know what the heck is happening, and so we said we would do something small, just for the family.

Of course, considering that the family consists of:

*my mother
*Vijay's father
* My sister
* Vijay's two sisters
* The two sister's two husbands
* One of Vijay's nephews in Delhi
* One of my cousins and her husband and two kids
* My Bua and Phoophaji
* Vani, who is honorary family member and her son who by extension is my nephew

...plus the 5 of us and the several maids that keep floating about, it was a full house ( it's twenty three people, in case you're wondering about the grand total) . To say the least.

It was the warmest, brightest, nicest little Birthday party for the two little boys wearing new clothes and looking all grown up. Babies turning Toddlers. The previous day, I had gone shopping. I hadn't been in a nice mood when I went into the store, with lots of stuff going on, and with shopping not being my most favorite activity, but when I got into the swing of it, I enjoyed myself like crazy. I bought three sets of toys for them, skates and a board game and an umbrella for Peanut, little return gifts for the few little kids who were attending, and party paraphernalia like balloons, streamers, party hats, paper plates and Dora glasses for my little girl, who ended up enjoying the party most.

My sister did the honors with the cake - or rather, two cakes from Maxims - lovely chocolate stuff, and Pickle and Papad stood at the ready with little plastic knifes, each wearing identical T-shirts that said 'Mummy's little Man' and gazing with curious fascination at the colorful candle that proclaimed them One Years Old, with various little sisters and a highly pleased Mama to help them cut their cakes simultaneously. I can't imagine a more perfect birthday. Where are the pics, people? I didn't take any, but there were various flashes of light.

Vijay's sisters did a little Pooja for them, and S Didi had even got tiny garlands made up of roses for them, and my little babies looked so incredibly adorable wearing them. Yeah, yeah, I know I'm gushing, but what the heck.

All day, memories of that fateful Saturday exactly one year ago kept floating into my head. 8.30 in the morning, staring at the blood in the bathroom. Rushing to the hospital. Emergency C-section. And all the other stuff that followed. And now, the most important thing was that the two little men are fine, strapping young toddlers already.

Pickle and Papad are the most amazing phenomenon for me. I may have loosely mentioned that I had a little obsession with the concept of twins. Is this common? I loved the Twins at St. Clare's series, and the Sweet Valley Twins series. I once ended up reading a highly inappropriate and somewhat disturbing novel called Twins at too early an age ( do not read it, please). I remember arbitly doing research on it years ago, and have been particularly interested in the connection that twins have with each other, the differences between identical and fraternal twins, and so on and so forth. I always secretly wanted a twin myself, but never ever thought I would be lucky enough to conceive, carry, deliver and raise beautiful twin sons myself.

At work, I joked the other day that I love A/B testing so much that I had twins just to carry out A/B testing with them throughout my life. But it's true. When you have identical twin sons, it's easy to figure out certain things. Such as, when parents say they love their kids equally, it isn't really true. There's a bit of a bias always. Mine is for one of the twins, and I will not disclose it for fear that the other one will one day read this and make my life hell. Hint, though - his name begins with P.

But in short, we have successfully crossed yet another important milestone. Here's to many more Happy Birthdays to the glorious phenomena that we so inanely refer to as

... Mister Pickle and Mister Papad.

7 comments:

  1. God bless your beautiful little boys!
    May they and Peanut always be your pride and joy. Tons of love to you all. The 'small' party sounds utterly delightful:)

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  2. belated birthday greetings to pickle and papad, post some pictures somewhere and give a link in your blog

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  3. happy bday baby boys.
    they're cancerian and these men love their mothers or have an xtra bone to feel for the mother.hope as an air sign,you deal protectively with their sensitivity and shyness.

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  4. Many many more to come....blessings!

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  5. Happy birthday to Mr. P Squares..:)

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