Dearest Ceyone,
December was usually a busy month in our home. It was your birthday month, followed by Christmas and year end holidays. We always had lots of fun with Tita and all the friends! You were turning 9 and it was exciting to see you grow older and more mature each day.
You enjoyed going for hikes with Papa and that was one of your cool treks around Singapore.
For the love of your soccer, we'd sometimes book the futsal pitch at the top of Funan Mall and that was one of your birthday celebrations with Vivaan and the coach. You loved the coach and enjoyed learning tricks from them.
It was also a time for me to connect with my friends. Even though we lived in the same condo, it was sometimes tough to make time at the same time. We went for this Sichuan meal that Deepti wanted to try and loved it. We always coordinated our dresses.
Eating delicious and spicy sichuan food with loads of pepper corns and having our lips numb after that.
Good times with Zee and Ahyo at Aspen Heights near the tennis courts side.
This was such a cute message card from each of you class mate. I loved reading them all!
Pool side chatting with my friends at night.
You'd go to Tita's church Christmas party every year and play games and have fun there. It was still covid times so masks were compulsory.
Some old photos that I found! That's me and Dolly mausi when we were in high school, Grade XI. She had moved to Gurgaon from Bhopal and I had gone to visit her for 10 days in the summer holidays. Nana dropped me and then I came back alone myself by Shatabdi Express, which is a day train from Delhi to Bhopal. It was the first time for me to travel alone and Nana came to pick me up at the railway station. It was such an adventure and I loved it. I had an amazing time at Dolly mausi's home with her family and we wore her Mom's sarees for fun. I always liked to play dress up.
That's one of your old photos, I think from Botanic Garden.
And that's me, sitting on a chair in a studio in Bhopal. Probably the photographer did something to stun me so I look into the camera :)
As it was the holiday season and Covid time, there were lots of gift exchanges and home deliveries. I was sent a box of Janice Wong fancy chocolates, a rabbit cake and a care box from my workplace, Twitter. Ofcourse, you had the most fun with all the goodies.
Ben and Betty became good friends and cuddled together.
It was so good to see you spend time with both Samar and Shiv equally well. Due to social distancing, masks were mandatory. It was daunting to see little kids like you and Samar in masks for full days.
I went for lunch with Dipti and Denis one of the days and wore my favorite skirt. I loved the color combination very much.
We had a treat day with yummy homemade kachoris. Thanks to aunty Sarab for her recipes.
We also had our team lunch at Mandarin Oriental hotel before the holidays started.
I was back by the time you returned from school and made it a point to pick you up from bus stop if I was home and did not have any meetings. Mask and no mask!
One of the days we had breakfast with Mansi and family before they were moving.
We visited Samar to hand him his birthday present.
One of the days we were playing with these science kits and having fun making slime.
For your love of soccer, we went to see soccer matches happening in Singapore. When I saw a live match for the first time, I hated the sport whole heartedly. I found it to be so brutal as the players would often do headers which seemed so injurious. Also, most of the time the players were running around in the field. But you enjoyed the games so we brought you to as many as we could. Often, you didn't want to stay the full duration so we left early. I think this was a match between the Philippines and Malaysia as Tita also went with us to cheer her country team.
Stole this quite from Twitter.
It was time for your birthday soon and you asked for samosas. So there it was! We enjoyed our home made samosas that I made as part of my annual cooking ritual.
Planning and preparing for your birthday was my favorite activity of the year. It was like a festival for me. On the eve of your birthday, after you went to bed, I'd sneak into the living room and prepare surprise presents for you. That year, I was extremely fortunate to be able to get Ronaldo signed t-shirt for you. It was a treasure for you! Your expressions were priceless and I have a whole video of it on Youtube. Check it out right here.
You were so pleased to have that signed shirt from Ronaldo. Your smile just wouldn't stop!
We spent the morning swimming and having fun with friends in the pool.
Then we cut your cake in the evening. I think we had a few different cakes!
You had lunch with Vivaan who had come over to our place. You guys enjoyed sushi together.
Then in the evening we had more friends come over for dinner and cake.
We played some games and had fun together.
Then you all enjoyed dinner together.
We did some more cake cutting in the evening.
We went to Popular book store to buy your favorite books, The Diary of a Wimpy Kid. You had each and every book in that series.
Right after your birthday it was Christmas eve celebration. Tita cooked her traditional roast chicken along with corn and garlic bread. We all enjoyed the special meal together. Belinda also joined us in the festivities.
It was time to open Christmas presents!
Then one of the days we went for a picnic at Botanic Garden with Deepti and family.
There you are doing your favorite activity - watching something on the projector.
I think you went to watch another soccer game during the holidays.
Meanwhile, in Bhopal Nana Nani celebrated the New Year with Shirish Mama.
Here's a list of your 2021 goals and how you did on each of them. You scored your own self.
That's you holding your Real Madrid soccer class certificate.
Meanwhile, I started a new weekly project for the year where I tried to dress up as somebody from the social media. It was a lot of fun and kept me happily busy for the full year. My goal was to do one look every week and at the end of the year, donate to charity. I successfully completed it and had a lot of fun while doing it!
We went for dinner together with Jeremy, your piano teacher at Kailash Parbat in Little India. It was a good and enjoyable evening.
For New Years Eve we went for dinner at Raffles Hotel and enjoyed their good quality food.
That's how we celebrated the first day of the New Year, cuddling together in bed with Ben and Betty, enjoying a cup of tea together. That was my favorite part of the day, spending time with you.
With Love,
Mumma
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