A fluttering favourite!

Some say that second time parenting is a breeze as there will be “been there done that” moments all the way, while others say that raising a second child can be twice as tough. Hmm….I feel it’s a bit of both…there are definitely a few “dejavu” experiences that you can bank on to guide you through tricky situations when compared to rookie parents but it’s also true that you are dealing with an entirely different subject-matter who just happened to be related to your first born  as a sibling…so that’s makes it a whole new experience, plus there's always the sibling protocol you have to be conscious of…at all times…that only gets more challenging as the younger one gets older and starts to demand the lion’s share of the parental time … and when that happens, your only hope is that the older one reaches adolescence and becomes too jaded to even care! J

When it comes to books, my younger one has been introduced to them at a much earlier age, when compared to my older one, and to my delight, she couldn’t have been any more fascinated than she is with the pictures and imagery, any more thrilled with turning the pages of a board book and any more eager as I sit down to read her favorite book!  Thanks to Kutoohala, that houses a curated collection of some of the best children’s books both home grown and imported, my younger one is literally spoilt for choices when it comes to books for toddlers. Thanks to Kutoohala, I don’t have to wait for relatives or friends travelling from the US or UK to revisit the books that I had read to my son while in the US. Thanks to Kutoohala, our love affair with Bangalore’s children’s libraries continues to grow…! J

One such book that took me straight to Portland, where we spent a good part of Abhay’s toddlerhood is “Flutter by, Butterfly” by Petr Horacek, that has been drawn from his vibrantly illustrated “Butterfly Butterfly” which was one of the first books we read together when Abhay was a toddler. While “Butterfly Butterfly” is a very colourful  picture book, with a simple story line that follows little Lucy in the garden,  as she encounters many of nature’s garden splendours in her quest for the most beautiful of all – the butterfly, “Flutter by Butterfly” is a board book that takes off from the butterfly to focus on all these chance encounters from 'Busy Buzzing Bee', to 'Wriggly Wiggly worm', all presented in colourful cut-away pages to culminate in the grand finale of the crunching munching caterpillar! With vividly rich illustrations,  and alliterating phrases that can make for a great read-aloud, this is my little one’s current favourite which is a mini-version of my older one’s one-time favourite book…. So I’m not just reliving my own childhood, in a way, I’m reliving Abhay’s early childhood too!