Can you believe it’s December already? It’s going to be a La Niña winter this year for us, 2 years in a row, a brutal winter is coming!

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And as I am writing this I am reminded of the epic dialogue from Game Of Thrones “Winter is coming” 😂 Brrr…

What have you been watching this December? I am currently loving Scenes from a marriage on HBO max and if you haven’t guessed I am also watching the GOT reruns!

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Oh, have you started writing down your new year resolutions and striking the ones you met this year? I for one did manage to strike a few out phew 😅 . No biggies, small achievable ones and I am totally pumped up about them !

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This post should have been out in November, I did start working on it after right after the Halloween Saga, Diwali –the Sharma way, before I could finish it Loss happened and with that I lost my train of thought.

Penning down about Diwali didn’t excite me for a while after that. So I trashed the old post and just last week started on the new one.

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It is finally Diwali time a month later 😬! I know, I know ! I am a month late, but I have to post this one before getting started on the topics for December.

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Diwali Celebrations at School

For last two years the girls have been celebrating Diwali at school too. They wear traditional Indian clothes and carry Indian sweets boxes of Kaju Katli and Mooti Chor ladoo to share with their classmates.

Some of their non-Indian classmates have developed a taste for Kaju Katli and specifically requested for it this year 😍.

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This year was even more special as Ms. V volunteered to narrate the story of Diwali to her class of 4th, 5th and 6th graders.

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The best part of Montessori education is that the teachers are introducing the kids to the festivals that their classmates celebrate at home however big or small giving the child a sense of pride in their own cultures.

And by introducing, I mean that circle time is spent explaining the significance and various traditions, parent volunteers join in on zoom to share facts about festival with the class and then there is the sharing time where kids who celebrate the festival are welcomed to get items or things pertaining to the festival.

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This year inspired by my friend Suman, I sent out a goodie bag consisting of clay oil lamp (big enough for the tiny hands to paint and decorate) , a tealight candle and stickers for each child along with a small note on Diwali (thanks to Suman ❤️)

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The kids at N’s class were delighted to receive the goodie bags and spent the entire school day painting their Diya’s , creating a mandala rangoli puzzle( that I got for the girls this Diwali) and gorging on the Indian sweets.

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We are enjoying the Montessori way of schooling for the girls ❤️.

Diwali

Before we moved to Seattle, we celebrated Diwali at my in-laws house in Bikaner, Rajasthan, a whole week off from work was spent shopping, gorging on street food, exploring nearby gorgeous cities of Jaipur, Jodhpur and others along with celebrating Diwali with family.

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After Ganesh Chaturthi (a festival I forgot to write about this year), Diwali is my second most favorite festival! After moving to Seattle, I started celebrating Diwali my way, a mix of traditions I picked up from my mom and my mother in-law.

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Since S is an atheist and I am somewhere in between, the pivotal Lakshmi puja is easier, a dash of tradition and a whole lot of fun. The girls enjoy participating in the prayers and the aarti 😍.

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A few weeks before Diwali my much awaited packages of goodies arrive from India. The package usually contains boxes full of our favorite handmade sweets and savory delicacies from home and new traditional clothes for the entire family.

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All thanks to my Ma who spends an entire month or even more shopping and getting everything ready for our Diwali. The arrival of package from India is when the feeling of festivities start to set in our house.

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We do a in-house fashion show for my mother over video call, trying out each outfit, some of which are even designed by her. Girls twirl and pose in their new lenghas, smiling from ear to ear as they flaunt they new clothes to their naani and ajju.

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Diwali Traditions

This year Diwali came soon after Halloween, that meant the Halloween decorations had to come down the same night, the next morning was the spent decorating the house for the “festival of lights” from deep cleaning the house to decking it up with lights, flowers and rangoli.

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Though the main celebration is on the day of “Diwali” we celebrate Dhanteras and Choti Diwali with equal enthusiasm and fervor . The girls join me cleaning up the Diya’s, dusting and decking the windows with garlands .

As you can see from the pictures we are terrible at rangoli but that doesn’t stop us from creating a master piece each year 😂.

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This time the girls went a step ahead and cleaned their doll house too, the dolls and entire toy collection was cleaned and sorted, I for one wasn’t complaining!!

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This year we had a rather short Diwali, basically 4 days were cut down to 2 days of celebrations blame it on the lunar calendar , so I had to squeeze in the 4 days of fun into two days.

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One of Diwali tradition at our house is painting at least one new Diya (clay lamp) for every Diwali. It started in 2018 when I saw Deepti, a friend posting an activity of painting clay lamp with her son for occasion of Diwali.

I picked up on the idea and from then it became a part of our yearly Diwali tradition.

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The other Diwali tradition is applying mehndi. In 2017 to make N’s first Diwali special, Ms. V and I got mehndi done. The then 5 year old Ms. V loved it so much that she requested it we do it every year and from then on It became one more thing we do every year on Diwali

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Third tradition and most fun of them all is S giving the girls a oil massage, proper Tel Malish a day before Diwali. They absolutely love getting the massage and the hot water shower that follows.

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Now Diwali is all about lights ,sweets , bursting crackers , dressing up and delicious but most importantly its about the Diwali parties!!

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Pre pandemic the parties would start soon after Diwali and continue for over a month or so. A wonderful time of the year meeting most everyone in your friend circle, having them over or going over to theirs for a good time and delicious food.

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This year we did only one Diwali party, we are slowly getting comfortable meeting more vaccinated friends indoors and hopefully next year we will meet more friends.

We hadn’t gotten comfortable with leaving our little puppy all by herself at home yet so I hosted the Diwali get together for one of my friend circle .

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Few of my friends are just fabulous at hosting, they throw some of the most fun and amazing parties. Swati and Nidhi are pros when it comes entertaining their guests and serving the most delicious and good looking food!

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This Diwali ended on a joyous note with some competitive dumb charades an taboo with the men, we lost and how 😂 and lots of fire crackers (thank god for our county where burning sparkles is allowed).

After last year’s Diwali where we met no one, it was really nice to meet and have friends over.

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Oh Ginger was in the house, since not all my friends are comfortable around a pet, we let her have the evening off in the backyard. The little puppy did her best to guilt us into letting her in though 😍😜

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Hope you had a joyous festival this year. Here is to the new year and hoping we can meet more friends and family in the coming year.

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