Fixed!!!!

A surprising number of you all (um, ok 4) have told me that the pictures on Kartik's Father's Day post are broken! I finally fixed them!!! I was trying to use windows live writer to format the post but it couldn't upload to picassa web, blah, blah blah

Pictures from last Father's Day!

I know you all don't care about the technical details, but Kartik really deserves a 'Papa's Day' post with photos; so please click HERE to see the updated post! And leave a comment! We love them! You don't have to sign in!

Happy Birthday Sonu Foi!

Ishaan and Amaani are so very lucky to to have Sonu Foi and Chintan Fua. We are able to talk to them on the phone some, and also visit with them on skype.

This is a photo of Bhailu, Kartik, and Sonu when they were little.

Fast forward roughly 20 years...

 

These are photos we took with Sonu Foi on Ishu and Amaani's only vacation so far! We went on a plane to New Jersey.

For those of you wondering-- yes; Amaani was there too... she just didn't need a ticket yet!

 

Ishu mostly asks me to sing only 3 songs so far-- twinkle twinkle little star; the aarti; and happy birthday. Normally he will fill in the name; and he always starts out with Sonu Foi and Chintan Fua. I've been trying to get him to do it on video; this is the best we could get out of him:

 

Sidewalk Chalk!

One of the things I've most looked forward to doing with my kids is arts and crafts. Pipe cleaners and watercolors-- for the most part Ishu is not ready to do them yet.

But we love sidewalk chalk! Ishu can draw anywhere as long as it's outside. He knows to hand me the chalk as he comes inside the door; and he asks for the chalk when he leaves the door.

Right now his world is full of so many 'NO's!' and it's nice to have a few activities where there aren't any at all.

These photo's are from his first day with sidewalk chalk; a few months ago.

He's a pro now! He can make lines and even circles (he scribbles round and round). It's a sign of exciting times to come!

Congratulations!

This post is a little late in coming.... The weekend before last we were so excited to go to our dear cousin's engagement party!!! I was able to put that zipper in Amaani's dress so she wore that.

We had so much fun! We were able to meet Neki's family as well as some out-of-towner's from our side of the family; who are all super sweet, and incredibly good with the under two set.

I know that it sounds cliche, but we are so happy for both of them! You can tell by the way that they interact that they are just perfect for each other. They make such a great couple, and I we wish them the very, very best for the future. We are so very excited for you Parag and Neki!!! 

Happy Father’s Day!!!

I’m so very lucky that my children have such a great dad. Mother’s often get a lot of credit, but anyone who’s spent even 5 minutes with our family knows that without Kartik, we all would literally fall apart. He is simultaneously the fuel and the motor that keeps our home running.

 

Kartik showing me Ishu after I got out of surgery

Kartik was not a baby person before we met… in fact, Ishaan was the first baby that Kartik ever held—just 20 short months ago.

Kartik's first birthday as a dad! (Ishu and I made that cake together!)

It’s been a 20 month long baby boot camp—Kartik has swaddled, rocked, changed diapers, swung, sung and bathed babies non stop for nearly 2 long years.




He also picked up the lion’s share of the ‘everything else’ that is our life when I was pregnant with Amaani.




Both kids are too young to understand what “Papa’s Day” is all about- in fact, I’m just now beginning to understand it myself.

I took this when Ishu was about a week old. You can tell Kartik is completely ready for fatherhood.

It’s not just recognition of sacrifice and a job well done—but a celebration of a new way of life. Here’s to fathers!

Big Truck!

Yesterday, I decided when I woke up, that I would go with the kids for a walk in the morning before it got too hot. I woke up at 8:30. To get us ready to go I....

• Change Amaani's diaper
• Change Ishu's diaper
• Put Amaani in the crib upstairs (She's rolling now!)
• Carry Ishu downstairs 
• Go back upstairs and carry Amaani downstairs
• Fix Ishu a bottle
• Nurse Amaani
• Pack a snack and bottle for Ishu on the road ('cause you never know with a toddler!) as well as paci's for both kids
• Put Ishu in a high chair
• Strap Amaani in her papasan.
• Go into the garage to find the stroller mercifully out of the van... but without the seats attached.
• Attach Ishu's seat to the stroller
• Pause in garage to enjoy the silence
• Open door to the sound of wailing children
• Put Ishu in stroller seat, give him grapes to keep him quiet-- Wohoo!!! One done!!! 
• Retrieve Amaani, buckle her into carseat.
• Snap car seat into stroller. Woohoo!!!! Ready to go!!!! 

EXCEPT..... I forgot that I don't have socks or shoes on, and need to get my phone and a water bottle for me. 3 minutes later, at 9:45 we hit the road.

It's hot. Oppressively hot. By 10:00 both my kids looked like they were being dry roasted.  So, I stopped in a shady spot to let them cool off a bit before heading home.

 Then we spotted it. Jackpot! A big truck!!!  

The truck is in front of my old middle school!

The driver saw Ishu staring, and pulled the truck up real close and honked. Was it worth going out? Um... probably not. But it made our morning!  Thanks awesome FEDEX Guy!!!!

 

Really, things like this happen to us all the time. I'm so thankful that we live in a place where people are willing to take time out of their day to smile at a fussing baby, have a nonsensical conversation with a toddler or open a door for a haggard looking mother with a monstrous stroller. It makes the day go from bearable to enjoyable.

So the moral of the story is-- random act of kindness are nearly always appreciated (especially by mom's) AND don't leave the house between 10 and 5 in the summer if you live in Texas.

Shirred Dress!

This is one of the first dresses I made Amaani. The pictures are terrible, but they are the only ones I have. It's super easy, any one with a sewing machine can do it! It's pretty easy to do on your own, but there are some neat instructions to make a similar dress HERE.

The body of the dress is from an skirt I found in my closet that still had the tags on (eek!). I feel so guilty when that happens and then you can't throw it out because it's still brand new.

That's my dad in this picture. A short story-- I love the look on on my dad's face. I couldn't crop it out. My 11th grade math teacher once told me, after meeting Daddy at parents night, "You can tell by his eyes how proud he is of you." And it's true! And when I look at this picture, I can tell how proud he is of his grandkids!

I used elastic thread to sew around the top of the skirt until the top part was Amaani-sized. Then I added straps cut from lace trim after sewing over them with the elastic thread. The ruffles and layers were already part of the dress.

So easy! Now there is one more dress in Amaani's wardrobe (which consists of mostly "boy" hand me downs) and one less item of clothing in my over stuffed closet. Win-Win! The whole thing is pretty stretchy, so I'm confident it will last all summer at least. Maybe even a top for next summer-- I should try it out on Ishu to find out.

Grow Squash Grow!

Earlier this year Ishu and I planted some squash and okra seeds in our garden-- um, I mean weed patch.


He really did help! I gave him a seed at a time, and showed him how toss it towards the dirt. You'd be surprised at how many times we missed. We waited and watered and waited some more. Finally we had little seeding.

We watched through the window as our little squash plants were pelted with rain and hail and gusts of wind last month.

We sang the squash grow song every time we were outside, so they wouldn't feel lonely.

 And today we finally have a squash flower!!!

I'm not sure how much of the process Ishu gets yet. I'm hoping this little plant experiment will translate into actual zucchini and crookneck squash so he can understand a little bit about where the food we eat comes from. I can't wait to be picking and eating squash in a few weeks!!! 

In Sickness and in Health

We've been really lucky in terms of illnesses with the kids; but this weekend Ishu got sick again. He has a runny nose and sore ears we think. Since he's been sick, he's been getting to watch video's on the computer.

In case you want a pick me up; here are Ishu's favorites along with what he calls them.

• Bicycle Rabbit -- Ishu's been obsessed with rabbits since he saw one in our yard.
• Jungle Jungle -- This is the intro song to a TV serial Kartik used to watch growing up.
• Om Jai Jagaswami -- I don't know when he became so interested in the Aarti-- it must be the fire. 

Today everyone took a nap together (well...except me, of course).

It's been a tough week sleep wise, with Amaani teething and Ishu not feeling well. Both of them were up late in the middle of the night a couple nights this week. We were lucky that Niki Masi (my sister) could come by and stay the night on Friday so we could get some rest. (Thanks Niki!!!)






Whenever one of them gets sick, I do feel terrible that they aren't feeling well, but also so very grateful that our biggest problems are a runny nose and a budding tooth.

Here's hoping for a better week!

Fun in the (Evening) Sun

So... Guess who didn't get to see the Mavs game in real time?

Yup, Kartik was out in the yard having fun with the kids, while the DVR was recording the game.

Earlier in the summer Ishu and I planted a few squash and okra seeds in the weed patch outside our backyard door.  Ishu will go out to check on their progress and to water them with the hose almost every day.

Today, Kartik went out to supervise and it got a little crazy.

It's what I call a 'grandparent edit'. It's so long that only a grandparent would watch the whole thing. If you want to see more; there are extra bonus scenes HERE.

You can barely hear it, but Amaani's laughing every time Ishu brings the water near her. I'm always in awe when they play together-- it really is amazing, especially considering Ishu could barely walk when she was born. They really seem to be fond of each other; as if they are old friends.

The screaming in the middle is Ishu dumping water on his face by accident. You'd think he'd understand how the hose works by now, (ie, water comes out the end), but maybe in a few months.

Oh, and way to go Mavs!!!

Flashback!

From before I ever thought about starting a blog; I knew that I wanted to mass distrubute these photos. These are photos from a few weeks after Ishu was born. A few of my cousins came by to meet the baby.... And assemble some baby gear. 

Here is a shot of them when they realized that they might have made a mistake putting the swing together...

 

And this is when they tried to fix it. :)

 

It was a team effort.

 

 

I'm so looking forward to seeing all of you this weekend!

Which Baby is Which?

One benefit of having two kids so close together is that you barely have to put away clothes between kids! Amaani is out growing her clothes at an alarming rate-- pretty soon I'll be just moving them from one drawer to another. 

I thought it would be fun to pull some 'matching' photos. These are all from roughly 4 months old

Can you tell who's who? 

You can comment in the comments, if you'd like. 

 

A big hint is the hair (or lack thereof). :)

First Dress

This is the first *real* dress that I've made Amaani-- I've done a few more, but those were just a bunch of rectangles sewn together.

This dress has a yoke, ruffled skirt, hem and trim! I measured and cut the dress without a pattern, and it came together really well.



We tried to have a photo shoot to show it off; but NOBODY was cooperating.

Miss Amaani was not happy at having to wear a dress right after her naptime snooze. This is pretty much the face she had in all the pictures. 


 What's our model looking at?

Why, these two crazies- of course!!!! 







Truthfully, it was so much fun to make, and pretty easy too! I did make quite a few mistakes:

 

1) The dress's back opening was too small originally. I ended just cutting the back completely open and turning in the edges right before she put it on. I'm going to install a hook and eye; but i haven't done it yet, so the neck is more gappy in the photos than it should be. You can see the back in this picture. (Kartik tied that bow!).

2) The print is too busy. I wish now that I had a contrasting hem or something to break it up.

3) I ended up having the dress completely sewn exept for the shoulder seams when I realized the armhole openings are too small to fit around my machine, so I can't put it together like an adult's dress. Blech... lots of rework. 

Just in case you got to the end of this post.... Here is the one smiling photo I got. 

Awww........ so cute!

'Maani on the Move!

This past week Amaani has started rolling in earnest.

She's very sneaky about it. You can sit with her patiently for a long while and she'll just lay there on her back. Look up for a second, and she's in a totally different place!

Ishu took her new found mobility well. The first time he saw her roll he thought it was the most hilarious thing ever; throwing back his head and giggling. Then he patted her head and said 'tikatikatika' as if he was blessing her.

  Life is about to get complicated with two moving babies!

Strawbazies!

Ishu started talking in earnest around 15 or 16 months. His vocabulary expanded rapidly once he got the hang of talking-- for example, when Amaani was born he'd call her 'hibaby!' (one of maybe 10 words he knew at the time).
 

Ishu and Amaani at a week old

In just a few weeks he had a name for everything under the sun. Although he wasn't always accurate (micus for music, kichi for kichidi etc), it was always very cute. Check out this video of him saying strawberry.

Then just a few days ago, I realized that that sweet adorable strawbazy had some how turned itself into a very grown up, big boy 'strawberry'.

They are growing up so fast! I can barely remember a time when he wasn't walking and talking... and pretty soon these days will fade away into a handful of funny stories, photo's and videos.

I'm hoping that this blog will serve to jog my ever-diminishing memory in the months and years to come.

Aarti

A few weekends ago we attended a katha at a relatives house. The kids are all dolled up in there very cutest Indian outfits. So cute in fact, that they apparently had to be secured by ADT.

We didn't think it made much impact on the kiddos, but ever since Ishu's been putting in requests to watch 'Om jai jagajaga' on the computer. Maybe it's a sign that we need to go to the temple more often.

By the way, this is Amaani with her mom's mom's mom. We are truly blessed that getting 4 generations together is a weekly occurrence instead of an event.