And she walked!

Ohh yes she did! It was around 9:15 PM on the night of Aug 9. I was facebooking while ANirudh was playing with Nishka. And then Anirudh called out to me saying that Nishka is walking. I didn't pay much attention and without looking up said "hmm.." and then he told me in a stronger tone "Usne abhi abhi apne aap ek step liya!" That made me look up. Anriudh kept calling Nishka to come to him and then I saw it. One faltering step and another and another and yet another step! And then she reached Anirudh and he scooped her up in his arms giving her a hug. I was looking at all this with my gaping mouth growing wider and wider, totally astonished, super happy and overwhelmed.

I knew she would walk soon but I was taken by surprise that night. Its been 4 days since and she takes those 3-4 steps gingerly and then sits down. She doesn't feel confident about it yet is what I can see. I tried capturing these precious moments in my camera but the moment she sees the camera in my hand, she immediately sits down and crawls at super fast speed to grab the camera.

I guess it will take about another week or two and then she would be walking with more confidence. As long as we walk with holding her one hand, she is perfectly fine and she really enjoys walking like that. But the moment we leave her hand, you cna see the confusion on her face :)

She is her usual chulbula badmashu bachha. You can't leave her alone for a single minute. She loves to crawl on our terrace and more than that she loves to pluck the leaves/flowers from the pots on the terrace. And the latest attraction is to to dig her hands in the mud in the pots.

A new game that she has started playing is she will roll over Anirudh when he is lying down. And if we sit her up on Anirudh or for that matter on anyone else's tummy too she just loves to jump on him.

She still wants to eat everything we are eating. So I put a handful of cheerios in my plate and give it to her which gives her the satisfaction that she is being given what we are eating.

She is my personal dentist. She pries my mouth open and puts her fingers inside checking my teeth inside out. if I close my mouth, she will pull apart my lips and then I've to open my mouth for her to keep fingering my teeth.

We modified her play gym into a rocker couple of weeks ago and she just loves to jump on it and make it rock. And in these 2-3 weeks she has even figured out how to climb out of it. But I fear that she will fall flat on her face if no one is around to help her out.

Some pictures to feast on :)

Enjoying the rocker

 Oh no!! Mumma caught me trying to climb stairs!

And I reached the top!

She is growing and so is Anirudh

Its been sometime since I blogged about the activities of Nishka. And lest I forget I decided to write today.

Nishka turned 8 months on May 30. She is a very active baby *touch wood*. She loves to snatch/grab any book that Anirudh is reading. There are times when it gets tough to help out Anirudh in his homework when Nishka is awake and nearby. She will lurch forward and grab whatever she can lay her hands on.

She can sit quite properly now although at the beginning of 7th month, whenever she would look up or turn around she would go *dhammu* and wail with big beady tears. And with her pouty style of crying she would look even more cute. She is still not showing any inclination to crawl and me and hubby and for that matter everyone else also thinks that she will proceed to walking straightway. She will hold onto anything that she can find and will stand up. She loves to stand holding the foot of our bed and can cruise couple of steps to the right and back.

She is still to sprout any teeth. Her Dadi-Dadu are a little apprehensive as her 4 days younger cousin Avani has already sprouted 2 lower teeth. Although we keep telling them every kid has their own time lines and they seem to accept but I feel that they are still not at peace inside about it.

I still get those sloppy wet kisses when I get back home. She will initially hug me tight the moment I hold her. And then she pulls herself back, as if to check its mumma only, and then will give a big grin and again hug me tight. This goes on for couple of times and then the kissing starts. She will just eat my jaw, my cheek or my chin. And this is exactly how Anirudh used to do too. This whole showing-love act lasts for good 5-7 min. And I just cannot lay her down on the bed even to go to the loo or drink a glass of water.

If she is in my lap and am drinking water or the plain salted nimbu paani, she will want to drink it too. And I do give it to her. Can you imagine she likes to drink the salted nimbu paani which is fairly khatta? I was surprised when after giving her a sip she wanted more. And in fact finished almost 1/5th of the nimbu paani the first time and continues to do so.

Lately I've noticed that if I want her to eat the salty stuff it has to be nicely warm else she spits it out. So feeding her khichdi is not as painful affair as it was earlier. We had introduced Cerelac for her but she took it only for a month and then has stopped eating it completely. We can't even feed her two spoons of that and there are days when not even one spoon goes in her mouth. So these days I've stopped giving her Cerelac but am thinking of trying again as its been about a fortnight since we tried feeding her that.

She really enjoys throwing toys from her high chair and then looking down at them. I wonder what goes on in her mind at that moment. She still loves to play the bouncing games where she will sit on my leg and keep jumping up and down making different sounds. We play peek-a-boo games where I cover her eyes with a small cloth napkin and she will take it away and give a big smile.

If she is lying in my lap she will push her feet and lean backwards. She can do that continuously for 10-15 min. And that's when I say "Haan nonu. Duniya ulti hai..to usko seedha dekhne ke liye tumhe bhi ulta hona padta hai!" (Yes the word is upside down..so to see it straight you also have to turn upside down).

She has started making a lot many more sounds. These sounds are "De..de..de.", "taay...taay..taay..", "aye-te...aye-te". She makes another sound which sounds almost like gargling sound. And we all just love it.

She loves to climb over Anirudh and seeing them play is just so heart warming. He will let her pull his hair, pinch his cheeks as long as she doesn't wet him with her drool. The moment he can feel any drool he will just run away saying "yuck" :D

We sometimes play "Catch me if you can" with me holding Nishka and trying to catch Anirudh while running softly. Nishka simply LOVES it. She will giggle and laugh so much when we play this game.

Anirudh keeps giving those full-of-love glances at Nishka and telling me "Yeh kitni cute hai na!" and will go and give her a tight kichhi (kiss) if she is awake and she will also try to hug him back by trying to wrap her arms around whatever body part she can hold on to :)

Betu also comes running to give me a hug and a kiss when I come back home but then its more of a 'task' that gets done :P reason I'm saying that is he will come running, give me a hug and a kiss and then run back to doing whatever he was doing.

He still likes me to snuggle with him when its his bed time and wants me to tell him a story. He will specifically ask me "Apni waali kahani sunayo...book waali nahi". I usually make my own stories right there and then after asking him 1-2 characters around whom the story should revolve. He loves hearing me weaving new stories every time. And these are the moments that make me realise he is still a 8 yr old and not a 18 yr old which he usually behaves as.

We introduced Anirudh to "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" by Jeff Kinney since approx 3-4 months and he loves reading them. So much so that he finishes a book in 3-4 days max. and then he starts demanding for another one. I'm trying to introduce him to Famous Five series by Enid Blyton which we loved as kids. But so far he hasn't liked it much. But I'm still trying to get him to read that. Let's see how much I succeed.

We have to travel to Bangalore this weekend. First air trip for Nishka and I'm hoping she is fine through the flight. She will also get to meet her cousin Avani. I am so curious to see her reaction to see someone her own size :D

At her 7.5 month appointment she weighted 7.5KG. Doc wants us to increase more nutrients in her diet by way of improved diet. We are trying to do that. Lets see how her 9th month appointment at the end of the month goes.

Some pictures from the early months!

These are a few pictures from the first 3 months -

April 18, 2004 - What a thinker baby!

April 21, 2004 - Monkey baby having a burpie time with Mumma!

June 26, 2004 - His tiny little foot!

June 27, 2004 - After maalish!

Homecoming and the months after!

My stay at the hospital was for about 5 days. On Sunday, April 4, 2004 we came back home. Hey! It just struck me that it was 04.04.04 the day we came home! So interesting! My SIL had been home with her kids waiting for us. She did tilak and pooja when we reached home.

Few minutes after we came back home, betu decided to do all the nature calls. We all laughed saying he's making everyone realise that there's a small baby home as we had all gotten busy talking to each other.

Once we came home, relatives and friends started to pour in. Not one day went for entire first week when we would not have someone home at least 2 times in a day! Things started to slow down the second week. How time flew, it was beyond me.

I could spends hours just looking at my baby. He was so cute that sometimes I would think to myself, I never expected my baby to be this cute! Hehehe...

Every time I would look at him I would be so amazed at the whole process of having a baby. And it still amazes me. How from a single cell it grows up so big inside and how the baby is delivered. It is just all so intriguing for me.

A week after we came home, his dad and his Majhli Mausi (MM) went to buy a cradle for him. Since betu would not sleep on the bed and would sleep only cuddled up in arms, we thought the swing motion of the cradle would work. And it did work great for him and for us too!
In the beginning, how hard he used to cry at maalish and at bath time. Few days later he started to enjoy the bath as long as you don't put water on his face. He never liked maalish though. Not till he was about 2 months or so.

He would hardly sleep for long during daytime in the first 10-15 days. The reasons were
- Reason 1: The family living on the floor above us had a huge dog (dunno the breed..I think he was a mix). He would be out in the balcony 24X7 and would bark 24X7.

- Reason 2: The neighbours were getting a room constructed just adjacent to our bedroom so you can imagine how much noise that created.

But after the initial 10-15 days, my poor baby almost learnt to sleep with all that noise and would frighten up or wake up with sudden noises only that these construction people were making.

On April 30, 2005 when he was a month young, we all (betu, myself, DH and MIL) went to Jaipur in Rajdhani Express. That was his first train ride! Since my in-laws stay there, the naamkaran ceremony was to be held there. His Dadu was waiting eagerly for him in Jaipur. Dadu had made the bed ready for his betu-ram and had spread up such a pretty sheet. The moment I opened his diaper, he peed right on the sheet. Hehehe...

A day or two later, DH and FIL (father-in-law) went to select a card for his naamkaran ceremony and selected a cute one. The date for the ceremony was fixed for May 15, 2004. We actually took a long time to decide his name since me and DH were anticipating a girl, we had selected a name for a girl - 'Sneha'. So we took a long time before deciding on the name 'Anirudh'. Despite the fact that ranked the first in preference in the list of names I had prepared for both girls and boys.

Till June, 2004, I didn't have a digicam. So we used to use our regular camera to click pictures. I think we clicked about 2 rolls of film. But somehow never got to scan those pictures to keep them on the PC in digital format. So in June 2004, his Badki Mausi (BM) sent a camera as a gift. Although however she justified that it was for her own selfish reasons so that she can get to see pictures of him being so far away (in US), we knew it was a gift to us.

As a small baby he used to love getting his pictures clicked. But sometimes he would get so conscious looking at the camera that he would stop doing whatever he was and just stare at the camera.

Months flew past and Betu grew into charming little baby! He was so much fun! Everyone adored him so much. And he also responded every one's love by smiling at them and laughing and giggling when they talked to him.

Thinking of his milestones that I can remember as of now are

• Betu had started to smile when he was little less than a month.
• In Jaipur he did his first flip - from back to tummy when he was approx. 40 days young. The date was around May 10/11, 2004.
• When he was about 4 months, he learnt to make this funny sound with his lips along with spraying everyone around him! :D The sound was something like "Phurrrrrrrrrrrrrr........" using his lips.
• Betu started to sit on his own by the beginning of 6th month. We had been propping him up since he was about 5 months and a week it was so much fun to see him topple over. I guess it wasn't as much fun for him as he would sometimes start crying if he would fall on his face.
• And just after 2-3 days into his 7th month, he got his first lower tooth. The next lower one and the other 2 on the top followed soon within a period of 1.5 months. But the next tooth took more than 2 months to appear.- The first word that he spoke were 'Papa'. This was when he was about 7.5 months. But by 9th month he stopped saying it. We used to wonder if he forgot it or just didn't want to say it. However we repeated the word but no, he was in no mood to say it. He would only talk the baby talk..the usual gibberish.

The first week!

My first glance at my baby is still etched fresh in my mind! He was all clean and white. You must be wondering what kind of statement is that. Well it was quite different from what I had expected so those were my first thoughts. He was very unlike the birthing and just born baby pictures that I had seen on the Internet. Frankly when I first saw such pictures my first thoughts were if the babies look so gooey just after birth, how will I feel love for her/him? I don't know if any of you first time mommies felt so too.

I even used to feel ugh at the thought of cleaning poop when I was pregnant. Its a different story that I did not even feel 1 millisecond of disgust when I had to do it the first time.

The second picture memory after his birth is when they brought him to me after cleaning up wrapped in a sheet, he looked so tiny, so adorable and fuzzy! And he looked straight into my eyes. After I kissed him on his forehead they took him away for some tests etc.

Once I was moved into my labor room back again, everyone started to come and congratulate me. It was around 10 pm when they finally moved me to my room where I would be staying for the rest of the period till I was healed up to go home. It was quite an eerie feeling lying on the stretcher and nurses taking you through the galleries with me looking at never ending pipes on the ceiling. Everything seemed to whiz past me and was making me giddy so I closed my eyes for the rest of the journey to my room.

Betu was kept in the intensive neo natal care unit for the first 4 days as he had had meconium aspiration. So it took 4 long-decade-like-days before he was given to me 24X7. Before that I would walk down to the nursery, and feed him there itself.

Walking down to the nursery was quite a painful task for me because of the episitomy stitches but I remember how I would wait for the feeding times or would just make excuses to go and feed betu. Just so that I could see him. Betu would never start feeding without spending at least a minute of looking at me. However hard he must have been crying of hunger, he just would not latch on without the look-at-momma time. So I used that time as our conversation time. Many a times nurses would talk to him saying you give us such a tough time wailing so loudly and now you don't want milk? :D

A day or two after birth while going back from the nursery to my room, I stopped at the nurses station and asked them for a weighing scale. I had been reading so much that mothers loose quite a bit of weight after birth and I wanted to know how much have I lost. The scale told me I had lost 8 Kgs.! WOW! I was ecstatic! And I thought to myself..only 6 Kgs to go. But who knew that those 6 Kgs will be with me forever! Those 6 Kgs just refuse to go away.

Betu was quite an active child since birth. That's what all the nurses told me. They said usually after crying for 10-15 mins all the babies sleep most of the time. But he slept quite little. He used to look around and throw his hands and legs in the air quite a bit.

On day 4 when they finally shifted him to my room, it was celebrations time for us. Whether he was sleeping or awake, everyone just wanted to hold him or look at him. I remember DH's expression when he came in the evening from work and held betu for the first time in his arms. DH was grinning from ear to ear and just kept admiring our little one. And the first words he spoke to betu were "Aur Mr. M? Kya haal hain?" We all had such a good laugh at that! (Our surname starts with M). This is his picture on this day when he's is just 4 days young.

I'm 4 days young!

The first night after he was shifted in our room was terrible. He woke up way too many a times and latched for 40-45 mins each time. Because of my stitches it was really painful to sit for long and I did not have my feeding pillow in the hospital. So next day I asked DH to bring it to the hospital and God! It was such a relief!! I guess for both of us as the next night was not as eventful as the first one. I really feel that these small small gadgets/accessories that are now available for mommies are such a boon!