First day at flight school

 Tanush, your dream has always been to be a pilot and today, you took your first flying lessons at Tampa Bay. We are beyond proud and incredibly happy to having been part of your life, this first step. 

Daddy cannot stop smiling. Tears of joy rolled from my eyes. Way to go sweetheart. First of many. 

Tatha (my dad) accompanied you in the back. Mommoma, Dimpu mama, Lohit mama, dad and I took lots of pictures.

So so proud of you.

Tanush’s first sleepover:

1^st week in July

We went to visit our family in Atlanta. Kids had so much fun with their cousin. Megha even played cricket and is getting very good at it. Here are the kids playing while building jenga.

We also visited 6 flags. Here is Tanush right before Anand and I were leaving for the hotel. Tanush insisted that he wanted to spend the night at my sister in laws’ along with my nephew. He was too excited (and hence the bad picture as he was jumping) and I was too nervous.

Tanush can now sit comfortably

Tanu-betu can now sit comfortably for a longer period of time. He is now able to pull himself up from lying position if he is the crib. Its only a matter of time he starts walking!

Well rested baby is the happiest baby!

Tanush rolls back on to his back!

My baby is growing up so fast. Tanush rolled over for the first time on dec 06th, 2015 and today he rolled back to his back from his belly! 

Megha's 4th Birthday

This 4th birthday for Megha is so much special for us so many reasons and the top 3 reasons are 1) Tanush is with us 2) Megha now knows and truly understands/ anticipates and enjoys the birthday 3) My parents are here.

Megha couldn't wait for her birthday. Starting September she has attended 4 birthday parties (2 of them from her school JK friends) and she was looking forward for her birthday. She knew what theme she wanted from the very beginning. It's Sofia the First (Disney's latest young princess).  This asking for Sofia started well before Halloween and I thought maybe by mid November she will change her mind but she did not. So, Sofia it is!

Megha wanted well her friends from school to be invited. That would make it 28 kids. So we cut down to kids from JK only, which was 14 kids. We also invited our family friends. After the last person rsvp'd yes, we had 24 kids and 26 adults.

We booked the same community center that we hosted Megha's second birthday party a while ago.

When we shopped around for entertainment, especially princess Sofia related, I couldn't find anything that was happy with. Since Sofia is not as popular as Elsa, we didn't have too many options.

Finally I decided to let go of the entertainment and just figure something else out. Since its around Christmas time, what better craft can there be other than the stocking? I bought about 30 stockings and lots of craft supplies. It took me several trips to the dollar store to get everything in place.
Each stocking had color sketches that go with it so that kids can color their own stockings, lots of stickers, glitter stickers, Christmas tree ornament with a string attached, foam shapes, round and bell shaped ornaments that can be colored and used as a Christmas tree ornament, pipe cleaners, Pom poms and some craft paper clips.

The idea was to keep the kids occupied for at-least 30-40 mins.
Apart from this, I also labeled every bag so that kids don't get into any kind of disagreements.
Putting this together has not been as easy I thought it was going to be. I had to cut glitter stickers in to small portions (so kids don't waste the whole sheet), portion the foam shapes/ stickers and quite literally everything needed attention. Several hours of work spread through about 4 days accomplished this task. I was very happy with it and so were the kids.

Apart from that, we also hired a local Milton mom to do simple face painting for the kids. Kids thought it was super fun and I was so happy to see the kids happy.

Cake, as usual was ordered from the same lady who bakes all of Megha's cakes. This time to go as per the theme, we ordered a 2 tiered cake (Anands selection). After much deliberation, here is what I decided for the flavors; the bottom tier was a simple yellow cake with custard+delche de leche as filling and top tier was chocolate cake with chocolate ganache as the filling. Of course the over all cover was fondant and butter cream holding the fondant and the cake together. It was soooo good to look at. Chocolate cake was finished much faster than the yellow cake (but of course).
We brought home small portion of yellow cake.
I bought Sofia the first paper plates, napkins and spoons and I thought the whole cake table looked cute.

Cake Cutting:

We 4:

Food was below:
Starters: chicken nuggets, veggie spring rolls, party mix chips and pretzels. Pop/soda; juice and water.
Mains: Cheese and pepperoni pizza, naan, veg biryani, muttar paneer, chicken biryani, butter chicken, raita, macaroni salad, potato salad.
Dessert: ice cream and cake

For a change (from previous parties) most of the food was consumed. Whatever left, which is not much, we brought it home.

For the party favors, I kept it simple as the the kids were getting to take their hand made stocking filled with things kids usually like. The favor bag consisted of a box of playdoh, crayons, small writing book, pencil and an eraser. I also left a big bowl of candy consisting of Hershey's kisses, candy canes and soft chocolates for kids to fill in their stocking.

The hall was big and it was such big help when a few friends showed up early to help. Anand helped set up tables and a few decorations and had to leave to pick up food. Everyone pitched in and soon before the first guests showed up, the hall was all decked up and ready. It was such big help to have my parents around. Without them, I wouldn't have been able to take care of Tanush and keep running around receiving the guests, helping kids etc.

Since Anand brought food just in time, everything was still warm/hot. If we brought it along with us when we first came to the hall, I would have gotten cold.

Megha was super excited and sure was the belle of the ball. She looked adorable in the white dress (From Macy's in states).
Tanush was wearing a comfortable sleeper. I could not put on his new outfit as he was crying so much in the car and was all tired. I just left him in his comfortable cotton cloths. I wore a brand new outfit myself; thanks to Anand for the gift card he gave for our anniversary. Anand was wearing his T.

Over all the party was a success. All of us were very tired, especially Anand as he was working nights. Megha got so many gifts which she opened at home the very evening when one of our friends came over with their daughters.
Tanush was such a sweetheart and so was Megha. Such a beautiful day it was.

On Megha's actual birthday, she really wanted to go to school. So off she went! Before that, I made her favorite breakfast, hashbrowns with eggs and bacon; served in her new Sofia cutlery. She loved it.

My parents blew a few balloons for her.
We gave her the birthday presents we bought for her and she cut the cake I baked at home (zebra cake).
My baby is 4!

Here she is opening her gift from her grand pa and grand ma (Anand's parents)

Tanush rolled over today...!

...And I am the proudest mom on earth today and I am so sure of that!
My baby can now roll over! Wow. I am so happy to have caught that "first ever". And once he figured out how to do that, there is no stopping him. It's just only been few hours since he first rolled over and already, when ever we put him down, he immediately rolls over.
Megha was so delighted too. My baby is soon going to outgrow my lap...though he will never outgrow my heart.

Tanush's first month birthday

We celebrated Tanush's first month birthday on 21st Sept. I was so excited to bake a cake for him. Usually Megha helps me with baking but that day she way away (for gymnastics) and in all the rush, I missed adding butter to the batter until after the batter went into the oven. Oh well, sometimes its the thought that counts right?

Here is Megha helping blow the candle...

Here is the one month birthday boy. How fast time flew by. If you take one night at a time, it feels longer but overall, time did fly by. He is starting to look more and more like Anand.

On a side note, I thought I could resume watching my favorite shows on TV/ Netflix but it doesnt seem like thats gonna happen anytime soon. I guess its too soon to expect to be able to watch shows!

Megha's first day at JK!

Where did all the time go? Seriously?! She is already in JK! Here she is at the entrance of her school on the first day of kindergarten.

My eyes welled up and I was going through so many emotions only I know!

Soon after getting into the car, Anand started talking about something else altogether and I think I kind of got distracted from my blues.
Here she is sitting after praying on the first day:

Under the same circumstances, on the first day of Daycare sooo long ago.

Baby movement!

Today I felt the baby move for the very first time! It's a wonder how nature works.
I am so guilty. I hardly write anything anymore.

Megha's 3rd Birthday Celebrations (15th Dec 2014)

Unlike the last 2 years, the planning for Megha's birthday celebration started merely 2 weeks before. Just as well, because this time we didnt want to make it as elaborate a deal as it was the last two times (it ended up being the same which is a different story).

Theme: The theme for the party was Disney Cars. Megha loves Lightning McQueen and Mator and so, we built the theme around it. From paper plats, balloons, decor to cake, party favors and Piñata, everything was Cars.

Venue: Based on the guest list (15 kids and 20 adults), we decided hosting a party at

home is ruled out. We rented an indoor playground for 2 hours which we thought would be perfect (and it was. well, almost). It came with pre decorated room and we didnt have to worry about that part. 

Also, Anand blew some helium balloons at home. We had fun on the morning of the birthday too. They also neatly arranged the tables and chairs and each kids chair had a balloon tied to it. Outside the room was the play area where there were big slides and all sorts of play things for kids.

Entertainment: We hired entertainment, a clown, the same one from megha's first birthday. For such short time (2 hours) we maynot have needed her but having her was fun. I let the kids play around for 15 minutes and called them all inside for snacks and her magic tricks/ face painting and the balloon toy making. 

She kept the kids entertained well while the adults got a chance to grab a bite. Anand was still out waiting for the food. Megha was a little cat this time (her choice totally).

Megha's outfit was from Macy's in US (Anand's selection).

Cake: Just like the last two times, we ordered the cake from the same lady. The cake was a simple 2 layered (vanilla on the bottom and chocolate on top) with strawberry filling and butter cream frosting. The cake was also built around Cars theme.

Someone switched the lights off and most pictures didnt come out well. Oh well, we had so much fun though. And the cake was yummy! 

One more picture:

Piñata: Megha by now knows what a Pinata is as she has attended a few parties where she saw pinatas. This time, we got a Cars (Lightning McQueen) pinata. The thing was BIG! I bought 4 big bags of chocolates from Bulk Barn and it only filled half of the Car. Anand bought additional candy and we (actually Anand did) filled it up to the brim.

Kids absolutely loved it! I bought some additional bags for them to fill in their pinata.

Food: For starters, we had Samosas, lots of chips, juice, cake pops (Neeta made these),

hummus and cheese. For mains we had pizza, biryani, naan, 2 curries, salad and ice cream.

Favor Bags: Just like that last time, I have personalized each favor bag (return gift as we call it in India) based on the child's age. Each bag contained a hard bound book. 

Some of them were stories, some journals etc. The favor bag also contained an assorted bag of

candy. We made them using the candy from the same bunch as Pinata. 

The gift bag also contained a Cake Pop, which our good friend Neeta made at home from the scratch!

Everyone (with the exception of one family) showed up at the party and I couldnt have been happier. Megha received lots of blessings, lots of gifts and lots of hugs from everyone. A great day!

After returning home, we packed some food and gave to some of our friends around. The next day, the big day for Megha as its the actual day of her birthday, calls poured from all over the world. She was thrilled to say thanks to everyone and she opened all her gifts.

We put a chair near her gifts and she opened them all. We clicked several pictures and here are a few:

This is a gift from me and Anand, a piano.

Potty Training: Done!

Megha reached a BIG milestone today. No accidents at all when it came to pee and poo today! Its official! Megha is now potty trained!

We had started potty training her a while ago, though it was only a passive attempt. Its only during the last 2 weekends that I committed to leaving Megha diaper free at home. I made sure the potty is where she can see, thats it. She went on Sunday 23rd Nov 2014 for the first time and today, Nov 26th, she is completely potty trained. After going poo in the potty, she got a special treat at the daycare, cookie!

At home, she gets stickers, she gets to blow a candle and small candy.

Here is her note from the daycare, all decorated!

Potty Training!

A very BIG day for us yesterday. For the first time yesterday Megha went pee pee in the toddler potty! YAY! I am so very happy and so very proud of my big girl. She never really went when i took her to the washroom or to the toddler potty from time to time. I just left her diaper free during weekends for the past 3 weekends, left the toddler potty where she can see it easily and voila! Yesterday she went all by herself! She pulled her pants down, went and sat there on the potty!

We jumped up and down, I gave her stickers and she got to blow candle twice. This evening too she went pee pee there again! I think she is very close to being trained completely. I feel so happy. I feel like throwing a big party for this. no kidding!

Here she is blowing a candle after going pee pee yesterday.

Black Eye!

Today, 10th June, 2014, Megha got her very first black eye! She was lying down playing with the toy elephant at the daycare and it accidentally slipped and fell on her face (just below right eye). She cried for a couple of minutes while the care provider tried to apply some ice. Soon it turned black and blue. My poor baby :(

This picture was taken about 8 hours ago at the daycare (sent by the provider to me). As it stands now the bruise deepened and has turned even darker shades of black/blue. When i was giving her a bath this evening, I was so afraid to touch her face for the fear of causing pain :(

Anand's note on Face Book: 
Mefha's first black eye after a bar fight.... With a toy elephant!!! I don't think the elephant is still around to enjoy rest of his life... Ha ha... Love this pic tho....

Here is the elephant...

Kisses to Ouches!

Megha's dad wanted to remember this date: He got slightly hurt on forehead (pretend hurt) and Megha very lovingly kissed him when he said "ouch" :)
This is the first time she kissed an ouch with out being asked :)

Sleeping through the night!

Megha reached a big milestone yesterday. For the first time, she had  slept through the night! I believe she had done this with Anand a few days ago but when I am home alone (with A working in the nights), she for the very time slept through!

Usually, I leave her in her room and I sleep in the master bedroom. When she wakes up for the first time (usually around 12), I go give her water (previously milk) and sleep beside her. Anand sleep trained her after I trained her off the bottle (week ago). So, now she wakes up and comforts herself back to sleep.

Even though she slept through, I still kept waking every hour...thinking she will wake up now and she didnt!

A major break through. I only went into her room at 4:45 AM...couldnt stay away for longer as I had to get up and get ready for work in 15 minutes.

So proud of you baby!!

Bottle weaning? Done!

Very happy and proud to announce that bottle weaning process for Megha is done! She no longer asks for milk/water from a bottle during the nights.
Having said this, she is surely missing the bottle. I can see that. She is not able to express it but I can so see it. This morning my daycare provider told me that she was wanting extra hugs...poor girl. She gets plenty at home but I guess she is just missing her bottle at the daycare and expressing it in a different way.

I have to mention, Farmers Almanac was looked into before I started the weaning process. It told me the days which are suitable. Crazy? Sure, but it worked!

Megha's Second Birthday- 15th, December 2013!!!!

Happy second Birthday Megha!

Unlike the first birthday party where we began planning for it at least 4 months in advance, preparations for second birthday began 1 month in advance. I think that’s reasonable, given its second birthday. But needless to say, we have put our heart and soul into this one as well. Here is my baby :)

The awesome part is we had 3 birthday parties this time for Megha!

Office party: I joined new team recently and I really wanted to do something. I bought the entire team coffee, tea biscuits and muffins! The whole team had a great day munching on these all day. This was couple of days before the actual birthday party.

The second party was at the daycare. The daycare provider (Sherry) hosted a beautiful birthday party for Megha (couple of days after 15th). She went to the daycare all dressed up, had a photo session and was the star of the day!

Here she is lost in thoughts while Sherry clicked away.

Here she is admiring the candles lit on mini cupcakes.

Here is the star with a birthday girl badge!!I still have it :) 

She gave small party favor bags filled with child safety chocolates. I heard the kids loved it!

Party we hosted: Preparations for the party started with the utmost care. Initially the plan was to host the party at home itself but after finalizing the guest list, we had about 40 people coming. That was not going to be possible at home and so we rented a hall.

Invitations this time went through e-vites. Nothing fancy, just small invites sent online. All 40 people responded that they would come. I was happy I booked the hall.

Food: This time, like last time we ordered main course from a restaurant (an Indian/Pakistani restaurant). Starters and dessert, we managed to arrange from home, with the exception of cheese, samosas, juice, pop...wow, quite a lot of exceptions! 
Menu included

Starters: Samosas, homemade pita chips (prepared by Anand from scratch!) with hummus and spinach dip, veggie fingers and cheese platter. Here is Neeta posing infront of the starter table!

Main Course: Chicken and veggie biryani, chicken achari, mutton curry, bagara baigan, aloo-spinach, naan, salad and raita.

Desserts: Ice cream with sprinkles (ahem ahem…wait for the picture below), homemade kheer (an aunt of ours made it), cut fruit, dates and gulab jamun.

Entertainment: This year we have hired Dora for the entertainment! We were speculating between Oso, a Disney cartoon character and Dora (a Nickleodeon creation), them being Megha’s favorites. We decided on Dora as per the entertainer’s availability. I couldn’t have been happier with the choice! Megha absolutely loved Dora!

Party Favors: So much thought has gone into preparing these party favors. I had to make 3 sets of favors: one for kids at daycare, one for kids coming to the birthday party hosted by us and one for the adults coming to the party.

Daycare favor bag: This contained simple child-safe candy and chewable’s. As is the policy at the daycare, I could not send any toys which may pose choking hazard to the kids.

Kids Favor bag: I have personalized each kids bag this time (unlike a standard one last time) according to their ages. Each girl had an assortment of chocolates to eat and a personalized gift. The various gifts included beautiful hair clips with flowers or dvd or soft toys if it were an infant or under an year old or bath toys or nursery rhymes. I bet they all liked it (Their moms emailed me later).

Favor bag for grown-up's: All the ladies got an assortment of dry fruits packed in beautiful net bags and also candle holders with candles inside. Anand helped me pack these.

All supplies were bought from Walmart, Michael’s arts and crafts and Bulk Barn. Here is how the bag looked like before giving.

I had so much fun collecting these items! I had made several trips to the above stores to make sure I had everything needed.

Decorations: Most of the decorations were used from the previous year as we had bought them brand new at that time and were still in excellent condition. A few new decorations were bought from Walmart.

Cake: Ah the cake! Like on her first birthday, we got Megha’s second birthday cake custom made as well from the same lady who made Megha's first birthday cake. Keeping the birthday theme in mind, we got Dora cake made. It had two layers, bottom was chocolate, then strawberry filling and then the top layer was white cake. I got fondant over the cake with Dora with her backpack, stars and even map J

The day of the birthday:

The day before the birthday, I made sure all the things which need to go to the party hall are ready. The morning of the birthday Anand woke up early (as I slept in late last night) and cut the fruits and got the perishables sorted. Megha woke up at about 7:30.

Calls poured in from all over the world and finally she was all set to open her very first gift which was from Anand and me J Here she is!

And here is the actual gift; a small Crayola board with one side where she can draw with sketches and crayons and the other side where she can use chalk. We have taught her to say "Thank you", when someone wishes her "Happy Birthday" and she did so well!

We got ready, loaded everything in the car and we got going. We made a few stops, picked up the cake, some coffee grind for the party, keys to the hall and reached the hall.

Here is how the hall looks like from outside. It’s a beautiful place with tennis courts and all. If it were summer we would have wanted to take a stroll.

We did a few decorations and then our good friend Neeta helped us along. I was so thrilled to see baby Naomi’s outfit! What a joy it was to see her!

And then came our neighbors who helped in decorations too!

Anand had to step away to get our food from the restaurant. It was too busy though. I was trying to get this and that done and it felt like I am stressed.

Here is our starter table:

Here is the main course table (the full picture).

Here is the dessert table, my favorite table! Sasha’s mom made yummy kheer. For the ice cream toppings, I used the below 5 bowl setting (a thoughtful gift by Neeta and Sasha for Christmas-2013). The big bowl had chocolate melts. Smaller one's around had M&M’s in one bowl, chocolate covered raisins in one bowl, dry fruits in one and candied cherries in another bowl….yummy yum yum! Fresh cut-fruit by Anand, some dates and of course Ice Cream and Gulab Jamoon were placed around.

And here is our pretty girl making a grand entrance! Megha knows it’s her day and she made the most out of it J

Dora entertained the kids really well.

Here they are playing a floor game where kids toss the coin in the center.

Another fun game involving parents too..

Another one where we needed to make mummies using the streamers! My neighbor’s kid won the prize and he sure deserved it!

Here is us playing musical chairs!

Here is Megha getting her face-painting done J

And here she is cutting the CAKE! God Bless you bab She had a little bit of cake, not much though as she is not really cake-person.

Dad and mom had the most of the cake...lol

Everyone loved the food and we in general had an awesome time. It was a bit tiring though as couple of my friends promised they would come and help me out but couldn’t make it because of the weather.

 Here is us, dancing to the lively Disney music.

Megha received so many gifts and by 4 PM, we cleaned out the party hall and returned home. Some friends joined us for coffee and drinks. What a great day we had!

Thank you so much Appu and Ramana for the beautiful outfit you had brought for Megha; as you can see, she looked oh so adorable. Thanks Neeta and Anita aunty for coming early to help us out! I dont know what we would ever do without your help. Thanks Faisal and family too for help with decorations!
And of course Anand and Megha...my sweethearts for everything.