The Birthday Party!

We had the birthday party at Baldwin park in Manassas last Saturday. The weather turned out just perfect, not too hot and no rain, yeah!! It is a nice little place with picnic tables, a playground and lots of shade trees. Grandma was here to help plan, shop, and make food for the party which was great because it would have been a lot harder without her help. Thanks Mom! Plus, she stayed home while Abhi was still napping until the party so we could go and set up before guests arrived.

We ended up having a great turn out and lots of kids so the playground was great idea. Abhi did get to do some swinging and his usual investigation and picking up and eating mulch, sticks, and dirt. We had tons of food! We made way too much, but better than not enough. Plus we can live on it until we are off to India shortly...not much cooking! Just picnic fare; sandwiches, chips and dip, hummus and pita, veggies, watermelon and, of course, cake and cupcakes.

After eating and playing we gathered everyone up for singing. All the kids got party hats and noisemakers. Abhi sat in his highchair in awe while everyone sang, then when the noisemakers went off it scared him and he started crying. Poor guy, but the video is priceless! Keshav had to rescue him out of the high chair and settle him down before he would eat some cake. That did not take long and soon he was covered in green icing! Here is the birthday boy....


When we got home, we ran into our neighbors Teri, Ajia, and Eli who did not make it to the park. They had us come over for more bday celebrations since they missed out. More singing and cupcakes...and finally a glass of wine for us! Abhi had more bday cupcake, this time he covered himself in yellow.
It was a wonderful day of celebration with lots of friends!!! We can hardy believe a year has already gone by! Our little boy is growing up fast. We only hope the years to come are as wonderful as the first!!!

Happy 1st Birthday Abhi!!!

Abhi is now a year old, hard to believe. The year went by so fast!!! He had a fun birthday, although he is still dealing with some of those darn teeth! Grandma and I took him to babygarten (storytime for babies at the library) in the morning. Then we went to the mall and grandma got him some new jammies (one is featured in the new side bar picture). Abhi ate a quick lunch and it was off to play in the play area in the mall. He napped on the way home while grandma and I stopped for lunch and shopping at trader joes. He got up, played more at home with grandma, ate, took his bath, and it was off to bed. We will celebrate this weekend with friends having a picnic in the park and that is when Abhi will get some birthday cake. It was a fun day!!! See his new picture on the sidebar taken on the big day.

Grandma, Keshav, and I celebrated with ice cream from coldstone creamery after Abhi was asleep. Just what we needed! Also, K brought me some beautiful flowers to celebrate the first year of parenthood. Here they are...













Abhi received some cards and money...thanks for that!!!

Grandma, Doctor, Parties and Picnics....

Before getting started with what Abhi has been up to, I must add a few more things to the "things Abhi can do" list (that I forgot and he has just started). He can also...

Dance
Give a Kiss
Imitate sounds and some words
Is now saying "mummum time" and last night he said "night night appa"
Moo when asked 'what does the cow say?'

Last Wednesday, Grandma arrived so I am taking advantage of her help big time. I have been coming and going as I please with all my errands and getting to the gym a lot more. I actually was able to go for a run outside this morning...can't remember the last time that happened. Also, K and I went to the movie and dinner/drinks last Friday night...also been awhile for that one! Abhi is enjoying Grandma and keeping her busy with his schedule.

Thursday we went to the doctor for Abhi's year exam...good to have grandma because back to the days of 4 shots. Abhi has not gained much weight since the 9 mos appt. Just a few ounces, so he is currently 22lbs 12 ounces. He did get considerably taller growing 4 inches and is now 30 in total. He handled the shots pretty well and did not cry too much. He was back to himself after his bottle smiling and playing peek-a-boo with people in the waiting room. He did not have a fever with this set of shots either, so all went smooth.

Saturday morning we were up and on the move early. We had a birthday party to attend for our Friends Oscar and Jennifer's daughter Fiona. She is going to be 2 . Abhi (well, mommy) got to paint a small pot and then it was time to run through the sprinkler and dip in the baby pool in the back yard. Abhi was the only boy running around with lots of little girls. We had pizza (peas and rice too for Abhi) and cupcakes for lunch. It was a nice party!!

Then, we were off for the afternoon to K's work picnic in Harrisonburg. So, it was naptime for Abhi during the 2 hour drive. They had the picnic in a big camp with tennis, pool, horseback riding, canoeing, etc... It was really nice but extremely hot so we decided to hit the pool. Abhi floated around in his baby float and it was great to just cool off in the pool!! We were planning tennis and other activities especially since grandma was with us to watch Abhi, but time got away from us and it was just so darn hot. Plus, we forgot the bug spray...do not forget that when you go into the forest in Va. We stayed and had dinner at the picnic then it was back in the car, back to sleep for Abhi, for the 2 hour drive home. We were all beat!!!

Sunday was and all day shopping/planning day for Abhi's birthday party. We are inviting friends for a picnic in the park next Saturday to celebrate the big event. Can you believe it, Abhi will be 1 this week!!! So more to come as the boy turns 1...

Abhi's first monument

Abhi has been to a concert and two beer festivals but never a national monument. It took him almost a year but now he can add to his experience 556 feet up the Washington Monument.


Keshav's cousin Govi visited us last week from Bangalore. He was actually in the US for work in CA and then visited us to get a view of DC (and NYC) before heading back home. He saw lots of stuff last week gone from morning to night everyday. On Friday, Abhi and I spent the day with him in DC to see the Washington Monument. So, Abhi got to to see DC from the highest point. I have never seen it before either so I was up for the occassion. I was not incredibly impressed but it is worth a look and it's free - nice thing about sightseeing in DC. After you have been on top of other landmarks around the world, this one pails in comparison, what can I say. Abhi did have fun. He looked out the windows and talked up a storm.

Here is our self portrait series from the top...

Things Abhi can do now...

As you can see in the picture, Abhi is now holding his own bottle. When I say it is time for milk, he goes and gets on the pillow to get ready. Course, he doesn't always drink, he likes to also play with the bottle which leads to milk everywhere. But, he is doing pretty good. He also is now drinking out of sippy cups frequently. I just bought him one with a straw and he likes it. I gave it to him this morning for the first time and he caught on immediately. He then proceeded to carry it with him everywhere this morning while he was playing. He was looking at his book with one hand and holding the cup in the other.

I am not sure if I have kept up what Abhi is able to do now on the blog so here are the latest things...
Up down with arms
Peek-a-boo (although he doesn't always cover his eyes)
Wave (knows bye bye means wave)
Go down stairs
Do upside down (bending over and looking through his legs)
Eating finger foods well - he is chewing good (he now has 4 teeth on the top to go with the 2 on the bottom, so he is having fun crunching cheerios and crackers between them)
Shaking his head no (and he knows what it means too)
Drink through a straw -new this morning

He is talking a ton too. However, I am not sure what he is saying most of the time. He is saying versions of ball, duck, and night night. I think I have heard attempts at buster and mooing like a cow. The latest is "hi" and "hi sweetie"(sounds like hi deetie). He has been saying hi sweetie for awhile but it took me awhile to figure out. I always say that to him which is where it comes from. But he says hi to people all the time now, it's cute.

Still spending time at the pool and Abhi loves the water. Here is a picture of Abhi after last Thursday's outing to the pool. He was a little tired!

4th of July Weekend

Abhi's first 4th was fairly uneventful, I must admit. He did not even see, or hear (slept through) any fire works. Since his bedtime is 8 or 8:30, he was gone by the time the fireworks started at 9:15.

First, let's back up... Abhi got to experience his first water park Thursday afternoon. We went to the signal hill water park with my friend Helen and her sons Anthony and Gabriel. It is by their house and Helen said it is smaller and more on a scale Abhi could handle. And it was very nice and smaller than our other parks. Abhi is just so darn independent that he wants to first of all, walk on his own without holding your hand and secondly, he wants to venture into the deeper waters (up to his waist and chest) where he gets a little wobbly. He also wants to join the bigger kids in climbing on things which he is too small for. It is a little unnerving and it is nonstop following and supervising for me! But he loved the sprays of water and had fun. We went about naptime, so I was a little worried about him getting overtired. But as soon as break came around, we put him in the stroller, got some snacks, and he was off to sleep. He took a 2 hour nap at the water park! It was awesome because I got some time to layout and chat with Helen and read my book. Relaxing by a pool is a rarity these days!!!

The 4th and the rest of the weekend mostly centered around Wimbledon tennis. So, Abhi got to watch some tv this past weekend. I don't think he really even cares now...he is too buy walking around and exploring everything possible. Plus, since we are rarely in the basement, it is new territory for him. We finally got out in the evening of the 4th and went for pizza at Tony's, the best pizza around us. So much for cook outs. Then we came home and did the nightly ritual of bath, read, bottle, sleep for Abhi and he was out by 8:30. Then we were planning to see the city fireworks from our deck. We have a fairly good view from there (although one of the trees has grown considerably since last year) and it beats fighting crowds. So, we poured ourselves a glass of wine and headed to the deck. It promptly started to rain! The fireworks still went on though and we did briefly watch under umbrellas.

Speaking of Wimbledon - excellent tennis! I do feel for Federer, but awesome Nadal!! Spain is on a role and that was a match for the history books!!!

Saturday we went to DC to the folklife festival that the Smithsonian has every year. It was hotter than blazes!!! I don't know why they have that festival during the hottest time of the year. I was too hot to enjoy anything!

Sunday, like I mentioned, was consumed with tennis. Then we met up with Kehav's cousin, wife and family in the afternoon for lunch - visiting from Dallas.

Hope everyone had a wonderful 4th of July!!