Malaika - day 2

Welcome, Malaika!

Malaika Lily Narjala was born Aug 20 2009 at 12:27pm with a hearty cry. Hearing the baby's first wail before you see them is really something quite special. The moment Susan and I saw her we both said she looked like a carbon copy of her brother when he was born. She also had pretty much the same stats as her brother: 6lbs 7oz, 18.5inches. And beautiful, long fingers. Think there might be a little pianist somewhere in there :)

.. ..

Almost there

Baby #2 could show up any day now. Early Sunday morning (3am-type early) we decided to go to the hospital since Susan had been having bad abdominal pain for the last few hours. After an hour and a half of monitoring at triage they told us the baby was ready yet, and we trooped back home.

Back to waiting.

Words and Pictures

Yo's vocabulary of spoken words is starting to build up, slowly but surely. It now comprises of: mamma, dada, hallooo, hi, bye, car, woof, uh-oh (which may or may not be a word dependng on how much of a purist one is), eye, teeth, no, and no (for nose). 'No' was his first word.

The boy certainly understands a lot too, and it's amazing to see how much of a sponge kids are. He's big on pointing these days - especially outside, when he wants his ammama to take him out for a walk or to play.

Some random pics from the past few weeks:

A basket case

Forget the toys; pots, pans, and now baskets/tubs will do just fine.

.. ..

From the mouth of (sleepy) babes

Here's an admission, out on the big internet: I sometimes (try to) sing to Yo while putting him to bed at night. Susan sings 'Away in a manger' to him usually when she puts him to bed, and since that seems to work, I try to attempt the same as well.

One night as I was rocking and singing to him, the boy, half-asleep, reaches out a hand, puts it over my mouth, and says 'Noooo'.

Okay. Maybe I should sing something else.

Tonight as I was putting him to bed, I switched to singing 'Hallelujah' - the slow chorus version - thinking it might be soothing and all. After a few minutes, he raises his head, with a wide smile on his face, and says 'Halloooooo'. (He has just started saying his version of 'hello', and perhaps in his sleepy mind equated my rendition of the song to the greeting).

Maybe I should take a hint.

Pongal and Poriyal

We hosted a lunch with the Indian crowd last weekend in honor of baby-to-be. Amma cooked up a storm, and some of our friends brought some yum dishes as well. It was a hot day, and the kids enjoyed splashing around outside for a bit too.