Shah Family photos...

Before the in-laws left they really wanted to get some professional portraits done. Luckily we were able to squeeze it in the day before they left which happened to be Diya's exact birthday...July 20! Here are the proofs. Enjoy!

Diya's 1st Birthday!

Diya is officially one year old! I totally can’t believe it. The other day we were thinking about what we were going through exactly 1 year back…how on our way to the hospital we were convinced it would be a false alarm and would return home empty handed. How shocked we were when the nurse checked me and announced I was almost 6cm already and she assured us we were not going home without a baby. Then the first time we saw Diya…it was sooo amazing. She was so tiny and helpless….so precious. I had tears of joy. Here we are a year later. She looks nothing like she did when she was born. She is no longer tiny…she is no longer as helpless… but she’s definitely still our precious baby.

We had a big birthday party for her past weekend. She did really well. She was playing with anyone that would take her. Even after everyone left she still wanted to play.

Thanks to everyone who helped out with all the preparations and to all that attended and thanks for all the wonderful presents too. It was definitely a memorable time and it was nice to see everyone. Below are the pictures from the party.





In other news…Diya went back to daycare yesterday after a 4-month break. We are sending her for half days this week so she can get used to it. She did ok yesterday. She had trouble with food. She didn’t eat too much. I want to try to give her more table foods. She doesn’t have her chewing teeth yet…so I’m not sure what kinds of foods to give her that she won’t chock on. We give her some green peas…small pieces of fruits…cheerios…but what else can I give her? If anyone has ideas please let me know. Keep in mind that we are trying to stay away from offering her non-veg at this time. I know it was only the first day and she was probably too distracted to eat. Teachers had warned me that this week will be an adjustment period for her and she’ll probably do better as time goes on. Good thing was that she was able to take a nap which I was concerned about.

So the reason Diya is back in daycare is because(as some may already know) the inlaws are leaving. In fact mummy and daddy already left yesterday and Neha will be leaving tomorrow. It’s a bitter-sweet feeling. Bitter cause we are gonna miss them. It was nice having them around and that Diya was so well taken care of. But at the same time it will be nice to be just the three of us again and things to be less hectic. I know they totally enjoyed being with Diya and were very happy to have gotten this time to spend with us and so were we.

12 months (part 1)

I know its not 12 months yet and I'm already posting. Since this is a big month for Diya I've decided to post it in two parts. There is just too much for one big post.

Past weekend was a busy one for us. Saturday was just insane. We went to the Kansagra house for a backyard party, then ran a bunch of errands in preparation for the party, then went to masi’s house and ended the day with Deesh and Vipul’s dinner. It was hectic, but it was really nice hanging out with Pintu and family after a long time. Can’t believe how big Shivani and Sahil have gotten.

Diya 12 months

On Sunday we went with the Pandes to the zoo. It was Diya’s first trip to the zoo and she seems to really like it. Her favorite animals were the lions and the seals. Unfortunately, our camera ran out of batteries half way so we couldn’t take as many photos as we wished. It was nice hanging out with Amit, Soni and Gautam after a long time. We used to hang out all the time before either of us had kids. Hope we can do more stuff like this now.

Trip to the zoo

This past month we’ve taken a ton of photos. That was another reason for posting in two parts. I didn't want to through all the photos in one post. There will be more photos (and stories)to come from her Bday party I'm sure.

wisdom teeth removed

Well…there they are…my wisdom teeth! I know I said my appointment was for Saturday, but day before I got an unexpected call from the dentist office asking if I wanted to pre-pone my appointment. So I went for it. So, how did it go….great! I mean great as a teeth pulling can go. The doctor was not my normal dentist, but he was good. He was able to get both out in half an hour. I think I got lucky cause neither of my teeth shipped or crumbled (as you can see from the photo). Also, they both came out pretty easy and he didn’t need to cut my gums or anything. Worst part was hearing the teeth crack as he was pulling them out. He showed me each tooth as he pulled them out. At the end of it all he asked if I wanted to take them home. I obviously did.

Before I left the office he put a big gauge in my mouth and prescribed some meds. I went to CVS straight from there and people were definitely giving me looks cause the gauge was so big that it made it look like the side of my mouth was swollen. I was feeling fine until the numbness started to wear off…that is when I started feeling the pain. I took a pain killer and was good for the rest of the day and night. Only bad part was I had a constant taste of blood in my mouth. Infact at night I had to get up twice to rinse my mouth cause it was filling with blood. That was gross, but as of this morning it’s all good. No pain, no blood.

It went so great I’m thinking of getting the other 2 removed too. The doctor said it’s a preventive measure which is better to get done while I was still young (yes, he actually called me young). My next appointment for a cleaning is in November…will think about it then.

annoying screaming baby

Diya’s birthday is July 20 which is less than 2 weeks away. Mummy and daddy are going back to India on July 21st and Neha on 23rd. So between getting ready for Diya’s birthday party and doing some last minute shopping before the in-laws leave we have been super-duper busy. In the mist of it all mummy got very ill the day before and Neha has a continued bad cough which Diya seems to also have. I just hope everyone gets better by the 19th.

Diya continues to get naughtier as the weeks go on. She can scream like nobody’s business now. She screams when anyone tells her ‘no’ or takes away a toy or leaves her alone….basically anything she doesn’t like. We have officially become that couple with that annoying, screaming baby. I always thought when we reached this stage we would get really embarrassed, but honestly we don’t really care as much as maybe we should. I mean we don’t just let Diya scream...we try to distract her the best we can, but if she screams again…oh well…we just deal with it. We haven’t reached the point yet where we won’t go out cause of her screaming. Of course we tend to go to places where it’s already a little noisy hoping no one will really notice (or care).

As Diya gets older a new behavior is starting to emerge. She seems to ‘attract’ older kids when we are out. We’ve mostly noticed it with girls in the age range of about 5-8 years old. They seem to be fascinated with her. They come and kinda jus hang around Diya. For example when we go to the park there is a little girl who will swing next to Diya’s swing then follow us when we go on the slide and will continue to follow us and just stare at Diya…at one point I sat down with Diya in my lap and the little girl just sat down right next to me. She didn’t say anything…she just kept looking at Diya. Another time we went out to dinner and Diya was in a high chair and these 2 little girls just came over and started playing with her. And yesterday, we were at the outlet mall and Diya starting fussing in her stroller and a little girl out of nowhere came over and gave her a balloon to play with and was dancing in front of her to make her stop crying. Of course Diya absolutely loves all this kind of attention. Dunno what it is, but I’m not complaining since it keeps Diya quiet :-).

Last thing…on a totally different subject...I wanted to update everyone that this coming Saturday at 4:30pm is my appointment for the wisdom teeth removal. For those that have gotten this done before I had a question and it may sound silly so I warn you...Will I be able to drive myself after the whole thing is over or should I have someone come with me? Also, is there any 'prep work' I should do...like not eat or brush my teeth before I go? I'll be calling the dentist to ask also, but never hurt to get more than one opinion. Will keep you posted on how it goes.

new and old video

This one is pretty recent. It's real short, but cute. It's of Diya with her favorite doll.

Diya with her favorite doll from Diya Shah on Vimeo.


This is an old video of her laughing or should I say screaming with her daddy.

playful screaming from Diya Shah on Vimeo.

11 months

Diya's is 11 months old and she is getting heavy. I remember when she reached 11 pounds I complained about how my arms hurt while rocking her to sleep. These days never mind rocking her… I can’t even hold her for more than few minutes at a time. I'm out of breath by the time I reach the top of the stairs while carrying her. (It is very possible that I could just be out of shape ;-) Of course it doesn't help that while I'm going up she has to reach out to touch every light switch, and wall hanging on our way. She is very active so one would think she would burn off everything she ate and she'd be lighter, but nope....not Diya. I think she must weigh at least 22 lbs by now.

She's learned a lot of new things lately. She learns things much faster now too. It took us a month to teach her ‘ta-ta’, but these new things she learned within days. Ask her where is Diya's 'bhodu' (belly) and she will pat her belly. Ask her where’s daddy and she'll through her hand up (kind of imitating a plane). Ask her to do 'jay-jay'(like praying) and she will put her hands together and move them back and forth. Most of these things the in-laws have taught her (obviously). But it’s amazing that she can learn something new in just a day or 2.
She also has a favorite doll now. Well it’s really a teddy bear, but we call it her doll. Infact, we call it 'nani Diya' which means ‘small Diya’. When we ask her to get nani Diya she will get that same doll every time. Then if you ask her to put nani Diya to sleep she will put her in her lap and rock back and forth. It’s really cute.

She continues to 'speak' better too. If you ask her to call Cody(our neighbor's dog) and tell her to say 'aav'(come) she clearly says 'aav aav aav..'. This word used to be a little muffled before.
We are trying to teach her to say mum-mum(food) for when she wants to eat . I’m also trying to teach her to say ‘mummy’ (can you blame me), so I hope she doesn’t get the 2 confused.

Here are last month’s photos.

Diya 's 11th month

Below are 2 videos. In this one she is doing everything I ask her to like saying ‘ta-ta’ and doing radhe-radhe.

Smart Diya from Diya Shah on Vimeo.

In this second one she is in her swimming pool which initially she was very scared of, but as you can see in the video she’s gotten over her fear.

Swimming Pool from Diya Shah on Vimeo.

few more photos

Neha and Diya before Naam Karan Vidhi (naming ceremony)

More Father's Day Photos

Past weekend

It was a big weekend at the Shah residence. On Saturday we invited some family over for dinner. We hadn’t invited them over in awhile and we were waiting for the in-laws to be here. So finally past weekend worked out. The menu went like this…we had strawberry milk shake as what Neha calls ‘Welcome drinks’. The main dish was Idli-sambhar, rasam-vada and dosa with coconut chutney. For dessert we had rass-gula and ice-cream. These are all typical south Indian dishes that the in-laws decided on...do you see why I think of them as south Indian? There was a lot of food, and it was good.

Backing up a bit, there were 2 other reasons for inviting the family besides ‘it’s been awhile’. First, it was Deesh(my sister) and Vipul(her husband)’s ‘vaynu’ dinner. Basically, it’s a dinner for the newlyweds. Although, Deesh and Vipul have been married for awhile and they have also had dinner at our place before…this was the official vaynu. Second, we did a mini naming ceremony for Diya. It is a traditional ceremony when the fai (in this case Neha) holds the newborn and rocks him/her in all four directions then placing him/her in a blanket and officially ‘names the baby’. I can’t really explain it all, but we have it on video. Although, Diya is no longer a newborn and she has already been given her name we wanted to do it for fun. Plus, Neha was so excited about finally getting her rightful chance as a fai we couldn’t let her down. I think everyone enjoyed…especially Diya.

So that was Saturday. Sunday was Father’s Day. It was pretty low-key. I got Diya ready in her ‘I Love Daddy’ top. Daddy and grand-daddy absolutely loved it. We took bunch of photos. Since we had leftovers from the day before we didn’t have much to cook so we spent most of the day out. We made a stop at iParty for some decorations for Diya’s first bday party. They have such cute stuff. We ate out and returned home where Premal packed. Packed for what you ask? He has another trip to Jacksonville, FL this time. He left today and won’t be back ‘till Wednesday after next…it’s a week and half long trip, his longest yet. Thank God his parents are here so I don’t have to be alone or make any arrangements.

Diya is almost 11 months old. I will be doing a seperate post for that later this week.

pulling teeth

I had a dentist appt few weeks back. Last two times I was there I was pregnant so they couldn’t take any xrays. So finally at this last visit they did and get this…they found 3 cavities! I was expecting one…two tops, but not 3. One is on a tooth on the bottom and in the back on the left side and the other two are on my wisdom teeth on the right side. I had the left tooth filled yesterday so that one is all set. Dentist said its best to just pull out the wisdom teeth with the other cavities. My wisdom teeth otherwise are not causing any problems. In fact she was impressed with how straight they had come in. So now I have to decide what I want to do. I’m little scared about getting the teeth pulled. For one thing I get tired of keeping my jaw open for more than 15 minutes and the procedure would take 1-1.5 hrs. Second thing is that since the bottom tooth is a little set in they would have to make a cut on the gum to get to the tooth which means I’d get stitches. And recovering from that doesn’t sound like fun. Third thing is I like my wisdom teeth…I mean isn’t it a waste to remove them if they aren’t bothering the other teeth? And couldn’t she just do a filling on them? I’m pretty sure she’s too lazy to do the fillings. Anyone have any experience with getting wisdom teeth pulled? Any advice for me?

Diya's dancing videos...

Diya dancing with Pig from Diya Shah on Vimeo.




Diya dancing to walker music from Diya Shah on Vimeo.




Diya dancing to Toy from Diya Shah on Vimeo.

long weekend

The long weekend was fun. Friday, they let us out early from work and I went home and cleaned…no, that was not the fun part. But, it was good to get it out of the way so we could enjoy the rest of the weekend.

Saturday, we went shopping with the family. We got Diya a new front-facing car seat. They say to make the switch after baby is one year old AND is at least 20lbs. Diya is already 20lbs and her birthday is not too far off so we decided to get it now. Plus, the one Premal liked was on sale, plus there was a coupon, plus we got a free umbrella stroller with the purchase so as you can imagine it worked out well. Not only was it a good purchase, but Diya enjoys being in the umbrella stroller much more than her regular one.

Sunday, we went to Hopkington State Park and had a mini picnic. We took the new umbrella stroller which was very useful and it took up a lot less trunk space. Since my in-laws are here we always take the Pilot and use the optional 3rd row to fit all 5 of us and Diya’s car seat…so trunk space is always an issue. Diya did really well at the picnic. She ate all her meals and even took a nice long nap(as you can see from this photo which also shows her umbrella stroller). Only thing she was not happy about was the water. Dunno if she was getting scared or if the water was feeling cold. Unfortunately, I didn’t take my camera when we went over to the beach area. (Waiting for Deesh’s photos.) But just picture her in a cute little bathing suit :)…yes, I finally got 1…well actually I got 2 :-P I realized that Diya really needed a hat and shoes at the picnic. I used Deesh and Vishwa’s hat which was still a little big, but did the trick.

Diya and Eshaan at the picnic

Monday, was another shopping day. We went to the Natick area. Old Navy was a big hit with Neha. She has always loved that brand and she found bunch of stuff on sale so she was very happy. We also went to couple of other places and I found not 1 but 2 hats for Diya and not 1 but 2 pairs of shoes for her …so I was very happy. We all returned home happy. It didn’t last long though since I soon the realized that the next day I was the only one who had to wake up early and go to work. Premal is taking this week off since he has accumulated so much vacation time.

Congrats & Happy Bdays

We had a girls night out...where I found out that my good friend, Sital is expecting! I'm sooooooo excited and happy for her and Jay!! It's her first and she's due early December...congrats, babe! I had such a great time hanging out with my girls. Like Tanvi said...we should do it more often.

Today is my cousin Vinisha's birthday. She's 8 years old. Happy Birthday, Vini! I remember when she was Diya's age.

Tomorrow is Premal's cousin's birthday. She lives in India so its her birthday right now where she lives too. Happy Birthday and congrats, Pooja!! She is also expecting her first and we found out couple days ago that she is actually expecting twins...we are very excited for her. Mummy is already making a list of things to take for her and now she'll have to take 2 of everything :)

Looking forward to the long weekend. Plan is to have a small picnic with close family on Sunday and relax for the rest of it. Looking forward to it. It will be Diya's first picnic!

10th month

Ok, so where to begin. I guess some general updates are a good place to start. Mummy and daddy (Premal’s parents) have arrived from India. Neha is still here and with Diya, Premal and I…our house is full. For a change all rooms in our house are getting used :) Diya loves having so many people around her and always having someone to play with. Daddy absolutely loves kids and entertains her all day long. Hard to say who enjoys more.

Daddy got another truck load of clothes for Diya. Combining what Neha, mummy and daddy got for her it seems like she has enough stuff to last her ‘till college. They are mostly summer dresses and Indian outfits. But, man they are so adorable and when you convert the price into US dollars it’s so cheap. But, watch...with my luck Diya will grow up to be a tom-boy and will hate to wear girly stuff.

I think I mentioned before that Diya had learned to stand up in her crib. Well, now she can stand up anywhere, anytime…as long as there is something to hold on to like the sofa, ottoman, TV, bouncer, even my leg. We have noticed that she is a bit of a scardy cat…once she stands she’s very afraid of falling and is very careful about going back on all fours. I guess it’s good in this case, but she also gets easily scared of certain sounds too. Daddy got her a toy that plays a tune and lights up and moves around….soon as we turned it on she froze and you could tell she was not enjoying it. She wouldn’t go anywhere near it.

Teeth count...her fifth tooth is coming in now! Her 2 front, bottom teeth are totally in...her 2 front, top teeth are half in and I just noticed another one on the top budding out. It seems like these last few teeth have come in with such ease. Her drool seems to have increased a bit, but other than that there hasn't been any other signs. Only thing though...now that she has so many more teeth her bites really hurt. I have to be careful when I feed her something with my finger.

Probably the best thing she has learned this past month is to dance. It is sooooo cute!!! She wiggles her hips and moves side to side. She’ll dance to anything that sounds like music….my singing, her musical toys, TV…she even started dancing to the blender once…that was hilarious. It doesn’t matter what position she’s in…she can be in her car seat, lying down, on all fours, or standing. She can put on her groove anywhere. No idea how she learned this.

She seems to be making some progress with her speech too. Before she used to just say ‘ta ta’. Now she can put her hand up and say ‘hi’. It’s not a clear ‘hi’ and it sounds a little different every time. But you can tell that’s what she thinks she’s saying. We also play this game with her where we put something over her head like a blanket or something and we ask ‘Diya kiya’ (where is Diya in guju) and when she removes it we say ‘aa rai’ (here she is in guju). So now when we do it she will say the ‘aa rai’ part herself.

Other major thing is that she has learned to climb stairs. She’s pretty good at it too. One of us is right behind her when she’s climbing, but even if we weren’t she shows no signs that she would fall. I think this may be due to her being a scardy cat. Either way I’m still not ready to take that risk. Ok, I think I'll end it here. So here are photos from the past month...

Diya 10th month photos

... and I'll post videos when I get a chance to upoad them.

Mother's Day

Diya and I on Mother’s Day!

There are many new updates about Diya that I can’t wait to share. I’ve been super busy lately, but I’ll be sure to have her 10th month post next week.

9 months old

Diya officially turns 9 months this Sunday. It’s been an exciting month...lot has happened. Biggest thing was that she started to crawl which I mentioned before. Every day she perfects this new skill of hers. She is speedy and will follow me from room to room. It’s very cute. By end of the day you can see the dirt she’s collected on her clothes around the knees area (not so cute).

Yesterday, something new and kinda big happened while I was at work. Diya was napping in her crib upstairs while Neha was downstairs. The monitor was on. Neha heard Diya rustling and getting ready to wake up. Then she heard her talking…all still normal…then she heard the mobile on the crib. Strange…it doesn’t go off on its own…unless you turn it on or touch it by accident it doesn’t make a sound. So she rushed upstairs to check. What did she see?... Diya was STANDING in her crib. She was holding on to the side of the crib with one hand and playing with the mobile with the other hand all while standing. Naturally, in the evening we put her in the crib hoping she would do it again and we could see it in action. Luckily she did it again. She was even able to pull herself up using the ottoman. She does get lazy after a few tries and gives up, but I’m still proud of her.

Another thing she has learned that I also love is that she waves bye-bye. Of course she does it at random times. But, she waves her hands and says ‘ta ta’ at the same time all while giving a little smile. It’s really cute and she’s getting good at it.

Yesterday, we could have sworn that she tried to copy some words we were saying. We weren’t even trying to get her to copy us. Premal said excuse me to her and Diya immediately mumbled something back and it was very close to ‘excuse me’. We laughed and thought it’s just a fluke. Later in the evening…I turned off her toy drum which says ‘Bye Bye’ before it completely turns off and Diya repested something that sounded close to ‘Bye Bye’. After that time we started to think that maaaaaybe it wasn’t a fluke. But, of course she didn’t repeat it so it must have been.

There is one last thing that she has learned to do. But, I won’t comment on it…I’ll let this video do the talking.

So, as usual here are the photos from last month and the link to the video.

First visit to the park

Guess who visited the park for the first time ever!! She loved it. She didn't really care for the sing or slide...she really just liked watching the other kids.

all better

I just wanted to let everyone know that Diya is back to her old self again. Knock on wood, all her sickness is gone. Only thing that hurts are her teeth. We are giving her some ayurvedic teething medication. Premal’s kaka is a big believer in the stuff and sent it with Neha. It’s a small pill that Diya takes once a day. Since its all natural I didn’t mind trying it out. I have to say that it seems to help. On days we forget to give it to her that following night she seems to have more trouble sleeping soundly. On top of that Diya loves chewing on the small tablet which easily breaks with her gums and tastes lil sweet.

Past weekend we saw some really cute summer clothes. So we got some for Diya and tried them on when we got home. As you can see this fits Diya perfectly now and no way will it last ‘till summer arrives. She was looking too cute… couldn’t resist not taking a photo or 2 (or 2 dozen). I’m really looking forward to summer. She’ll be old enough to sit in those baby swings at the park. We’ll get those mini pools that she can sit and play in…will get a cute little swimsuit...ohhh…I can’t wait.

and she's off...

Many people have been asking how Diya is doing so here is an update. She is doing better. She no longer has diarrhea or constipation or a fever. But the ear infection seems to be causing her some pain. It’s either the ears or her teeth (or both). She’s been a little fussy during the day and wakes up so many times in the night. Last night she woke up at midnight, 1:30, 2:30, and 5:30. This was actually an improvement from the night before when she woke up every, single hour. Each time she starts screaming within moments of waking up. Usually, she can fall back to sleep on her own, but lately she has to be held while you walk around. When you think she’s finally sleeping… slowly put her back in the crib. But it’s this last step that usually wakes her up again and you have to start all over again. Getting her back to sleep takes 30-45mins these days. Premal and I (and even Neha last night) have been taking turns putting her back to sleep. Hopefully each passing night will get better. Keep your fingers crossed.

So, while all this has been happening there was something amazing that happened yesterday evening…a huge milestone was achieved by Diya. She learned to crawl!! Luckily we were all there to witness it. It was really exciting for her and for us. Soon as she figured it out you could tell her face was saying “Wow, this is awesome!!” We can already see how we are going to have to be more careful with her now. She was all over the living room yesterday...no fear of coffee tables or fireplaces or ottomans…nothing was stopping her. Here is the video from moments after her first crawl.


Diya learns to crawl! from Diya Shah on Vimeo.

bad to worse

So, Friday I get home from work and Diya had pooped only once all day. Finally…relief...we thought. She didn’t go rest of the evening then Saturday morning she goes again, but it’s very little and it’s really hard. Great. She was now constipated. How does she go from one extreme to the next…no idea. Doctor said it’s pretty common nothing to worry about. So we start giving her the regular diet. Saturday night she felt little warm so we took her temp and sure enough she had a fever. We gave her Tylenol. Sunday morning she still had fever, but seemed better. Sunday evening she had a nice, big, normal poop…finally! Monday morning she still had a temperature. Ended up taking her to the doctor. She has ear infection in both ears. Great. She’ll be on antibiotics for next 10 days. Premal was most upset that for the first time she has actually lost weight. By now she should’ve been over 18lbs, but she’s only 17lbs 3oz. I'm sure she will make up for it soon.