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July was an incredibly crazy month for us. To start, both of our brothers got married. Dave and Leah's wedding was on July 10th, while Niral and Liz's wedding was two weeks later on the 24th. Niral and Liz had an additional party the weekend in between, during which the engagement ceremony was held. The Friday evening before Dave's wedding, Kris headed down to where the wedding was for the rehearsal dinner and spent the night there at the hotel. I stayed home with the girls since our usual babysitters (ie Kris' parents) were also involved with the rehearsal dinner. Kris was in the wedding, so she was busy most of the day Saturday with hair and makeup. I got the girls ready and took them over to Jen and Steve's house who were incredibly kind enough to watch the girls for the night, while I headed down to the wedding myself. This was the girls' first real sleep over, and who better to have one with than their best pal Grace! We were nervous about leaving the girls with them, since they've never stayed with anyone other than us or Grammy/Papa, but they did fine!

Kris and I had a blast at the wedding, and it was nice to see everybody. We partied well into the night, and went to sleep at the hotel. We got up and picked up the girls the next morning. We were happy to see the girls, and they were happy to see us!

The next weekend, we drove down to NY for the weekend to partake in the festivities surrounding Niral and Liz's engagement. Since they live out in California, they had never had a chance to perform the ceremony, so they opted to do it a week before the wedding, since they'd be in town. This was our first really long drive with the girls really potty trained. That meant frequent stops, which resulted in a very long car ride. Once we got to my parents house, we relaxed and chatted with the rest of my family that was visiting for the big wedding. Some of my aunts/uncles from India were there. It was nice to see them, as well as my cousins and other aunts/uncles that continued to show up during the week.

While the ceremony was really nice and fun, the girls were very shy the entire weekend, and clung to us most of the time. I think the sheer number of people at the house for the weekend just freaked them out a little. That trepidation didn't subside the following weekend, either, when we drove back to NY for the actual wedding. Since I was in the wedding this time, Kris had to handle the girls herself while I did what I needed to do. The girls basically latched on to Kris and wouldn't leave her side for a second. They were very well behaved during the wedding ceremony, though... Kath was even smiling and waving at my brother at one point, which was cute. The ceremony itself was just wonderful. They had a Reverend who specialized in inter-faith marriages who basically blended a lot of the Chrisitan and Hindu traditions/cultures for what amounted to a really great ceremony. It was very unique, and I think it went very well. We lasted another couple hours maybe, before we had to leave the wedding because the girls were just not cooperating. There were just too many unknown faces for them to handle. So we wished my brother and new sister-in-law well, and headed to the hotel for the night and put the girls to sleep.

Somewhere between Dave and Niral's wedding weekends, Kris started a 4-week dance/gymnastics class session with the girls. Kris showed up to the first class and found out that parents aren't allowed in the room with the kids. Parents are supposed to go to another room and watch the class from video monitors. While Kris tried to get the girls into the room without her, it was definitely not working. I think had we known parents weren't allowed in there, we wouldn't have even signed up for it. So unfortunately, Kris had to just leave. She ended up being able to transfer the girls to a "Mommy and Me" class instead, in which parents are allowed to be with the kids. So she finished out the remaining three weeks doing that instead. The girls really enjoyed that. The class included some dancing in the dance studio and play/gymnastics in the play room. We are planning to enroll them in an 8 week session with the same teacher (who they loved) starting in Sept.

The girls are clearly in a phase right now where they're very weary around strangers. They even tend to get that way around people they do know, if there are others who they don't know also around. Hopefully they grow out of that very soon, because it makes it difficult for us to do anything, if they're always clinging to us wherever we go.

The girls are also developing fears now, and really learning what it means to be scared. Kath is now afraid of the dark in her bedroom. It got to the point last night, where I had to put a night light in the room. Her fear has been growing bit by bit over the past couple weeks, and now it's reached an apex. The night light seems to have made her happy for now.

They're kids, and these are phases that we expected them to go through. It's just interesting the things that come up out of the blue. As parents, you're constantly being thrown curve balls... it really keeps you on your toes. Logically, you wonder... well, you've been sleeping in your bed like this for two and a half years, without any problems... why now, are you afraid of something? Or, you've been fine around other people for so long, but why now do you get freaked out? These are just phases that we have to support the girls through, and I'm sure they'll come out on the other side soon enough.

In other news, this weekend was Kris' annual trip to Hampton Beach with her college friends, so I was with the girls myself all weekend. Yesterday, we were having a fine time on the deck with the girls' little kiddie pool. The girls were running around on the deck having a hoot, when all of a sudden Kath starts screaming and saying she has a boo boo on her foot. I pick her up and see two very nasty splinters in her foot (pictured right). These weren't splinters, even, they were small spears of wood! I've never seen anything like that before! I, myself, have never gotten anything like that! I calmed Kath down and was able to get the one in her toe out myself, but the one that was in the bottom of her foot was going to require assistance. Unfortunately, I had to have Kris drive back (luckily Hampton Beach is only about a half hour away) to help me get it out. It was a doozy, and we made Kath scream bloody murder, but we were able to get it out. She was fine as soon as we were done poking and prodding her with a safety pin and tweezer. Poor girl...

Alright, I've rambled on long enough for this post... I will leave you with a couple videos for your viewing pleasure.

Fun on the swings

The Great Jump

[July Photos]
[Niral & Liz Engagement Party Photos]
[Niral & Liz's Wedding Photos]

Well, as you've all probably noticed, I've been posting a little less than usual... I think I'm gonna start posting photos on a monthly basis, mostly because we're just not taking as many photos as we used to, so no point putting up ten photos a week, or something. So below you'll find a link to all the photos taken in May (and yes, I know I'm almost halfway into June haha).

We had a pretty good May... we had brunch with Mickey/Minnie, we hosted a Cinco De Mayo party, we visited Sesame Place, and Dada/Dida came to visit the girls, at which point we also celebrated Dida's birthday. At the very end of May, the girls even snuck in their first trip of the season to the pool at Grammy and Papa's house. The girls have been up to all kinds of shenanigans, some of which is evidenced in the video below.

May also happens to be the month we started potty training the girls... and by we, I mean mostly Kris. Kris has been doing an amazing job really getting the girls to use the potty... Since they're just learning, they've absolutely had many accidents, but they're becoming less frequent. The girls are actually doing pretty well with it, and I am very anxiously looking forward to the day we are DONE with diapers. It's only been a few weeks of training so far, so we have a little ways to go before the girls will be total pros, but we're headed in the right direction. Exciting times

For anyone interested in how we're doing it, we bought two Baby Bjorn potties for the girls, and we offer them a treat for every successful trip to the potty. A treat being a little bite sized Snicker's or Kit Kat. We had tried to do it with stickers before, and while they always wanted the stickers, it was nowhere near the motivation a little candy is... they really look forward to that piece of candy (imagine that), so it's been working pretty well.

We're also teaching them to wipe, throw the toilet paper into the toilet, and flush. They love flushing the toilet, so the whole process is going very well. Karina even had her first poop on the potty on Friday! They're basically in undies all day except during naps and sleeping at night... and also if we go out, we don't want any accidents while in a store or something.

Alright, those are the major updates... I leave you with the aforementioned video of shenanigans...

Somersaults and Other Madness

[May 2010 Photos]

This past Saturday, Kris and I decided to kick off the summer with a Cinco de Mayo themed cookout. We had a fantastic turnout! So many friends, and so many kids of all ages to partake in the fun. We even had a pinata for the kids to take turns whacking. Ultimately, as you can imagine, it was the older kids that took care of it, allowing everyone to fight for the candy guts. The girls and the other younger kids still had fun hitting it with a stick. Most of the party was spent outside by the swing set, since it was such a beautiful day. Everything went really great, and we had a blast hosting the shindig. We got to see a lot of people we hadn't seen in quite a while, so it was really nice. All of the kids seemed to have a really fun time too, which was great!






Thanks to Eleanor, I have a TON of photos from the party. Please click the link below to see them all! But before you get to that, I will leave you with a video of the girls playing with their Stand N Spin, er Sit N Spin...

Stand N Spin

Cinco De Mayo Party Photos
End of April Photos

It was an eggciting (hehehe) Easter weekend. Although, this post starts earlier in the week, when we let the girls decorate some Easter eggs. We were going to let the girls actually color the eggs, but then thought better of that plan last minute. Instead Kris and I colored the eggs, and when they dried, we let the girls put stickers on 'em and decorate them. They had a great time playing around. I would say the eggs lasted about 20-25 minutes before they were all broken haha!

Yesterday, we had a visit from the Mankad family (close family friends of mine, who I consider actual family) all the way from Pennsylvania. It was the first time Aroon mama, Geeta mami, and Rahul visited our house, so it was great to have them over and see the place. Hiral came as well along with Manisha. Her husband, Mehool, had just flown to Japan for work that morning, so he wasn't able to come. The girls had a really great time playing with Manisha (she's about a year older than the girls). It was such a beautiful day, we spent a lot of our time outside playing aroung the swing set too! It was a great visit, and we all had a lot of fun.

Late last night, Kris and I put together 24 little plastic eggs with little treats inside each of them, and hid them around the great room for the girls' first ever Easter Egg hunt this morning. We couldn't wait to get the girls in the morning for the hunt. Kris had also put together two Easter baskets filled with goodies for the girls that they got first thing this morning. They got some stuffed chicks, chocolates, a slinky, sparkly socks and some other random stuff. Needless to say, breakfast this morning started off with chocolate. We had to bribe them with the idea of the egg hunt to get them to finish their breakfast. Once they ate enough, we let them loose in the great room in search of all the eggs. They were fast! They zoomed around the whole room in search of more and more chocolate. Every time they found an egg, they tried to open the chocolate that was in it to eat it. We had to stop 'em after a couple, cause we didn't want them eating THAT many pieces of chocolate. So the girls collected all the eggs and treats and put them in a basket that they can see on the mantle. And we'll give 'em a little over time. All in all, it went great, and the girls had a fantastic time! It'll be even more fun next year when we can get even more creative with the hiding part, since they'll be older and even smarter.

Early afternoon, Grammy, Papa, and Uncle Dave came by to give the girls some more Easter gifts. We all hung out outside for a while, as the girls played on the swing set, since we had yet another fantastic day, weather-wise. Then we had a nice lunch out on the deck. All in all, it was a great Easter Sunday and we were all pooped by day's end.

Finally, I will leave you with a funny video of the girls "playing" Ring Around the Rosie.

Ring Around The Rosie [March 31, 2010]

[The Mankads Visit]
[Easter Eggs]
[Easter Egg Hunt]

So much to talk about!! I'll get right to it... lately, Karina has been waking up with night terrors. The first couple times, we just thought she woke up screaming/crying for no real reason, maybe a nightmare or something, but when we got her and picked her up she was really unresponsive to our efforts to comfort her. She almost seemed like she was having a seizure, with erratic, seemingly uncontrolled arm movements. She just wouldn't stop screaming, and definitely seemed out of it, even though her eyes were open and she was looking around. After this happened twice, we looked into it a little, and we realized that she was having night terrors. I guess it can be pretty common for kids at this age. It's a really upsetting thing to watch your child scream in such pain and anguish, and not be able to do anything to help her. When kids have night terrors, you're supposed to just sit next to them and make sure they don't hurt themselves and let the night terror pass on its own. Picking them up or talking to them is supposed to be a bad thing that actually makes the experience even worse for the poor kid. So we've been trying that, and after about 10-15 minutes, it does usually pass, and she's ok again... Most of the times, we're pretty certain it's triggered by a lack of nap during the day or if she just didn't sleep very well during her nap.

A few weeks ago, right before these night terrors occurred, Karina woke up screaming one night and we did as we usually do and let her cry without going into the room, because 90% of the times she's woken up like that, she goes back to sleep on her own within 5 minutes. After about 5 minutes passed, and we were just about to go get her, she stopped and went back to sleep. Kris thought, maybe I should go in there and at least wipe her face, because it's probably soaked in tears and what not... I told her, just leave her, she just fell back asleep and you'll end up waking her. Kris decided to go in anyway, and thank goodness! Karina had thrown up everywhere! Poor girl had vomited and was then laying in it! Turns out she caught that stomach bug that has been going around up here lately. We cleaned her up, changed sheets and put her back to bed... a couple of days later, Kris started to not feel so great... then later that night, I wasn't feeling so great. Long story short, both Kris and I got knocked out really good by the stomach bug. Luckily, most of our woes occurred after the girls were in bed for the night.

Alright, enough "bad" stories. For the first time since the girls have been born, we've finally booked ourselves a real vacation. We've taken short trips here and there, but never one that required an airplane. In a couple months, we are going down to Florida for a week! Grammy and Papa have a condo down there right near the beach, so we'll stay there. It's close enough to Orlando, so we're thinking we'll take a day trip to Disney World one day. I'm sure the girls will love that. We're very excited about the trip, but also very nervous about how the flight is going to go. Hopefully the girls will love it, and do great. We're flying JetBlue, so at least we'll have the TV screens for them to watch if all else fails haha!

In order for that trip to be a success, the girls are going to have to learn to sleep on real beds. They're way too big for Pack N' Plays now, and there are no cribs at the condo. There are, however, two twin beds that they'll use. So, in an effort to start training them now, we decided to pull the fronts of their cribs off last night. I did install a bed rail, though, so they don't fall out of bed in the middle of the night. They really like to curl up right against the edges of the crib. But the bed rail still allows them to get in and out of bed on their own. To keep an eye on them during this training period, I also installed a night vision camera in the room, so we can see if they're actually sleeping, or if they got out of bed to play with their toys. They did pretty well their first night. Reeny stayed in her bed, but Kath got out a couple times to walk around, and even climbed into Reeny's bed at one point. After about 5 or 10 minutes, though, she had gone back to her own bed, and went to sleep. Success!! Naptime today, however, didn't actually include any napping. They refused to stay in their beds. As we watched them on the camera, I would yell to tell them to get back into their beds, and they would... but then not even a minute later, they'd be out again. We were afraid of this... the shades in the room don't really darken it that much, so it's usually fairly bright in the room during naptime. So that doesn't help. At least at night, it's dark in there, and they know they should be sleeping. It might take us a week or two (hopefully no longer) to get them properly napping in there, without getting out of their bed to play. Even tonight, Kath got out of bed at one point, but we yelled up and told her to go back into her bed and she did... and then they both went to sleep. So it seems they'll do just fine at nights... it's the daytime nap we have to figure out. It's only been one day, so hopefully it'll get better.

Earlier today Randy, Julie, and Max came over for a playdate. We also planned to go out for lunch together, as they had a gift card they wanted to use for a restaurant that just happened to be in our neck of the woods. The girls had a really great time playing with Max, as they hadn't seen him since their birthday party. Max seemed to have a fantastic time, and really loved the big slide we have in our great room. Lunch went really well too. It was nice to hang out with them, as it had been a few months since we all got together.

Finally, I leave you with a video of the girls singing their ABCs. They've been able to do this for a while now, but I've been incredibly lazy with the camcorder of late. I keep saying "I gotta get that on video", and then just never do. They're really good at singing the Itsy Bitsy Spider too... so one of these days, I'll get that one taped Anyway, here's the ABCs... and listen for Karina's funny "break" in the video

Singing the ABCs

[February 4 -21, 2010 Photos]