Uma Laughing Sleepily

I know I don't blog on here regularly anymore, I've been posting more videos and pictures on my facebook page, and emailing them. However, with my new Flip UltraHD video camera, the files are too big to email out anymore, so I'll probably just do it here since it can support it.

Here's Uma sleepy and talking and laughing. Of course, Kavi needs attention constantly, so I'm trying to interact with him while filming Uma!

Uma Grows, Kavi Leaps!

Smile for the camera, Uma-zooma!

A big milestone for Kavi, today - he finally jumped off the ground with both feet!!



He seemed a little delayed in being able to get this, but he finally did it today!! Yay!! I told him that once he could jump and get both feet off the ground, there's lots and lots and lots of cool things Daddy can teach you:



So, anyways....


Well, Uma has her moments when it comes to breastfeeding. Sometimes she falls asleep, other times she flat out refuses and pushes away! Today she did a bit better with it.

Of course, she senses when it is my turn to feed her, because I feed her with the bottle, which is a lot easier for her. When I hold her, she all of a sudden gets alert and starts smacking her lips, and squiggles around ready to eat. WAIT - you're not supposed to get like that with the daddy!!

She wasn't as easy of a baby as we thought she was going to be! Now she is finding her voice and will cry a lot more when she feels necessary to communicate.

And Kavi hasn't been regressing much and handling things fairly well...

Hey, you're too old for that, buddy!

Uma's First Week Home

So Uma's been home for a week! Lot's going on. We need sleep. She needs to be fed every 3 hours. And it is such that Nisha and I both need to wake up because our process goes like this:

1. We wake her up (b/c she won't wake up on her own!), and change her diaper, which makes her more alert.
2. Nisha breastfeeds her until she passes out/takes no more, which usually lasts for 10-15 minutes.
3. Then I bottle feed and burp her, while Nisha pumps.
4. Change her diaper again, b/c she will invariably have an explosion in her diaper during her feed.
5. Sleep, then repeat.

She is a very quiet and chilled out baby! Much moreso than Kavi when he was her age. But I wanted to capture a moment of her crying, because you don't really hear it all that much!



She had her first check up with her pediatrician, Dr. Hargrave. He was very impressed with how well Uma eats. She was pretty much back to her original birthweight after she lost some weight in the hospital (pretty typical). He said most babies take a couple of weeks to regain that, it took Uma 6 days. Go Uma!

Last week, Nisha's mom was here to help, this past week, Nisha's youngest sister, Kruti, came to help us out. She has been tremendous. We will definitely miss all the help we've been getting!



Kavi's been enjoying having all these relatives come by to help out. This past weekend, his cousins, aunt, and uncle from San Antonio came to hang out.

Starting Sunday afternoon, we're on our own! Yikes!

Enter Uma! Kavi's sister

As you may or may not have noticed, the title of this blog has changed from Kavi's Corner, to Kavi and Uma's Corner.

Uma Patel Rahman was born Wednesday, July 21, 2010 at 4:53pm, at Seton Hospital in Austin, Tx. She was born at 5.3 lbs and 17 inches.

Her due date was August 16th. She was 4 weeks early, and came at exactly 36 weeks. So, she is considered a preemie. And let me tell you, she acts like one!

I can see it now - she is not going to be overshadowed by her older brother and his grand entrance into this world.

So it was all timed in a very interesting way. Nisha's mother and brother came the day before, and they drove by the hospital just to see where it was and to make sure everyone knew how to get there just in case. And without knowing that they did that, I did the same thing on that day with Kavi after I picked him up from his daycare.

My biggest fear was that Uma would come right when I was teaching our kids summer camp, because I have no replacement for the days I teach, and I would miss her birth.

So it's Wednesday, the very next day from when Nisha's mother came (and stayed over night). I finished summer camp. I had a schedule private lesson right after camp. Right towards the end of that private lesson, I got the phone call from Nisha's mother. I told her I'd be right over.

Now, this person I was teaching had 3 more steps to learn to finish the routine she'd been working on for months. She said that if I had to go, that we can just finish up next time.

I thought about it for a second and said, "No, you're too close to the end. It won't take but 5 minutes to finish." So I risked it, and made sure she got through those last 3 moves and could do it by herself.

The minute I finished, I was like, LATER!!

Do you think I went straight to the hospital?

Nope! I had to pick up Kavi from his daycare. I tossed him in the car and put the pedal to the metal! I kept saying aloud, "Hold on, Uma! Daddy and Kavi are coming! Wait for Daddy and Kavi, Uma!" I said it so many times, that Kavi started saying it, too!

Do you think it was an ease of a drive? Nope! Even if the hospital was only about 3 miles from Kavi's daycare, every single light we hit was RED! *sigh*!!

I bursted into the hospital, and found Nisha, and they were still asking her tons of questions, while she was on a gurney. So I totally made it on time, and had some to spare.

What had happened with Nisha was that her placenta abrupted. An abruption means that the placenta detached from the uterine wall. She had high blood pressure while she was pregnant towards the end, and the high blood pressure caused the abruption. So she had a LOT of bleeding.

So, this was, in every sense, an emergency C-section. The doctors and the whole medical team remarked at how surprised they were at how calm we were about this whole situation.

Our response: Been there, done that.

So Nisha and Uma had to stay in the hospital, because Nisha's blood pressure was still high. Uma was fine. But Nisha's blood pressure wouldn't go down even after delivery, so they had to put her on Magnesium. Typically, they give you Magnesium while pregnant to slow the contractions down to delay the birth (that's what they did with Kavi - see the first post of this blog).

But this time it was about getting Nisha's blood pressure down. And after they give you Magnesium, they have to monitor you for 48 hours. Her pressure went down a little, but it is still on the high side.

On Sunday, July 25th, they discharged Nisha and Uma to go home. Nisha's blood pressure is still high, but they didn't give any medication for it, because they think it will go down on its own, eventually. Time for her to start doing Tai Chi regularly!

Kavi saw Uma on the day of her birth, when she was being wheeled to the nursery. It didn't really click with him who she was.

Kavi saw Uma again on Friday, in Nisha's hospital room. We brought him to her and said, look Kavi, this is Uma, your sister. And he looked for a second, and then looked in another direction and said, "TRUCK!!"

Now that they are home, Kavi is going through the adjustment phase of having a sibling. I feel for the guy, it must be tough. But, he's a tough kid. Look at what he went through to enter this world. Uma's going to be a tough little cookie, herself. She made her own grand entrance to prove her strength as well.

Okay, enough chatter. I'll get to the pictures and videos now!

First Time at McDonalds!

Yesterday was Kavi's first time at McDonalds. I got him a Happy Meal, and a "Number 1" for myself (Big Mac, Fries, & Coke). He took the top bun off of his cheeseburger, and then proceeded to devour his french fries. I fed him his hamburger, and he ate about 3/4ths of it. Not bad. He was somewhat ambivalent about the Yoda toy he got with his Happy Meal - he was more interested in chewing the cardboard box it came in.

This McDonald's was bizarre - there was NO drinking water! I went to the water tap at the soda fountain, no water. They even had a water fountain by the bathroom - it didn't work! So I decided he could drink Sprite. He tried it and HATED it! So, I ran back to the car to get his water bottle, and all was good.

Kavi Rocking Out!

He loves the song "Figure 8" by They Might Be Giants:

Kavi's 2nd Birthday Party!