A Father’s Diary

When I posted the pictures from tabi’s 1st birthday party here, I had mentioned that we planned to do another grand party later. So we did and it was quite a party for a one year old.

Tabi’s mom had planned this party for months, including how to decorate the apartment, how the cake would look like, and what to include in the goodiebags.

The theme of the party was hugs & stitches which both of us liked a lot. We had bought all the themed items many weeks before the party. The cake was also based on this theme and after talking to a bunch of cake makers we placed our order at one of the shops with our fingers crossed. He did a pretty good job.

Here is the picture of the cake along with other goodies.

Oh and we also decorated the apartment quite a bit. Here are some pictures of how our little place looked like on the day of the birthday.

The area around the TV

The dining table

This is the table with birthday caps and goodie bags

The wall banner and balloons

The front door of our apartment

And here is the birthday girl. She looked very happy without a doubt.

After the party it was time to open all the gifts.

Tabi sitting in front of the wrapped gifts wondering what’s inside.

And here she is with all the opened gifts.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures as much as we enjoyed organizing the party.

Welcome to the new and existing readers of A Father’s Diary.

After experimenting with this blog for over an year, I am glad to announce the official release of my parenting blog.

Your comments on how I can make this blog better, and what would you like to read here would be highly appreciated.

Please take a moment to subscribe to this blog through email or RSS. You can also follow me on twitter here. I never tweeted about my adventures as a father, but I plan to do so from now on.

I predicted in my last post that tabi would start walking soon. I was right. Just a couple of days ago she let go of the furniture and took her first steps.

It was like magic. Just one day before she couldn’t dare to leave her support and next day she managed to walk away in the middle of the hall. To make it more philosophical, it seemed like a small boat mainly used to sail along the shore just ventured out into deep oceans.

What can I say, it’s one small step for our child, but a giant leap for us parents!

Now we’ll have to chase her all around the place.

Tabi just turned 13-months and here is the progress.

1. She is on the verge of taking her first steps. She can walk confidently holding on to furniture and walls but still unable to do it independently. I guess in few days she will be walking around the home without any support.

2. She doesn’t say any words clearly but occasionally tries to repeat what she hears and often talks in bablish which sounds very cute to us.

3. She has attitude. She clearly expresses herself when she is angry, dislikes something, feels like hugging you, or wants to play with you. You can’t really predict what is she going to do next.

4. She has a hard time sleeping at night. Most nights we fall asleep before her. She keeps playing on the bed hopping around from one edge to other over our sleeping bodies. And then randomly falls asleep.

Dear Sweetheart,

It’s your birthday, your special day. And I want to take this opportunity to wish you a very happy birthday.

I remember the time when we used to celebrate your birthday before Tabi was born. It used to be just you and I, a romantic dinner, and carefree night.

Things are different now. Much different.

Gone are the days when we could spends hours in each others’ arms, driving and wandering around town, singing our favorite songs, and not worrying about anything else.

Now Tabi is part of everything we do. We have to make her sleep before we sleep at night, keep it quite when she is asleep, make sure she is well fed, dressed up, and clean before we go for an outing, try to rectify the reason she is crying.

Today your life and my life revolves around our child. I am sure it’s more cumbersome for you as she is with you 24×7 and I am there only for few hours a day. But the fact remains that we don’t get any time to sit and talk with peace, share some precious moments, enjoy life.

But that doesn’t mean the importance of your day, your birthday, has decreased any bit. It still matters the most. Even if we don’t celebrate it the same way, even if I don’t get a chance to give you a greeting card, even if you spend the entire night and day of your birthday attending to tabi’s needs, it’s still your birthday.

So let me revive and renew my feelings by saying that I will always love you and you will always be in my heart. No matter how cold and boring our world may become, the warmth of our love will always ignite our lives.

And some day, when there will be no more distractions, we will be together again like we used to be.

I wish you a very happy and joyous birthday, my lovely wife.

With all my love,

A father

Tabi turned one on August 26. We invited some friends over for a small birthday party. Since we have lots of friends and a small apartment, we decided to celebrate the birthday multiple times so that everyone can attend. So on August 26 we invited very close friends. We will do another party in few weeks. Here are the pictures from the birthday party.

This is the cake that my wife baked. It tasted really yummy.

And here is the birthday girl. She loves being around people so she was very happy, even though she had no idea why there were so many people around her.

Here is another pose. She learned to stand up holding on to furniture and stuff ever since she was 9-months old. So she tries to stand whenever and wherever she can. Oh, and the reason she is not wearing any shoes is because they don’t last on her feet more than a few minutes. She is like allergic to shoes. She takes off her shoes and throws them away as soon as we put them on her.

Until now we had a traditional four-wheel stroller that we bought before tabi was born. It was fine for a few months but as she started sitting up the stroller proved to be less attractive and desirable to be used and enjoyed by the little infant girl. As a result we ended up pushing an empty stroller while one of us carried the baby. This was obviously not a fun thing to do as it negated the purpose of having a push cart for the baby.

In the mean time we noticed the strollers by Quinny and were fascinated by the way children enjoyed “riding” it. So we decided to give it a try, hoping our daughter would like the look and feel of the three wheeled stroller and maybe spare us from carrying her everywhere.

But there was one problem. The Quinny was expensive. Way too expensive. So buying a new Quinny was not a possibility. So we started looking for used ones and luckily found one in a good condition and at a great price. We purchased it immediately.

The effect of Quinny on our baby was magical. She “adapted” it with no trouble it all. It was just amazing when we first sat her on the newly purchased stroller and she didn’t complain at all. We couldn’t believe it was happening.

From then on our experience of going out has been totally different. Even when she falls asleep while we are out it is very easy to make her lay down on the quinny and she can continue sleeping peacefully. This was impossible to do in her old stroller and she would always wake up as soon as she was put inside it.

We believe our daughter has an appreciation for expensive and stylish things. It’s going to be fun raising her up.