Kaniz & Abbas +2

As most of you probably know, I've done my share of work-related traveling over the last few years. Fortunately, as soon as Samarah was born, my work travel stopped (for a couple of reasons which I won't go into).  So the past 9 months have been great because I've been able to stay home and spend lots of time with Samarah. On the other hand, I'm running out of travel miles (no 'free' plane tickets) and losing my airline & hotel status (no airport lounge access, no room upgrades).. it's a small price to pay for what I get in return, but I think Kaniz secretly wants me to travel some more to keep the perks! Anyway, that is a long, roundabout way of telling you that I had to spend a whole week in California earlier this month without Samarah (& Kaniz). It was really tough being away from home, especially because Samarah decided to get the stomach flu midweek (soon followed by her mommy). Thank goodness for cellphones, e-mail, Skype & Blackberry Mess...

Samarah's been busy as ever.. and she keeps getting cuter and cuter (as you'll see in the pictures)! A few highlights from this set: Attending her first birthday party - her friend Justin turned 1. Samarah and Justin are going to be daycare buddies! Meeting Baby Emily - congrats Hiro & Inthida! She's gorgeous. Eating, eating and more eating.  Enjoy the pictures! And make sure to leave comments, so we know you want more pictures! ;)

Hello again faithful readers. Sorry to have kept you waiting for almost two weeks for new pictures! Samarah has had a busy few weeks with teething, crawling and standing seasons in full swing, not to mention a full social calendar. Unfortunately, I haven't been as diligent lately about bringing the camera along on our outings or taking pictures at home, so this latest set of pictures is fairly light. On another note, it turns out that between the California trip and Samarah's teething, the poor girl's schedule has become a complete mess. Before the trip, she was sleeping consistently for 10-12 hour stretches at night, which really spoiled Kaniz and I. Then, for the entire month of November, Samarah was up every 2-4 hours at night! To top things off, Samarah also got her first cold and even a bit of laryngitis. But before you start worrying, don't fret! Our little princess has recovered fully - she's over her cold, her voice sounds as sweet as ever and even her sleep...

Can you believe it's taken me three posts to get through our CA trip? So where was I...?  Yes, so after Hearst Castle, the plan was to spend the next night in Santa Barbara. After a relatively uneventful drive (except for lunch at a dumpy dive where we had a run-in with a crazy lady), we got to SB and checked into our hotel late afternoon. Santa Barbara seemed to be very much a college town, or at least that was the impression I got from walking the main shopping strip.  The next day, we continued our drive down Route 1, which had now turned into the Pacific Coast Highway (PCH). The drive here wasn't as scenic as it was earlier in the trip - either that, or you just get spoiled looking at the ocean so much. We stopped for lunch in Malibu and then continued on to Santa Monica. Our plan was to have dinner in Santa Monica with a couple of dear friends, Preeti and Siva, who've recently made the move from NYC to LA. So, naturally, we went to another Mexican restaurant.. dinner w...

Kaniz and I have done the SF to LA roadtrip a few times, but we've always taken the inland route and never tried driving all the way down the coast.. so we figured it was about time. We decided to take our time driving down to LA, with an overnight stop in Cambria (a town near Hearst Castle ) and a night in Santa Barbara. We left Fremont a little later than we were hoping, and by the time we stopped for lunch in a little town called Pacific Grove (near Monterey/Carmel), it was already 2:30pm. The drive down the coast was postcard-perfect, but unfortunately it got dark midway and driving down a very dark, very curvy, very foggy, cliff-hugging road wasn't as much fun as I'd imagined. Mental note for next time - get on the road early! Hearst Castle the next day was great - most of the pictures from this set are from our tour of the castle grounds. Having learnt our lesson from the day before, we got on the road right away (pictures to follow)... in the meantime, here are the p...

I know I've got some more pictures from our California trip left to post, but I thought I'd share some exciting news with you... Samarah decided to wait till we got back from our trip to hit a few exciting milestones.. drum roll please! Watch where you put those fingers! Samarah sprouted two teeth overnight! Where'd mommy and daddy go? Samarah's starting to develop a little bit of separation anxiety, and even though it's hard to admit, she is showing a preference for her mommy. The other day she almost jumped from my arms to Kaniz's! I can't help but feel a little sad about this, although I'm told that I'll get over this quickly. Get me a GPS! Our little girl is on the move! She's figured out how to crawl (backwards).. plus she's rolling over and even somersaulting (kind of).. all this basically means that we can no longer leave Samarah unattended on our bed (or anywhere for that matter). We managed to capture the first few crawling attemp...

Can you believe it? Kaniz and I both had our reservations about the possibility of an Obama victory, but Samarah knew it all along (even when she was just a +1 back in February!). Let's just hope that Barack is able to deliver on his message of change and hope - America (and the world) needs it. Congrats to everyone who voted!

Did we ever mention how much we enjoy visiting California? Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, so Kaniz, Samarah and I are headed back to Toronto on an early flight tomorrow morning. As expected, Samarah did really well the entire trip. She was perfect on the plane, perfect in the car on our drive down the coast and adjusted to the time difference right away. We landed at SFO last Saturday and after a 90-minute wait at the car rental place, we headed down to Fremont, where my cousin Ambreen had graciously offered up her place for us to stay. The next day, we went over to San Jose to visit my friend John Nack, his wife Margot and their adorable son Finn (who's two weeks older than Samarah). Even though we've been keeping up to date with Finn's antics through his blog , it was so much fun to meet him in person. John & Margot have a fabulous home (which Kaniz is still talking about), fully appointed with every toy Samarah would want, and to top it off, Marg...

Kaniz, Samarah and I are in Irvine, CA for Halloween, visiting Sarah & Kabir. We just came back from Samarah's first 'Trick or Treat' outing, which was a great success. We had brought along a cow costume for Samarah but it ended up too hot outside, so we opted to dress her up in her swimsuit (yes, a swimsuit on Halloween - life's tough in Orange County).  The pictures from tonight aren't quite ready yet, but I'm posting some from the last couple of weeks (before we left on our vacation). Some highlights: We hosted a baby shower for our dear friends Inthida & Hiro (and Baby Sasaki).. and we got to meet Baby Jayden! Our annual Thanksgiving dinner at Atul & Sonal's place. Unfortunately, Rahul had to be in India for work, so we had to make do without him (the evening wasn't quite the same). Thanksgiving dinner #2 at Kaniz's mom & dad's place. Yummy Thanksgiving samosas! Now that fall is in full swing (and then some), we went out on a ...

This isn't really a strictly baby-related post, but Samarah, Kaniz and I went to the Chinese Lantern Festival a couple of weekends ago (thanks for the invite Javed & Nishat!).. the installations were very impressive, and to top it off, we had perfect weather. All in all, a fantastic evening.. enjoy the pictures!

I'm pretty much out of excuses for not keeping up with pictures, so I won't even try. Here are some of the latest pictures chronicling the adventures of Samarah (and mommy & daddy). Enjoy! Pictures from Days 184-202

Hi everyone - just wanted to wish friends and family a belated Eid Mubarik. Kaniz, Samarah and I were fortunate enough to celebrate this Eid-ul-Fitr (which marks the end of the fasting month of Ramadhan) with family and friends.  I have some photos and videos that I was hoping to post, but haven't had a chance to download them from the cameras, so instead, here are a couple of videos from September for your viewing enjoyment. The first one is a couple of weeks old - Samarah is a real pro at sitting now. The second one is of Samarah hanging out in Brampton with her cousin Sakina. The lighting wasn't great in the room, hence the terrible picture quality:

Can you believe it? Our little girl is growing up, and before we know it, she's going to be crawling, walking, running, asking to take the car out, moving away for school, getting married, etc. etc. Ok, so maybe I'm getting a little ahead of myself, but I just can't help myself! So lots of activity in the last few weeks - some highlights: We started solids! We ended up starting Samarah on solids a little earlier than six months, and she's already gotten through rice and barley and now on to butternut squash! As with everything else, Samarah is doing great! We took a couple of trips downtown - once for a walk around Yorkville and another time to see LeBron James (and also for some stargazing). Our friend Ateka (who's been super generous with giving us lots of clothes for Samarah) asked me to do a little photo shoot for her three kids.. so Samarah, Kaniz and I met them in Unionville and had a great afternoon. Samarah took her first trip to the zoo with Rayn, Diya and ...

Samarah is getting more and more fun everyday! It seems like she's learning to do something new every day. She's almost mastered the skill of sitting on her own (although she still hasn't figured out how to roll over just yet). This video is almost 4 minutes long, and for the first half, Samarah struggles to push herself away from the couch and then finally sits on her own. We're so proud of her!!

Just when I thought I was going to catch up with the pictures, I got lazy and missed a couple of weeks! I think maybe I need to streamline my workflow - as it is, the whole process goes a little something like this: I take (hundreds of) pictures, download them to my computer, select the ones worth keeping (and ones worth posting), add the oh-so-witty captions, publish the photos to the web and then write the actual post. The whole thing ends up taking longer than you'd think, which may explain why I'm posting so irregularly these days. Anyone have any brilliant ideas for me? Anyway, the last month has been quite busy, as you'll see from the pictures. Kaniz, Samarah and I had lots of fun going to different festivals across the city, entertaining friends and family, and we even made it out to the beach! Enjoy the pictures! More videos are on their way (.. and for those of you keeping count, the next post will be our 100th!) Pictures from Days 147-158

Here's another video that I had posted on YouTube a while back and never got around to adding to the blog. This is Samarah's 4-month visit to the doctor to get her shots on July 24:

I've been meaning to put some of these videos up for some time, but you know how it goes.. if it's not one distraction, it's another. Anyway, enjoy the videos! 1. [August 4] Here is Samarah meeting Adnaan. As you can see, Adnaan was quite smitten with Samarah (she has that effect on boys!).. 2. [August 2] Here is Samarah going to town on her fingers. For the last month or so, as she starts teething, her fingers are spending more and more time in her mouth: 3. [August 26] Samarah has definitely become aware of the video camera. As soon as she sees the red record light come on, she quiets down. I think I'm going to have to put some tape on the camera to block out the light, just so I can get some footage of her babbling away. The clip below shows her current favourite past-time: 4. [August 27] Another milestone - Samarah sitting up (almost) by herself. She's definitely better at it in the morning after a full night's rest, but even still, she does pretty well for ...

Samarah turns five months today - so Happy Birthday sweetie! It's hard to believe that it's only been five months since our little +1's been in our lives, and at the same time, it's hard to believe that five months have already gone by! Samarah has really grown into a healthy, happy, beautiful baby. Although Kaniz and I often forget how little she was at birth, we were recently reminded when Safiya brought over her baby doll wearing one of Samarah's preemie outfits! There's a picture of the doll in Samarah's car seat, and it's hard to believe that our little baby was so, well, little! As usual, Samarah has been quite active - going to parties, going swimming, going shopping, going to the library.. sometimes I feel that my infant daughter gets out more than I do (sadly enough, this might actually be true). I really have to hand it to Kaniz for putting in so much effort to keep Samarah stimulated (despite only getting a few hours a night of restful sleep)....

Although I've taken a lot of pictures of Samarah, we don't have many pictures of the three of us.. So with the goal of getting at least one good 'family photo,' Kaniz, Samarah and I headed down to Edwards Gardens in North York with my trusty Nikon D80 and a borrowed tripod courtesy of my brother Hussain. It seems that I'm falling further and further behind on the pictures - this particular set was taken on August 3rd, so I guess that means about 15 days behind. Overall, I think the pictures turned out well , especially the ones with Kaniz and Samarah. As always, enjoy the pictures ... and feel free to comment!!

You bet! I think my favourite part of the day these days is when Samarah and I share a few minutes of non-stop laughter.. it's priceless!

Samarah's 4 and a half months now...when I look at the pictures of her when she was first born I can't believe that she was that small...and that she's grown so fast. It's cliche but it's so true. Anyhow, we've been busy!! We started going to the Ontario Early Years Centres for babytime. It's great. Samarah is one of youngest babies but she's starting to get into it more now. She can hold on to toys or books, she is a pro at tummy time and she loves to laugh and giggle at the older babies. We're still going to the library twice a week as well and we made it to Masala Mehndi Masti at the CNE last weekend. I find that keeping busy with her, especially while the weather is nice out, keeps both of us happy and entertained. Enjoy the pics! Samarah Days 122-133

Before I even start with today's post, let me just acknowledge the fact that it's been a while since I posted.. and I really should do a better job with keeping this thing up-to-date. Also, I should have done this a while ago, but I added a little form to the sidebar where you can subscribe to this blog.. so rather than checking in occasionally (or several times a day as some of you claim to do), you'll get notified by e-mail when there is a new post. So subscribe away!! Ok - back to the real post. When Samarah was still a '+1', I decided that I wanted to invest in a digital camera rather than a video camera.. although once she was born, I felt like I couldn't adequately capture the entire experience of having her in our lives with still photographs. I started doing some research on HD cameras, and even tried out a couple, but found the process of editing or sharing the videos to be more time consuming than I would have liked. So no video camera for me (and Sama...

Ok, so you probably thought that Samarah didn't survive the ear piercing as we haven't posted in so long, but she did! Her ears are healing very nicely and she already got her first new pair of earrings. We can't put them in for another 5 weeks though. 2 weeks ago, we took Samarah downtown for a fun filled day in the sun. It's so hard to keep her shaded though (and no sunscreen for another 2 months). We met Lauranna at Saving Grace for a delicious breakfast (my new favorite spot) and then we walked around Trinity Bellwoods. We then headed down to the Harbourfront Centre with Pratiksha and Rahul for Samarah's first summer festival, Beats, Breaks and Culture. Half way through the break dancing competition, her and I left Daddy and went to browse through the clothing and jewelry stalls - man that girl loves to shop! The next weekend Maria came to visit us from NY and we went to Livia's baby shower. Abbas and I volunteered to help make the favours so we decided...

Last Friday, as we're heading to my parents' place, Kaniz announces that after the visit, we were going to a mall and getting Samarah's ears pierced.. although I wasn't sure about getting this done so soon, Kaniz persuaded me that now was the best time, before Samarah is really even aware of her ears.. so off we went to Claire's at Yorkdale Mall to get the ordeal over with. As usual, Kaniz was well prepared - she brought a numbing cream for Samarah's ears as well as some baby Tylenol. The plan was to give her some Tylenol a half hour before and numb her earlobes to ease the (eventual) pain. So far, so good. Except, as soon as we got in the store, Samarah must have felt something was up and started fussing and crying, which is quite unusual for her. We first tried to have Kaniz hold Samarah while her ears were being pierced, but Samarah kept moving too much, so I had to do it. Having to restrain my wailing baby while willingly letting someone hurt her was quite d...

The days are flying by.. so much so that we almost missed Samarah turning 100 days old! She passed that milestone on June 30th, and we didn't realize it until the day was nearly over.. so alas, no picture of our little cutie on her big day.  In our defense, we've been pretty active and Samarah has been learning new tricks almost every day, such as: Giggling fits! If you get her in the right mood, she can't stop laughing.. it really is the sweetest thing, and hearing her laughter cracks us up, which in turn makes Samarah laugh even more. Sitting up.. well, not quite on her own, but she can sit quite comfortably in her Bumbo chair (thanks Safiyya). Surfing on her tummy time board. We've been doing tummy time with her for a while now, but she hasn't had a lot of staying power until recently. As you'll see in the photos, she's gotten quite comfortable on her tummy. Soothing herself with her hands. She's been doing this for a while, but it's been very con...

Our first family roadtrip continued from Ottawa to Quebec City - a distance of about 450km (~300 miles). We decided to take the back-roads rather than the main highway, and while it took us a little longer to get to our destination, the drive was quite scenic (and fun!). As usual, Samarah was perfect! We stayed at the Chateau Frontenac for our first night in QC - I had earned a free night through the Fairmont loyalty program. While the historic hotel's decor and ambience isn't our style, it's hard to argue with free. Even our dinner was on the house, but the most memorable moment of the evening was probably when Samarah had a major diaper leak and we had to hose her off in the bathroom sink. For the next two nights, we checked into Hotel 71, another boutique hotel, located in QC's Old Port neighbourhood. We had a really nice room with modern, minimalist decor, 14' ceilings and a rain shower. Some other highlights of our stay in QC: Samarah rolling from her tummy to ...

One of my good friends from university tied the knot on Saturday, June 21st (congrats Namgyal & Jeff!) in Batawa, an interesting little town north of Trenton, about 2 hours from Toronto, so Kaniz, Samarah and I decided to turn our trip east into a week-long roadtrip. Packing for the trip was quite interesting. Since the stroller takes up most of the trunk space, we had to bring along a lot of small bags rather than 1 or 2 suitcases. In the end, we probably overpacked, but better than running out of diapers in the middle of the night, I suppose. After attending the reception, we drove straight to Ottawa and got to our hotel (Arc) around 12:30am. Samarah did very well in the first leg of our trip and our first night in the hotel which was encouraging for Kaniz and I. The Arc Hotel is a little boutique hotel in downtown Ottawa, and while it isn't necessarily baby-friendly (e.g. had to carry the stroller up several stairs to the lobby, the staff were very helpful and our rooms were...

Me, Mommy that is. Abbas has been working hard at keeping the blog up to date (even though we're behind) and I haven't posted in months! Months...I can't believe 3 have passed since Samarah's birth. It's just crazy how quickly time flies. I'm already thinking about the fact that I have to go back to work - and dreading it! Anyhow, let me fill you in on what I've /we've been up to. I discovered that the community centre across the street from our house has caregiver/baby classes as well as fitness classes. It's so convenient and it makes it alot easier to get motivated to exercise. Baby weight still present...we're working on it! So I've taken a muscle conditioning and pilates class. In a few weeks I start aerobics and yoga. Samarah has been busy too. We go to baby time at the North York Centre library which is really fun, even though she sometimes sleeps through the session. We're also taking a class put on by the public health nurses cal...

I guess it was bound to happen - my blog posts have started to slip. I was hoping to have an update posted every weekend, and I definitely missed my deadline this week! I've said this before, but I'll say it again - the days are flying by, and it's bathtime and bedtime for Samarah before I know it! Anyway, here are the pictures from days 65 - 78 (this brings us up to June 7) - I will try to write up some highlights later, but I better post the pictures before friends/family turn on me! Enjoy!

Now that Samarah has gotten her first set of shots, she is out and about town, hitting up all the hot parties!  Ok, so that may not be exactly true, but she did go to her first formal party (an engagement at Angus Glen golf club). Kaniz and I are getting a lot more comfortable taking Samarah out, whether it's for a stroller or sling ride in our neighbourhood or a dinner party downtown. So far she's handled all of it exceptionally well. I might be a little biased, but I think Kaniz and I have an angel for a daughter! Some highlights from the week (days 58-64): Meeting the Chagpars Dressing up as the third bear (see photo above) Getting more and more tummy time - she's almost ready to do the Superman flying pose Visiting with Noa and meeting Rayan Going to our pre-natal class reunion at our instructor's (Jaye's) house. Although a bunch of people ended up canceling, it was fun hanging out with Aaron and his parents. Meeting Aunty Shamshad and family from NY Attending a...

It looks like I'm a week or so behind in the pictures.. and even though Kaniz is the one that is supposed to be suffering from less than optimum memory, I can't seem to recall all the things we did during days 51-57.. good thing we've got lots of pictures as reminders! One notable thing during this time was our family trip to College St. (our old neighbourhood) for some dinner. Samarah, as expected, handled the outing exceptionally well. Aside from a feeding, she slept through most of it. Having seen plenty of toddlers have meltdowns at restaurants, I think Kaniz and I need to take advantage of this low-maintenance time as much as possible. Aside from that, we went out a bunch of times to visit with friends and family.. and we had a few guests drop by. Thanks to everyone for coming by, and bringing such wonderful gifts. Aside from diapers, we haven't really had to buy anything for Samarah! Here are the pictures - enjoy!

As usual, the last week just flew by. As I write this (12:11am), Samarah will be turning exactly 8 weeks old in 5 hours (adjusting for daylight savings). I know I'm beginning to sound like a broken record, but I can't believe that time is flying by so fast! It may sound a little silly, but I really miss Samarah as a tiny 4.5 lb baby whose crying sounded just like the squeak of a mouse or a tea kettle about to start boiling. Despite the 'nostalgia', it is incredibly rewarding and humbling to see her get bigger and learn new things every day. This week's installment of photos are, in my opinion, pretty interesting.. we've got a few nice shots of Samarah's bathtime routine, which generally consists of bathing in a plastic bowl in the bathroom sink followed by a gentle massage with some lotion.. and since her head was shaved, we've also been putting some baby oil gel on her head. For Mother's Day, I have to admit that I wasn't able to think of anythi...

As I mentioned in the previous post, we shaved Samarah's head last weekend, in observance of Islamic custom.. Although Samarah looks super cute with her Kojak/Sinead O'Conner look, I still miss the hair a little. It'll grow back soon enough (it's already started!)... Enjoy the pictures!

Another busy week for Kaniz & Abbas + Samarah. A few highlights: We bought a crib mobile! I'm not sure why it took us this long, but we finally got our act together.. Samarah isn't sleeping in her crib full-time yet, but she takes her naps there and she really seems to like the mobile. Our friends Jamie & Kim came over with their son Sebastian for a weeknight dinner.. in the midst of all the excitement before Samarah's arrival, I forgot to write about how Kim totally helped us out by installing our car seat for us (so, belated thanks Kim!). It was fun to see Sebastian try to cover his head with rice.. can't wait till Samarah starts playing with her food! (or starts eating food, for that matter). Janelle, Scott & Karen visited us on Saturday. Karen really like Samarah (almost as much as she liked ghantia - a salty, deep fried snack made from chickpea flour). Saturday evening, we got together with Kaniz's parents and my brother Hussain, my sister-in-law Ba...

Samarah turns 6 weeks today.. so I thought I'd share a list of six things we (or I) couldn't live without as new parents: My Brest Friend nursing pillow - we looked at the Boppy and Jolly Jumper nursing pillows but opted against them. The Brest Friend pillow wraps around the body, ties securely, provides back support, and is made of much firmer material. Definitely makes feedings a lot easier. GR8X receiving blankets - I've mentioned these already, but I like them so much, they deserve a second mention. The problem with most receiving blankets is that they're a little too small for a proper swaddle. GR8X blankets are larger, they're soft and they're stretchy - and most importantly, they let you give your baby a tight swaddle.  Sleep positioner - I'm not sure what brand we have (it's a hand-me-down) but the thing is fantastic.. not only does it ensure that Samarah is sleeping on her back while in her bassinet, we've also used it to let visitors (wh...

Where does the time go? When Samarah first arrived, I figured I'd have plenty of time to keep the blog up to date, but between working full-time, running errands and hanging out with Samarah, the days just fly by! I've still managed to take pictures of our little treasure every day, and hopefully I'll be able to do a fun 'year in review' DVD for her first birthday! In any case, here are the latest pictures that I've managed to process.. this brings us up to April 26, so I'm not doing too bad, right?

As promised, here are some pictures from Samarah's second photo shoot. I took most of the pictures by myself, so there aren't very many 'dynamic' shots in here, but the next shoot (scheduled for tomorrow) should have a little more variety. Stay tuned. In the meantime, here are the pictures !

My dear friend Vicky, who I know from my first job in California, now lives in Montreal and has her own greeting card company. All of her cards are hand made and reflect her beauty and creativity. She sent us this card, which you can't appreciate in the pictures but it's the most beautiful card I've ever received. I'm certain Samarah will just love it as well when she's old enough to sift through the many lovely cards friends and family have given us to celebrate her arrival. Thanks Vicky (and Michel)!!

Today is not only Earth Day, but it's Samarah's 1 month birthday! It's hard to believe an entire month has gone by since she came into our lives. She's doing great (as you can see in the tons of pictures her daddy is posting). We had a pediatrician appt yesterday and Dr. Freedman said she was doing great. In fact, he gave her an A+! She's 6lbs, 6ozs now so she's gained 30% of her birth weight. She's much more alert these days as well and has been following objects with her eyes. Another fun development game we've done with her is scents. Abbas let her smell cinnamon which she liked and citrus which she was indifferent to. Tummy time pics to come!

I know I know - I've been a little neglectful of updating the blog over the past week. But I'll make it up to all of you in the next few days (I promise!). I'll post about the highlights from the past week a little later, but here are a few photos to keep you entertained till then: Samarah's first official 'photo shoot' at home Days 22-26

If you make it through the 3 minutes and 50 seconds clip of me and Samarah hanging out in our room last week, you are officially part of the "Samarah Fatima Fan Club"!

Phew - it's been a busy few days, although to be honest, Kaniz, Samarah & I haven't been doing very much outside of our usual routine. The days just seem to fly by anyway. It's hard to believe that Samarah is already 3 weeks old (tomorrow is her actual due date)! Some highlights: Last week was my first full week back at work, and as most of you know, I work from home. It's definitely been a challenge to stay focused on work during the day, instead of running downstairs and hanging out with Samarah all the time. I feel really lucky though because I can spend time with her (& Kaniz!) during my breaks and over lunch.. and I'm home as soon as I stop working!  Samarah went to the mosque for the first time on Friday. Samarah also met her newest friend, Mahdi (who's super cute and looks just like his mom) Hussain (my older brother), Bano (my sister-in-law), Sakeena (their 2 year old daughter) and Zain (my youngest brother) visited on Thursday evening. Bano was ...

Here's a video of Samarah meeting her older sister (our niece) Safiya. It's about a week old, but it took me that long to figure out how to do anything with the HD video that Sony camcorders create (this is a separate rant altogether, so I'll spare everyone).

At our last clinic appointment, we got the official confirmation that Samarah is over 5 pounds! She weighed in at 2430 grams, which is roughly 5 lbs, 6 oz. So based on the weigh-in, Samarah is gaining 39 grams per day, which is much better than expected, so she should be catching up to other babies her age pretty quickly. More importantly, she'll finally be able to fit into all her newborn clothes. Other than that, not much new to report. The stream of visitors has been steady over the last few days, and I've stayed busy with the camera. We tried to do a 'professional' photo shoot yesterday for the official 'thank you' announcement, but ran into a few 'amateur' issues. Hopefully, we'll get it all sorted out this week. In the meantime, here are the latest round of pictures . I feel as though I'm posting an inordinate number of pictures of Samarah just lying there on her blanket, but I just can't help myself! She is so cute!! :)

Samarah's officially 2 weeks old! The time has just flown by and I'm already feeling like the year will be over before I know it. I just have to keep reminding myself to enjoy every second with her. Motherhood really does rock, just like our friend Iris said. Being able to comfort Samarah and having her look up at me with her big brown eyes brings happiness to me that I've never known. Anyhow, we have settled into things very well. We feel relaxed, well rested (relatively) and most of all, well fed! Thanks to everyone who has been feeding us!! We really appreciate the help and it certainly has given us time to feel comfortable at home quickly. Oh update on the bp - I saw my doctor last Thursday and my bp woes seem to be over (fingers crossed). I'm back down to normal numbers and so I'm off the meds. They had said the high bp could last for up to 4-6 weeks after delivery so I'm very thankful that 2 weeks later and everything seems to be fine. I still n...

Well, another few days have gone by, and Samarah has been doing great! Although we don't have the official word, I'm sure that she's over the 5 lb mark.. and she keeps wanting to feed more and more, so she'll be catching up to all the other babies pretty soon! A few random highlights since the last post: Our friends Muslim & Minaz had a baby boy, Mahdi, on Thursday evening, so a big congratulations to them both! The nursery is complete! The crib got assembled and we put up the Dottilicious dots. Pictures coming soon. We had more visitors! Nishat and Baby Rayn visited on Wednesday with Ateqah and her kids, Dia and Sabria. My mom and sister-in-law came to visit with my niece, Sakeena, on Thursday. And yesterday Samarah got to meet Lauranna and Pratiksha & Rahul (also known as Prahul) I started back at work on Wednesday. More on this later. So here are the latest photos from the last 4 days. Should have some more by Sunday evening, along with a video or two!

Not sure how well this is going to work, but here goes nothing! A quick 'test' video of Samarah and I hanging out with our friend Danny the Duck.

10 days, that is! Even still, time seems to be flying by! I think that she's going to grow up before we even know it.. so Kaniz and I are trying to enjoy every moment that we have with Samarah. So I'm happy to report that everything is well on our end. Samarah is feeding regularly and putting on those ounces - at her last weigh-in at her pediatrician on Tuesday, she almost broke the 5 lb mark! After the doctor's appointment, Samarah cruised around town a bit more, and managed to get a feed and a change in the car! Since it's day 10, I thought I'd share ten things that I've learned as a new dad: Swaddling a baby is a science, not an art. By the way, GR8X makes great receiving blankets! When changing diapers, it's always a good idea to have more than one clean diaper at hand. You can never take enough pictures of your baby, even if most of them are out of focus! Breast pumps are totally weird (but thank God for them). Newborns have it right: eat, sleep, poop...

At 5:11am ET, Samarah Fatima Rizvi turned one week old, and it has been, without exaggeration, the most blessed week of my life. It's unbelievable how much hope, joy and contentment this little girl has brought to us.. Having a child of my own, and feeling an absolute, unconditional love towards her, it's incredible for me to think that my own parents felt (and still feel, I hope!) that way about me. The whole experience has given me a much better understanding of my parents and helps me understand how they were able to make all the sacrifices for me and my siblings. Anyway, enough emotional stuff - you're here to see pictures, not listen to me go on.. so here you go - the latest pictures from Samarah's Day 7 .

Phew! Someone should have mentioned how much work a newborn is! We're managing fine - it really helps to have family nearby to help out with meals and Mom has been great keeping things in order around the house while Abbas and I experiment with feeding cycles and diaper changes...yes, there have been some very interesting events on the changing pad which I will spare you from. I just wanted to say a quick hello and THANK YOU to all my friends and family who have written such lovely notes/emails to Abbas and I. I apologize for not being able to respond individually, I hope you understand that time is precious to us right now - and I'm really just not sleeping as much as I should be. We do however, appreciate your kind words from the bottom of our hearts...again, Samarah is such a lucky girl to have you all in her life. I'm trying to take better care of myself as the hypertension issue is still around and will be for a few more weeks until my body readjusts. You know me ...

We had our first outing yesterday, and it went really smoothly. Kaniz had a couple of follow-up appointments in the morning at Women's College and then we had Samarah's first doctor's appointment in the afternoon. Samarah's pediatrician's office is right next to her grandparents' condo, and Kaniz's mom was nice enough to make us lunch. Everything checked out at the pediatrician's office - after losing a couple of ounces of weight after birth, Samarah is on the upswing and should start gaining weight this week, which is pretty exciting. All in all, we left the house at 9am and got back around 4pm, but the day definitely felt much longer! In the evening, Khalil, Rifat & Safiya brought over dinner and then it was time for Samarah's first bath at home. Judging from her reaction, I'm guessing that newborns aren't big bath fans.. but it helped her sleep much better overnight, which meant (believe it or not) that Kaniz and I got plenty of rest. ...

As promised, here are Samarah's latest photos .. there were taken over Day 3 and 4, while we were still at the hospital. Even though we didn't do very much today, the time flew by so quickly... I didn't even have a chance to take a single photo! Despite two to three hours of sleep last night, I had an incredible morning! I got to finger feed Samarah for her 9am feed, held her in my arms through breakfast and then took a little snooze on the couch with Samarah lying on my chest, soaking in the sun. As uneventful as it sounds, it was one of the most satisfying experiences of my life. Taking care of a baby is definitely full-time work, and then some. It's difficult for me to imagine how parents with multiples manage.. a day or two before Samarah's arrival, we watched a couple of episodes of Jon & Kate + 8 , a reality show about a couple who have a set of 6-year old twins and a set of two-year old sextuplets! Talk about work! (And before you ask, the title of our ba...

Just a quick note to let everyone know that Baby Samarah came home yesterday afternoon! Samarah was discharged from the NICU on Monday evening since her blood glucose level and temperature were holding steady. The three of us got to spend our first night together in our hospital room on Monday night. She did really well overnight and by mid-morning, the staff gave us the green light to go home. Before we were officially discharged, we had to go see a lactation consultant at the breastfeeding clinic and also get Samarah a bath. Our lactation consultant, Anita, was really helpful and showed us a few tricks to get Samarah the food she needs. Because Samarah was slightly pre-term and so tiny, she doesn't yet have the required strength to maintain a steady latch, so we were shown the 'finger feeding' method. Essentially, you take a thin feeding tube attached to a syringe full of milk (breast or formula) and then tape it to your finger. You let the baby suck on your finger and yo...

First, thank you to everyone who sent along their well wishes. It means a lot to Kaniz and I to have so much love and support all around us, and we know that Samarah will thrive surrounded by family and friends who cherish her as we do. Day 2 for Samarah was quite eventful! Since Kaniz was feeling much better and had no symptoms of a cough or cold, she got cleared by the hospital staff yesterday afternoon to go visit Samarah in the NICU. So since 2pm yesterday, we've been making frequent trips to go visit our beautiful little daughter. I managed to do a couple of diaper changes, which proved to be a lot more difficult with a live, kicking baby than the baby doll I practiced on in our prenatal class. Kaniz got a chance to try to feed the baby and after a few visits, both mom & baby are learning what to do and getting to know each other more. The entire experience has truly been a treasure. Samarah also got a lot of visitors. On Day 1, Khalil mamoo, Rifat mami & Safiya baji d...

Wow - what a day! Kaniz and I are still in a state of disbelief that we have a beautiful little baby daughter. After the delivery, which went really well, Kaniz and I got to spend some time together with Samarah, who (and this may be biased) is absolutely adorable. Even though she had a low birth weight (4 lbs, 9 oz), she got to stay with us for a few hours because her body temperature was good and her blood sugar levels were decent. Unfortunately, her blood sugar level dropped a little late morning when we moved into our recovery room on the 4th floor, so Samarah had to be admitted into the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) nursery for 24-hour monitoring. Thankfully, it's not as serious as it sounds - the hospital staff are being extra cautious, given the recent issues that Kaniz had with hypertension.. The care here at Women's College has been fantastic, and we both know that Samarah is being well looked after in the NICU. The only disappointing thing is that due to Kaniz...