Homecoming and the months after!

My stay at the hospital was for about 5 days. On Sunday, April 4, 2004 we came back home. Hey! It just struck me that it was 04.04.04 the day we came home! So interesting! My SIL had been home with her kids waiting for us. She did tilak and pooja when we reached home.

Few minutes after we came back home, betu decided to do all the nature calls. We all laughed saying he's making everyone realise that there's a small baby home as we had all gotten busy talking to each other.

Once we came home, relatives and friends started to pour in. Not one day went for entire first week when we would not have someone home at least 2 times in a day! Things started to slow down the second week. How time flew, it was beyond me.

I could spends hours just looking at my baby. He was so cute that sometimes I would think to myself, I never expected my baby to be this cute! Hehehe...

Every time I would look at him I would be so amazed at the whole process of having a baby. And it still amazes me. How from a single cell it grows up so big inside and how the baby is delivered. It is just all so intriguing for me.

A week after we came home, his dad and his Majhli Mausi (MM) went to buy a cradle for him. Since betu would not sleep on the bed and would sleep only cuddled up in arms, we thought the swing motion of the cradle would work. And it did work great for him and for us too!
In the beginning, how hard he used to cry at maalish and at bath time. Few days later he started to enjoy the bath as long as you don't put water on his face. He never liked maalish though. Not till he was about 2 months or so.

He would hardly sleep for long during daytime in the first 10-15 days. The reasons were
- Reason 1: The family living on the floor above us had a huge dog (dunno the breed..I think he was a mix). He would be out in the balcony 24X7 and would bark 24X7.

- Reason 2: The neighbours were getting a room constructed just adjacent to our bedroom so you can imagine how much noise that created.

But after the initial 10-15 days, my poor baby almost learnt to sleep with all that noise and would frighten up or wake up with sudden noises only that these construction people were making.

On April 30, 2005 when he was a month young, we all (betu, myself, DH and MIL) went to Jaipur in Rajdhani Express. That was his first train ride! Since my in-laws stay there, the naamkaran ceremony was to be held there. His Dadu was waiting eagerly for him in Jaipur. Dadu had made the bed ready for his betu-ram and had spread up such a pretty sheet. The moment I opened his diaper, he peed right on the sheet. Hehehe...

A day or two later, DH and FIL (father-in-law) went to select a card for his naamkaran ceremony and selected a cute one. The date for the ceremony was fixed for May 15, 2004. We actually took a long time to decide his name since me and DH were anticipating a girl, we had selected a name for a girl - 'Sneha'. So we took a long time before deciding on the name 'Anirudh'. Despite the fact that ranked the first in preference in the list of names I had prepared for both girls and boys.

Till June, 2004, I didn't have a digicam. So we used to use our regular camera to click pictures. I think we clicked about 2 rolls of film. But somehow never got to scan those pictures to keep them on the PC in digital format. So in June 2004, his Badki Mausi (BM) sent a camera as a gift. Although however she justified that it was for her own selfish reasons so that she can get to see pictures of him being so far away (in US), we knew it was a gift to us.

As a small baby he used to love getting his pictures clicked. But sometimes he would get so conscious looking at the camera that he would stop doing whatever he was and just stare at the camera.

Months flew past and Betu grew into charming little baby! He was so much fun! Everyone adored him so much. And he also responded every one's love by smiling at them and laughing and giggling when they talked to him.

Thinking of his milestones that I can remember as of now are

• Betu had started to smile when he was little less than a month.
• In Jaipur he did his first flip - from back to tummy when he was approx. 40 days young. The date was around May 10/11, 2004.
• When he was about 4 months, he learnt to make this funny sound with his lips along with spraying everyone around him! :D The sound was something like "Phurrrrrrrrrrrrrr........" using his lips.
• Betu started to sit on his own by the beginning of 6th month. We had been propping him up since he was about 5 months and a week it was so much fun to see him topple over. I guess it wasn't as much fun for him as he would sometimes start crying if he would fall on his face.
• And just after 2-3 days into his 7th month, he got his first lower tooth. The next lower one and the other 2 on the top followed soon within a period of 1.5 months. But the next tooth took more than 2 months to appear.- The first word that he spoke were 'Papa'. This was when he was about 7.5 months. But by 9th month he stopped saying it. We used to wonder if he forgot it or just didn't want to say it. However we repeated the word but no, he was in no mood to say it. He would only talk the baby talk..the usual gibberish.