..SouthAsiaRocks..

There are a lot of traditions here in this country... Yesterday our friend Germeet came over to see Aashini. When he got there, we showed him right in to see her. He said, "no, I can't see her yet, you must sit me down and offer me water first"... we offered him water but he didn't want any... he said that he had to sit down first before seeing the baby and that we needed to do that with anyone that came into our house... we always offer people water when they come into our house, but this time he was acting a little strange about it... He goes on to explain that while walking on the road that people come in contact with ghosts, so when they come into our house we must let them sit down first... it was a little confusing trying to understand what he was saying, but something to do with sitting down so that the ghosts can come off the person or something and stay away from the baby... Traditions can be interesting... :) So then Germeet came in to see Aashini (after...

HaPpY ThAnKsgiViNg everyone !!! Today was Aashini's first Thanksgiving... we weren't expecting to have a baby this Thanksgiving - we weren't even expecting to have a baby at Christmas :) haha! Here we are traveling to meet up with our friends for Turkey day :) After we ate (you can see the aftermath in the first picture)... we went to the park nearby. Aashini continued sleeping :) What's Thanksgiving without a little football!! Whoo hoo!!! This picture of Adam cracks me up! haha!

Today we had a fun / interesting cultural experience :) Here in our country, there are these people called Hijras हिजड़ा .... or Eunuchs. Most of these people are true eunuchs - they were born without male or female parts. They all live together in their own ghetto. If you have a child that is a Hijra, then they will come and demand you for your child and people here will give them their child. They all live together and in order to get money, they mostly do a glorified sort of begging. They are always dressed to the hilt. They come and visit you when you've had something big happen in your life - usually weddings and.... NEW BABIES. They come and dance and make a HUGE ruckus. They ususally do this until they are given a large amount of money. Some of them can be quite crazy and violent, but mostly they will just annoy you to death, barge into your home (or wedding) and dance and sing around until you give them money (usually around $100-200 is their demand). Everyone...

Both Aashini and I were released from the hospital yesterday!!!!! I was in the hospital for 12 days!! A lot of great things happened yesterday!! My OBGYN was looking at my cardiology reports and thought that my cardiologist needed to re-review my charts. He re- reviewed all the findings and decided that I didn't have Post- Pardum Cardio Myopathy !!! He said it was all related to the pre - ecclampsia and the pulmonary edema and just looked like Cardio Myopathy at the time. That's HUGE!!!! If I had Cardio Myopathy then I wouldn't be able to have kids again, so it is definitely good news!! Here's Aashini lounging at home :)

We got to hold her for the first time today and we took our first family picture together :) Aashini Miley Born: November 7, 2007 at 5:09pm Weight: 5.43lbs Length: We have no idea ;) Aashini Pronounced: “Asha-knee” Aashini is a hindi name that means Lightning :) When we were picking out baby names, we started looking for name meanings that had something to do with Light. We love the Matthew 5.13-16 passage about being a Light for the World and wanted her name to reflect that. We saw the name Aashini and knew we just had to use it – Light with zap! We also both love the 1 Kings 18 story of Elijah and Mt. Carmel. At the end of the story fire comes down from the sky (like lightning) and shows that he’s the one true G0d! Miley Miley (my-lee) means smiley or one who smiles :) We wanted a middle name that started with an “M” so that her initials would be AMS. Those were Adam’s brother’s initials and we thought it would be a cool way to remember him with a smile :)

GIRL!!! Aashini Miley (5.43lbs) was born on November 7th, 2007 at 5:09pm. This is Adam writing. Both Andrea and the baby are okay. Both have been placed on breathing assistance. After the C-section, Andrea had an asthma attack brought on by the pre-eclampsia. She was taken down to the ICU. Her oxygen levels have returned to normal after being put on a cpap (respirator type thing). The birth and condition put a lot of strain on her heart. The cardiologist came and decided that she has post-partem cardio myopathy. They are giving her some diuretic to remove the fluid, bp medicine, and meds to strengthen the heart. Aashini came at only 34 weeks and 5 days. Andrea's pre-eclampsia had escalated so the docs decided to go ahead and deliver the baby via C-section. All went well with the surgery. I can't hold her yet because she's hooked up to this breathing thing to help her lungs. She is still breathing a little fast so that's why the doc put her on that. Hopefully she will be...

I LOVE ice cream! I've especially loved it lately... Yesterday Adam and I were out and about and decided to get some gelato... we had only been to this store once before, but when we went in this time, it had changed!! It now has a part of it called "GelatOnStone".... like Coldstone or Marble Slab if you've had that... they have a big cold slab of marble there and they mix the ice cream or gelato on the stone with your toppings! You can see the guy below making mine :) I got white chocolate gelato with oreos... but then he started adding all sorts of great stuff... he poured on chocolate magic shell stuff and white chocolate magic shell stuff (you can see it in the pic below)... Man! Talk about sweet!! It was AWESOME!!! He mixed it all up and put it in a waffle bowl! It was great!!! This store (below) is in the same market - it's called the "dollar store"... they sell everything for 99 rps.... which is closer to $2.50... but they do have imported th...