I am here. I am alive.

Wow. I'm like the worst storyteller ever.

If you are still hanging in there on ol' Chickenbone Jones - and I can't blame you if you aren't - then thanks. I really love writing in this blog, and I really love when you read it, and I feel horrible that I went this long without posting, especially when my last post ended on a bit of a cliffhanger.

In my defense, though, it would be easier to finish that "Setback" chapter if things were actually finished. To make a long story short, Chickens did just fine on the crate rest, and seemed to be back to his old self again. For about five minutes. Then, in developments that were either related to the setback or unrelated to the setback, in mid-September we entered a difficult stretch in which Chickens was having violent leg spasms, lots of trouble walking and copious amounts of diarrhea. We discovered some sort of problem with his back left foot, and he is obsessed with licking it, and that makes the spasms worse because the whole thing gets red and irritated, and it's even harder for him to walk than usual. These problems continue today.

We have been to a bunch of vet appointments - some at the regular vet, some at the fancy surgery vet - and there seems to be no answer other than this: We just have a very messed-up dog. In other words, regular problems that happen to healthy dogs are much more difficult when they happen to Chickens. His little nerves don't fire correctly, and lots of his muscles are either way too strong or way too weak. One small irritation on his paw might feel totally crazy to him and he can't leave it alone, which just makes things worse. The leg spasms can topple his whole back end, which makes him stop in his tracks and not move anymore. We are carrying him around more and not letting him use his dog ramp much because he's just not a good mover right now. It is frustrating for him and for us.

The most important thing, though, is that he's not in pain. He is lovable and smiley and tries all the time to wag his little limp tail. When one of us sits on the couch, he loves to sit on our laps snuggled up in a warm blanket. And now that his sister is mobile, those two adore taking turns chasing each other down and planting kisses on the other's face. He's a happy dog, and that matters more than all the rest.

Speaking of his sister ... guess who has a birthday next week!

The festivities have already begun, as we picked up her grandma and one of her four grandpas at the airport last night. I am looking forward to posting all 12 of my monthly Mia-in-the-chair photos when I take the last one on Monday, her first birthday. So, see? I already have my next post planned. Stick around, will ya?

Speeding right along

When I mentally began composing this post many weeks ago, I figured I would entitle it "The summer so far." Unfortunately I didn't find time to actually write anything until "Summer is practically over, so let's get on with it already."

My head spins with how fast the past few months have flown. Mia turned nine months old today, and it seems like the more her little personality explodes and the more fun things we can do with her, the faster time drains away. This must be the beginning of what every experienced parent still reminds us about: Enjoy it now, because these parts will be over before you know it.

Summer begin with Mia's baptism. We held it in the chapel of the high school where I work, and it was lovely. Mia drew some laughs during the ceremony when she stuck the priest's hand in her mouth, and she was a very good sport despite wearing a giant cream-puff gown in the sticky June heat.


After the baptism we enjoyed a delicious lunch at Il Fornaio, where Mia bonded with her new godmother by munching on her jewelry. (See a theme here?)


We had our bottles, Mia had hers.


Also in June we took two weeks of swim lessons, with our good pals Amy G. and Sofia. Mia and Sofia were the only babies at the pool, so they were a real hit with everyone. We even had one mom tell us she forgot to watch her own kids because ours were so cute! I think you will agree.


Mia took to the pool like a champ, enduring regular dunks, water in the face and lots of kicks and splashes. Most of our time was spent passing her back and forth between me and her teacher, fully submerged in the water, which gave me regular heart attacks. But I adjusted.


The best part, each dip in the water ended up in a real tight hug for mom.


We went to work with dad! Sal's job takes him to lots of community events, and in the summer it's easy for us to tag along. We enjoyed a fine night out at the Valley of Heart's Delight fundraiser for History San Jose.


We were joined at our table by KRTY morning show host Gary Scott Thomas, his wife Heather, and their son, Luke. Mia gets a real charge out of seeing other babies. She even tried to hold Luke's hand. Hussy!


In July my dream of going out of town for a little break finally came true, and we made our first trip to Santa Barbara with our baby. Traveling with a baby is ... well, it's not the vacation we used to have, that's for sure. Navigating naps and feedings while being out and about all day, trying to find places to accommodate your giant stroller, sharing a hotel room with a baby ... all that adds an undercurrent of stress that we didn't anticipate. But we had a fine time, anyhow.

We took Mia for her first zoo visit!


We fed some lettuce to a giraffe!


Though Mia seemed a lot more excited about the goats and sheep than the actual exotic animals. Maybe they reminded her of Chickens!


One of our new favorite Santa Barbara restaurants is The Natural Cafe, where Mia enjoyed her lunch of pita bread and hummus with a side of steamed vegetables. Sitting her outdoors by the railing was a stroke of brilliance on our part, since she used her adorable, messy grin to make friends with almost every single person who walked by. Free entertainment for baby gives mom and dad the rare leisurely meal.


We spent the World Cup final at Union Ale Brewing Company. It was actually our second visit to the place, since it was close to our hotel, relatively baby-friendly, and filled with good beer and barbecue. Here's Mia and her dad. Notice the expert head-turn-gulp, a move every parent should know to maximize enjoyment of a drink while there's a baby in your lap.


Though I brought a bag full of toys, my tube of Clinique sunblock was the only thing that kept Mia content. Kids!


Our last outing was to Isla Vista, where we got our favorite burritos and had a picnic in the park. See that weird little tongue curl thing Mia's doing? I don't know what that's about. She does it all the time. It's cute.


Paparazzi shot.

And now here we are, staring August square in the face. In a couple of weeks school starts back up, and I go back to the full-time grind. But I'm not going to worry about that now, since today we're going to a barbecue and an outdoor concert. There's a little bit of summering left to be done!

8 months old

We have some new tricks to show you. For instance, Mia loves to clap!


She also loves to blow raspberries. She has in fact livened up many a car ride by making fart noises in the backseat for miles on end.


Mia loves to gnaw, slurp and suck on anything you put in front of her. Or under her. Like this chair.


She also loves to laugh at her mom, who is making silly sounds from behind the camera.


Our Mia. God, but she's a charmer. Of all the milestones and new tricks and skills and habits, the most distinguishing thing about my daughter is that wherever she goes, she forces people to adore her.

Here is a scenario I have seen dozens of times. We go to a restaurant. From her perch - be it car seat, high chair or our arms - she scans nearby tables to pick her first target. When she has settled on someone, she stares at them intently. Without blinking. Without flinching. She patiently bores her eyes into her prey, craning her neck to catch their gaze, to the point that I am almost embarrassed - like, hey, kid? That's kinda rude to stare at people that way, did nobody tell you?!

When the person finally notices that strange baby staring at them, that's when Mia flips the switch. All of a sudden the catatonic stare melts into batting eyelashes, hands tucked coyly under her chin, and squeals and giggles and a thousand-watt grin. Predictably, the target begins to coo and smile and say over and over again how PRETTY that baby is, how FRIENDLY she is. And would you look at that SMILE? And those EYES!

And at this point, once she has reeled them in, do you know what this child does? She moves on TO THE NEXT PERSON. I'm not kidding, I have literally seen her tackle four tables in one meal. And of course, as we're leaving, she flashes a friendly grin at each of her new pals. But I just know that in her head, she's thinking, "Hahaha! GOTCHA, suckas!"

Best. Vacation. Ever.

So! Believe it or not, I've been off work for more than a week. You'd think that would open up all sorts of time for blogging, especially when I have at least six posts churning in my head that I'm eager to pour out here. But alas, that's not how it turned out. Instead, I was far, far too busy with all the NOT WORKING to actually get anything accomplished.

You see, here's how the average workday goes for me: Alarm goes off at 5 a.m. (Unless, of course, the baby got up to eat at 4 or 4:30, which has happened a few times, in which case going back to bed would be pointless for me, so I just stay up. If she wakes up any earlier than maybe 3:30 to eat, then I try to sneak back to bed for a little bit. Most nights she sleeps till 6 or so, but seriously, you just can't ever tell.) So, to begin again: Alarm goes off at 5 a.m., and between 5 and 6:40 when I have to leave for work, I must accomplish four things: Feed the baby; shower and get ready; eat breakfast; grab my purse, breast pump bag, lunch and coffee before I sail out the door. The order of these things changes every day, as it all depends on what time I hear the little squawks come from the baby monitor. It is stressful.

Then I go to school. There, somehow between meetings and phone calls and e-mails and deadlines, I have to fit two breast-pumping sessions into the workday. These can 25 to 30 minutes. Sometimes I spill milk on my pants. Once I squirted my own self in the eye. Twice I have been walked in on by custodians. (If you have never seen what a woman pumping her breasts looks like, you have no idea how horrifying this is. Just trust me.) It is stressful to pump milk out of your breasts with a machine in your office.

Then I come home, usually by around 3:30 p.m. Between 3:30 and 8, here is what must be accomplished: Change clothes. Feed baby. Express dog's bladder. Hand wash approximately 497 little plastic breast pump parts. Take baby on a walk. Feed baby. Play with baby. Play with dog. If necessary, get groceries, do laundry and/or pick up house. Fix dinner. Give baby bath. Feed baby. Put baby to bed. Express dog's bladder. Pack lunch and pump bag for next day. Collapse on couch. Try very, very hard not to fall asleep 11 minutes into a TV show. Fail frequently. Go to bed.

It's a dead sprint from 5 a.m. till 10 p.m., five days a week.

So, I spent my vacation in pajamas. Resting. Rushing nowhere. Napping. Cuddling with my baby. NOT PUMPING. And grinning from ear to ear at having one whole week away from the chaos.

While I didn't have time for all the writing, I can show you some cool pictures!

Here's little Easter Mia, wearing a dress from her Grandma Eva. I tried to get her to pose prettily next to her stuffed rabbit, Mr. Bun.


However, he soon met the same fate as everything Mia gets her hands on these days.


Here we are practicing tummy time. We do not like tummy time. But we do it anyway. Glad Sal took this picture before the howling began.


Waking up from a snooze with the daycare provider.


We bought Mia a high chair, in preparation for starting her on real food in a few weeks. She LOVES it. And for the first time in months, we can actually sit together and enjoy a meal without a squirmy baby on somebody's lap.


Finally, Mia went to her first baseball game - the San Jose Giants home opener. She had a ton of baseball fans fawning all over her and how cute she looked in her Giants onesie. We made it two and a half whole innings, including beers and barbecue for mom and dad. That's a home run, I say!

Five months old

Taking Mia's monthly picture was, for the first time, quite difficult. Instead of posing prettily for the camera, she would much rather...

... stare at Chickens.


... slobber on the chair.


... and play with the pillow.


But then I got lucky.


Pretty cool to see how she's grown since month one.

Oh, yeah! The baby!

It has been brought to my attention that the Chickenbone Jones blog might be a WEE bit heavy on the dog-poop talk and not enough adorable baby girl.

Point taken. Let's catch up on Mia.


Affectionately known around the house as "The Little Meesters," she is very close to celebrating the five-month mark. Her favorite things include: Sticking her tongue out. Staring at Chickens. Sucking on the legs of Sophie the giraffe. Loudly babbling things like "BAAAAAA. BABABA. OOOOOOOOOO. BAA."

Recent new skills include: Rolling over front to back. Holding her bottle on her own. Throwing things violently onto the floor. (That one we learned with newspapers - at least she started with daddy's livelihood!)


She has settled on a favorite baseball team.


She loves to stare at herself in the mirror.


And there's nobody on earth she adores more than her dad. (I'm pretty sure the feeling is mutual.)

Let's wrap up with a movie! Starring Mia and her favorite pastime of all. I would edit this down a bit except I don't know how. But come on, can't you suffer two and a half minutes of pure, Grade-A, giggly Meester cuteness? With a little dash of Chicken?

Three months in

So the 14-week-party known as my maternity leave has drawn to a close and I have returned to work full time. On my first day, people kept coming up and asking about the baby, and then they'd give me a sympathetic head-tilt and ask gently "So is it hard to be back?"

To which I reply: AHAHAHAHAHA! Are you kidding me? At work, I can actually sit down and enjoy a meal! I can go pee whenever I want! I can set goals for myself, AND THEN ACCOMPLISH THEM! I freaking LOVE work!

Fine, so it wasn't quite that easy. I do miss my little baby girl something awful. But she is spending her days with her favorite person in the universe (dad), and a couple afternoons a week her grandma comes over. So I know she is in excellent hands. And I love my drive home every afternoon - it's the most thrilling 12 minutes of my day, knowing that I'm on my way to see her.

Here are some pictures I took at 1, 2 and 3 months old. Look how much those little legs chubbed out!

And here's Mia at very beginning. She was maybe two or three days old when we took this picture of her laying in her bassinet on top of her blue bilirubin blanket.

She's grown a little bit, eh?


Also, it took me a week of working in 5- or 10-second bursts to put together this post. Why does it seem like the less time I have to blog, the more I have to say? Folks, my brain is bursting at the seams with stuff I want to write. More to come, including an update on Chickenbone (who, incidentally, recently pooped in the bathtub, just as I predicted.)

Important announcement

I know this is going to sound kind of unbelievable, but I would like to report that Saturday, January 16, 2010, was a good day. The whole damned thing, good! Let me tell you.

It started at Weight Watchers, which I rejoined two weeks ago because I am carrying around one hundred eleventy thousand pounds of baby weight. Unfortunately I had a supremely lousy performance my first two weeks out. I didn't write down what I ate, I didn't weigh or measure my food, and I consumed a ton of junk and approximately no fruits or vegetables. But Saturday morning when I climbed on the scale, I didn't gain ANY weight! Good ol' breastfeeding! OK, that's the first good thing.

Then: We came home and cleaned up the house. Nothing makes my heart go pitty-pat like a clean house.

And then: Mia's grandparents stopped by, so we had them hang out with her while we took Chickens for a "sling walk" up and down the street. Not only did he spurt out some pee, but he also pooped. In someone else's yard, just like a real dog!

AND THEN: Sal, Mia and I went downtown to a comic book festival, where Mia had lots of fun staring at all the nice nerds and their pretty pictures. Afterward, we walked to Caffe Trieste to have coffee and a pastry. You know, just like leisurely, breezy people! Who have time to go to COFFEE SHOPS!

AND THEN! After we came home, I was changing Mia's diaper and singing her a song. I sing to her a lot, very theatrically, with hand gestures and a fake microphone and everything. She loves it. And I don't sing those goofy kid songs, either. Lately I've been on a Lisa Loeb "I Missed You" kick, which is what I was singing when she looked up at me and laughed. She unmistakeably, adorably LAUGHED! Oh, you guys. There's just no way to describe how cool that is. And I am allowed to sound all goopy and obnoxious-parent about this because, is it just me, or has this blog been a bit of a downer lately? There's just a bit of imbalance between depressing dog stuff and cool baby stuff.

We wrapped up the day with an actual home-cooked dinner. OK, it was for the most part Trader Joe's quickies: orange chicken, which we served over some fried rice made by my wonderful neighbor across the street, plus some pot stickers and steamed string beans. String beans might not have been the wisest side dish - snipping all those tips with a fussy baby in the Bjorn was not easy. But snip them I did, one damn bean at a time! It was the first real hot, healthy meal we have pieced together in I don't know how long. So I was very impressed with us.

The nice thing about a string of endlessly shitty days is that a good one feels downright miraculous.

Feeling a little frayed

I wish the bar on what constitutes a "bad day" would quit moving on me.

Six weeks ago, a bad day was listening to my paralyzed, stapled-shut dog sob for hours on end. Locked in a cage, unable to move his legs, drugged out of his gourd, and snarling and snapping at us whenever we tried to take him out to squeeze the contents of his bladder onto a pad on the kitchen counter.

Now that dog can darned near walk, he can wag his tail and play with toys, and he has even started to pee a little bit on his own. So how can things possibly still feel miserable?

Well, it turns out Chickenbone's progress somehow makes this situation feel worse. For one thing, while he can sort of manage a very wobbly walk on our big rugs, he slips and stumbles on the wood floors. So whenever he wants to go anywhere in the house besides the living room, he sits at the edge of the rug and barks for someone to come over and "tail-walk" him to his destination. (He moves his front legs, and you hold his back end up by his tail. After awhile, this feels REALLY great on your back, especially when you are hefting a 12-pound infant in your other arm.)

Also, now he wants to jump back up onto his beloved couches, where he spent 90 percent of his days before his injury. Uh, Chickens? Hate to be the one to tell you this, but you're still crippled. You ain't jumping anywhere. Plus, even if he could physically jump, we simply can't let him do that ever again. Never, ever again can he get on the sofas by himself because the risk of reinjury when he leaps to the floor is just too great.

But today, with Sal back at work after his 10-week paternity leave, I was sitting on the couch when Chickens got out of his doggie bed, wobbled over to my feet, and started trying to come up for a cuddle. We can't even let him ATTEMPT to jump, so I had to stop him somehow, but I was nursing Mia so I couldn't do anything but yell at him. It felt awful! He is like the kid who had to stay home from school with the flu, only now he feels all better and he doesn't understand why he still has recuperating to do. He just sat there giving me his pleading eyes, and moving his upper body pathetically up and down in an effort to jump. It broke my heart.

Meanwhile, breaking my eardrums today was Mia, who was suffering some tummy and sleep issues. For four hours, she wouldn't nap, wouldn't eat, wouldn't do anything but squirm and wail in my arms. A couple of times, thanks to wild swinging and shushing and pacing and singing and bouncing, I finally got her to doze off in my arms. JUST IN TIME to hear Chickens sitting at the edge of the rug barking for a "ride" to his water dish, waking the baby and making mommy cry.

Folks, life is not easy around here.

I guess I just got used to Sal being around all day to help with the Chickens stuff. He had his baby, I had mine. At least we could divide the work. But one person dealing with both Mia and Chickens is very, very hard. If you're not neglecting one, you're neglecting the other. Neither one of them appreciates this very much, and they aren't shy about telling you so.

And then there's the pressure of all the stuff I want and need to do. There are basics, like taking a shower, doing a load of laundry, eating lunch. When I'm lucky, I get to a couple of these things. But there's a second to-do list in my head, one that every single day I intend to tackle. And every single day ends with absolutely no progress. Answering 800 e-mails. Writing in Mia's baby book. Digging my non-maternity work clothes out of storage and pressing and hanging them. Uh, BLOGGING. Putting away Christmas. Going through Mia's drawers and removing clothes that are too small, which is, like, everything. And don't even get me thinking about the third-tier list, stuff I'd just really like to do, but since they aren't necessities, they flat won't happen. Like going to a yoga class, cooking a fun meal, or reading a book. The hours just seem to slip right through my fingers, and it seems nothing gets accomplished except getting through the day.

That's a lot of whining, I know. Sorry. We just really need to get to the next part of Chickens' progress soon. So much of this will be solved when he's strong enough to walk through the house on his own. To that end, next week we are going to have a real physical therapy session at the hospital where he had his surgery. And we'll keep working on the pee thing. We take him out for a sling walks now - me holding the regular leash attached to his collar, Sal holding up his back end with a homemade sling (made of a leash, an old sock and rubber bands) and Mia in the baby Bjorn. We're quite a sight! And during these walks, we have seen many little spurts of pee come out, meaning there has been some neurological healing with his brain and bladder. (And can I just say, I never in my life thought I'd spend this much time squatting down to stare hopefully at a dog's penis. Not my most glamorous moments.) We still have to manually express most of his urine four or five times a day, but that's still improvement.

I guess I just need to dig a little deeper and find a lot more patience, because that's the only thing that's going to get us through to the other side of this mess.

Here, let's look at some fun pictures. Here's photographic proof of Chickens walking. He was eating a sardine (he gets one per day - they contain lots of good vitamins that can help with things like a back injury) and every time he licked the bowl it would move, so he'd walk to follow it.


Here is Chickens during his bathtub therapy. We plop him into the tub and wave treats back and forth across the water, and he walks trying to get them. He finds this setup terribly convenient, since if he gets thirsty, he just sticks his face in the water and drinks!


Speaking of baths, here is Mia's favorite time of day: bathtime with dad. Even if she is screaming her face off - as she often is at night - stick her in the tub and she's all coos and smiles.


Obligatory mohawk shot.


I love this one. I just wanted a picture of the cute outfit Mia's nana gave her. But it ended up being such a perfect snapshot of our life right now. Check out my messy, unwashed hair, and that big, wet spit-up splotch on my shoulder. And in the background, you can see the sad dog watching all the fun from his cage. Oh, poor everyone!


Christmas morning, Mia surrounded by a bunch of her presents.


And here is an exhausted husband and wife, staying home on their favorite holiday of the year. After Mia went to bed, we had a party for two, sitting in the back yard listening to a live mariachi band that was playing at a party down the street. We made it to midnight and well beyond, enjoying champagne and cocktails that resulted in my first hangover since January 2009. And that little Mia, she decided to sleep for 10 hours straight that night. So I guess life isn't all bad!