Chicken Run

It is just crazy how fast these chickens are growing! Their fuzz is all gone and they are all feathers. They still cheep occasionally but they're starting to cluck and squawk. They've been doing really well in their coop. It's kind of hard to see in these pictures but they have a little hen house that Mark made from an old shed, and he made a fenced in area for them to run around and they have that little door with a ramp so they can go in and out as they like. The really cool thing about the ramp is it folds up and we can latch it closed so the chickens are safe at night. Since there's not much in the way of shade, we draped a tarp over one corner of the fence so they have a cooler place during the middle of the day. Give them feed and water and some table scraps and they're happy. And they're finally getting used to us. With the exception of the white ones (I call them the Foofy chickens), they're all starting to run up to the gate when they see someone coming because they know it means they're about to get a treat. The Foofy chickens are still pretty skittish but they're getting better.

Although a couple weekends ago I was in the front yard with Mira and heard a ton of squawking coming from the back yard. I thought that was suspicious so I ran back to see what was going on, thinking maybe the dogs or some stray cats were harassing the chickens. When I got back there, I saw one chicken clawing and flapping her way up the chain link fence, and another one standing on the roof of the hen house. I shooed them back into the pen and counted... 7 chickens. I got so scared for a minute. Where did the 8th one go?? Did we lose another one somehow?? I didn't see any feathers or a carcass in the back yard. I looked over the fence into our neighbor's back yard, and what do I see but one of the Foofy chickens strutting around all by herself! That was interesting to knock on the neighbor's door and say, "Ummm, I need to go into your back yard, one of our chickens escaped back there." I'm sure that was a new one for them. Anyway they were nice about it and I chased the chicken around back there but she was able to slip out into the front yard so I had to chase her around there, then she got back into the neighbor's back yard again, and finally I was able to corner her and tackle her. She did not appreciate that but I made some modifications to the pen and we haven't had any more escaped chickens. Yet, anyway. Mark of course wasn't at home when this happened and when I told him about it afterwards he responded with, "I thought chickens were supposed to be stupid!"

Here are some pictures of the chickens.

The crazy thing is in the couple of weeks or so since I've taken these pictures the chickens have gotten even bigger - it's like watching Mira grow up but even faster, if such a thing is possible! We still let the chickens out to wander in the whole back yard every so often and they still haven't figured out how to do something individually - they always go as a group.

Mira is growing like a weed! I've been wondering if she's been going through another growth spurt because she's tired all the time and constantly hungry and waking up hungry in the middle of the night again. Oh yeah, and those damn molars are still trying to work their way through. Yesterday she had her 15 month checkup (our pediatrician does things a little differently, instead of a 9-month and 12-month checkup he does 12 and 15 months to space out the immunizations a little bit) and in the 2 1/2 months since her last one she's grown 2 inches (up to 32 inches) and put on almost 3 more pounds (22 pounds 14 oz). Yikes! She's 51st percentile for weight and a whopping 91st percentile for length. Maybe that's why she's been so cranky, her bones hurt because they're stretching so fast! Her OFC is 17.7 inches, which puts her in the 25th percentile. So she's been holding steady as a tall, exactly average weight girl with a tiny head. Mark and I both have small heads so that's not surprising - and that part really was helpful when she was being born. :) She got more immunizations and of course she screamed while they were stabbing her but as soon as I picked her up and hugged her she was fine. And now unless something comes up she doesn't have to see the doctor again until she turns 2 or even 3 if I want to put it off that long. There's one booster she needs in there somewhere but we've got awhile before she needs to go in again. After the next one there's not another checkup until she starts school. That's so crazy, for the first year or so you're constantly bringing your baby in for checkups and immunizations and then all of a sudden you don't need to go in at all. At least the hard stuff gets done when they're too little to remember it. I think for that reason I'll take her in at 2 just to get that one booster done as soon as possible. And - no ear infection this time! Woohoo for a healthy baby again! I mentioned to the doctor that I'm always paranoid that something's wrong because of where I work. He reassured me that she was doing everything a kid her age should be doing - she's walking, she's active, she's jabbering, she's social and she's very curious, all good signs. I knew everything was fine, I just get worried and need to hear it from someone else.

As I mentioned, it's been getting pretty warm out here lately, highs in the 80s or even 90s a few times. Mira is getting a nice little farmer's tan going on because she LOVES going outside. One nice thing about living in a desert is it hardly ever rains so it is possible to take Mira outside pretty much every day without getting rained out. With summer around the corner - and since I'm always trying to find ways to keep this busy little girl occupied for some extended length of time - I got her a little wading pool. Luckily she likes this better than either the Atlantic or Pacific Oceans, especially if I leave the water out for awhile before I put her in it so it's not freezing cold.

Have toys and water, will play.

She also really likes to play with the garden hose. I'm not sure why but that's okay because our lawn has some dry patches so I just place the hose where it's dry and let her have fun.

She has a tendency to spray water in her face but she doesn't even cry about it. She gasps really big like she's surprised, then laughs. Hardly anything makes this girl sad! Everyone who meets her comments on how social and happy she is and asks if she's always like this, which she is.

Finally, some videos of her playing with the garden hose.

Good Times

To start off, I'm going to say that I love my job but sometimes I hate it because I see so much sadness. It seems to come in waves and the last month or so we have had some really awful and sad cases come through the unit. Cancer, traumas, heart failure... Sometimes I look at the horrible things that I see every day I go to work and I'm just amazed that it's even possible for a kid to be born without any problems at all - or wonder that it's even possible for a kid to survive to adulthood without anything catastrophic happening. I have to keep reminding myself that what I see is a very small percentage of the general pediatric population. Most kids never see the inside of a hospital in their lives, much less the ICU. But lately I come home from work and I squeeze my little girl extra tight because I cannot believe I was one of the lucky ones to have a child that is normal, and God-willing will never see the inside of a hospital as a child. My job really forces you to appreciate good health.

There's been some good stuff at work too - every once in a while you form a really good bond with a patient's family and they beg to have you take care of them every time you work, and even better, you don't mind it! I've been lucky enough to have one of those families the last couple of weeks. It's been nice to have that boost in my self-esteem. :)

A funny story that I'd like to include just so I don't forget it: The unit is hiring a third Assistant Nurse Manager and the Director put the email out a couple weeks ago. To be considered they wanted you to have some amount of experience in a leadership-sort of position, such as an expanded role or Charge Nurse or something along those lines. Obviously I deleted the email because even though I might be interested in going into management later in my career, I'm definitely not ready now. I haven't even been in the PICU for 4 years yet! Anyway, a few nights ago I was working next to a nurse who I would consider to be one of the best nurses we have - she's been in the PICU for years and years, she's a charge nurse, a flight nurse, and has such good instincts as an ICU nurse. I really look up to her. She asked me if I'd put in for the Nurse Manager position since I'm really good and know everything already. I laughed and acted like she'd said that as a joke - but she was acting like she was serious. Me?? I have no seniority, I'm not a charge nurse (don't plan to be one until I don't have to be a cardiac nurse to do it), have very little leadership experience - but she was acting like I should have put in for the position. I told another friend of mine, expecting her to laugh and think that was funny that someone would even suggest that I put in for it, and her response was, "Well, why don't you?" I told Mark, expecting him to find it amusing, and he asked why I didn't apply for it. Here I am thinking it's laughable that anyone would even suggest that I should be a Nurse Manager of a unit I've only been in for 4 years when there are people much more qualified and have been around for decades and people are wondering why I didn't think to apply. Go figure. Anyway, even if it was laughable it really did make me feel good about myself. That says a lot when people are thinking I'd be a good manager when I have so little time in the unit and there are close to 200 nurses to choose from. I'm flattered. But I'm still not going to apply. :)

Okay, enough bragging and on to Little Miss Mira. I seem to have only taken one video of her since the last post... which seems odd to me but apparently that's all I did. Her new thing has been a fascination with talking on the phone. Give her a toy phone or real phone and she tries to talk on it - although she doesn't quite get the concept of putting the phone to your ear yet.

Is that funny or what?

She's not really talking yet, which I'm not going to push because she's only 14 months, but I swear she says "Hi!" to people and she's been saying something that sounds like, "Ah dat?!" We're thinking she's trying to say, "What's that" or "Want that" or something along those lines. She also says "Dis!" which we're thinking means "This," because she says it when she's pointing at something. Mark thinks I'm hearing things and she's just making noises, and maybe she is, but those sounds are pretty consistent. She's gotten the idea of sign language and she can sign "More," "Please," and "All done," and we're working on "Thank you." We're also teaching her where to find certain body parts - she knows where her feet and belly button are, and she knew where her head was until we tried to teach her nose and then she got confused, so when we ask her where her head is she sticks her finger in her mouth. Well, close enough. She's also decided to cut at least 3-4 teeth at once, and for some reason her molars are coming in before her other teeth. I thought molars are supposed to come in last but she's got one on each side on top working their way in, and man she is not pleased about that! Not that I blame her but she's been quite cranky lately. (Of course, Mira-cranky would still be a very well-behaved baby in comparison.)

Here we go with some pictures. We had Hamburger Helper a few weeks ago and as you can see, it was a big hit:

Mira finally has enough hair that I can pull it up into a little pigtail. This has got to be one of the cutest things I've ever seen! Now I can start styling her hair and putting bows in her hair again!

I'm not sure why she was so bored here - she must have been tired or something.

One of her favorite things to eat is berries. It's not usually this messy but after squishing some raspberries and blackberries in her hands she of course had to wipe her face... Oh man, what a mess...

Oh yes, and an Angry Face.

Mark and I took Mira out to eat at a sushi restaurant last week. She will eat sushi! She also likes the gyoza and miso soup and even the tobiko (that's flying fish eggs for those of you not familiar with Japanese food). After dinner she saw a lime that was a garnish on one of the plates and kept pointing at it and signing "please" and squealing. I wasn't going to give it to her but then I thought about the funny faces she would make so we let her have it.

Umm, yeah she loved it! I couldn't believe it. She really will eat just about anything!

Warmer weather means it's time for sandals, and if you're wearing sandals it's time to get your toes looking pretty. I tried painting Mira's toenails a couple weeks ago and she just didn't get what I was trying to do and screamed while I was trying to put the polish on, so that didn't work. So then I painted my toenails and showed her, and she got really interested in the nail polish. A few days ago I tried to paint her toenails again and she sat through the whole thing and even tried to blow on the wet polish to help dry it! She was excited to see her toenails are bright pink now. I'm excited to have a pedicure buddy!

We still spend lots of time outside in the nice weather and she likes to walk on the sidewalk up and down the street and for some reason she loves to cross the street too. She knows to hold my hand to cross the street, luckily. I'm going to be so paranoid and overprotective about cars and roads and such just because of the crap I see at work. If she starts walking towards one of the parked cars in the driveway I pull her away and tell her to stay away because cars are dangerous. I'm sure I'm overreacting but I am so scared she'll get run over by someone pulling out of the driveway!

When she's not walking around the neighborhood with me, she still likes to sit on the bench in the front yard and swing her feet in the dirt.

One day she got into my purse and of course the first thing she found and got into was my wallet. I guess it's instinctive for little girls!

I'm still amazed when I look at Mira and see how much she's grown up already! I still call her my baby but she really isn't anymore. It's so insane.

I think she might be ready for a baby doll because a couple days ago she was playing with the iPad and started playing a video of her when she was about 3 months old. First of all, Mark and I couldn't believe how tiny she was then. Second of all, when Mira saw a little baby on the screen she leaned forward and gave the screen a big wet kiss!! I couldn't stop laughing but I think we might start looking for a Cabbage Patch doll or something along those lines. I'm interested to see how she acts with that.