The Zog Blog

Son, I love you more than words can say. Nevertheless, here are ten things that I really wish you’d hurry up and learn. Triscuits are not an interior design element. Egg salad is not a fashion accessory. When you are so exhausted you can no longer walk, the solution is not ‘try to nurse, talk, [...]

Jacob has come down with a bit of a head cold, his first since he was about 4 months old. And it’s the weirdest thing. We’re treating this cold like he’s a big kid, basically. OJ and chicken soup, lots of fluids and rest, and Robitussin. Hallelujah, a decongestant! No more sleepless nights and trying [...]

That “first word” milestone is trickier than it seems. While I was pregnant with Jacob, I indulged in daydreams of my adorable little boy looking up at me with big blue eyes and an unruly mop of red curls, saying a perfectly-formed “Ma ma!” and smiling. Of course, it turns out he needs to practice [...]

Jacob has been a very busy bee. He got his first real haircut, in a barbershop no less. It was very Normal Rockwell. He seems to go faster, now that he’s not weighed down by his locks. He attended the Half Moon Bay Pumpkin Festival: He got all the decorations when we took down the [...]

We’re smack dab in the middle of the Jewish harvest festival of Sukkot. Formal practice of this 8 day holiday includes building a “fragile hut” in one’s yard and “dwelling” in it, and waving around a collection of greenery called a lulav and smelling the citrusy scent of an etrog. (Informally, one simply spends 8 [...]

Time flows so differently now that we have a child, now that I stay home with him, now that we’re not teenagers. No big events and sweeping changes, anymore. Just the quiet rhythm of domesticity, of new words spoken and bread baked and bumps soothed. Our nights are also quiet now, not filled with friends [...]