If Randomness

If you would have been standing with me in the paint aisle at Lowes the other day, you may have wondered as I did – If I were a paint color, what would I name myself, and what color would I be? I thought long and hard about this for some reason. The color came to me easily - I would be an orange color with a hue of brown….so orange-ish brownish I guess. But, what sort of catchy name would I make for myself? With names like Kiwi Burst and Milkshake and Sweet Caroline and Come Sail Away I had to think of something. I came up with Tuscan Sun. I don’t know if I like it…I might keep thinking. If you were a paint color, what color would YOU be and what would YOU name yourself?

If you’ve been around me the past two days you would know that I have lost my voice due to a cold. It happens to me every year, and every time I am reminded of how interesting it would be to live life without a voice. You’d be surprised at how many times you need to use your voice throughout the day….like every minute or so. I’ve had to whisper to communicate. And, the funny thing is that JJ and Jayla have been whispering back to me. I don’t think they even know that they are doing it. :)

If you are wondering where Jake will be this week, you should know that he will be permanently planted in section 107 of Wells Fargo Arena, watching game after game of the high school boys state tournament. He will be eating endless orders of nachos and ice cream and fountain pop and pizza and strawberry smoothies. And, he will be doing what he loves at this time of year….watching his Kingdom Hoops players play with their highschool teams against the top competition! He already got JJ warmed up last week with a few sessions during the girl’s tournament, and JJ loved every minute of it! However, JJ did end up ditching Daddy for a seat by his buddies….


If you haven’t heard, Yaw and Des Moines Christian got upset last night by Caroll-Kemper at the state tournament. It was a BIG HUGE BUMMER. We are all still kind of down about it. I don’t think any of us really saw that one coming. But, now we move on. On the bright side, Yaw was lookin snazzy in his warm-up stripes….

And the rest of Team Sullivan was looking good in their DMC tees…

(What will the chances be of getting all of us to look straight at the camera and getting all of us to smile at the same time? Will it ever happen? At least this one was 4 for 5 so I’ll take it!)

If you think I can put this book down…..

…..think again! I am H O O K E D! This book is a collaboration of real-life adoption stories written by adoptive families and by those who have been adopted. It is awesome. I think I have teared up at almost every story. Each story is very personal, detailed, and different than the one before it. I cannot believe what talent these people have at writing. They really pull you into the emotion of their situation. I also like that this book shows the many realities of adoption….from stories of international adoption in which fraud was involved, to the emotions of what it feels like for the adoptees who have no idea what their family history is, and how that feels from their eyes. This is good stuff.

If you have been driving on South Duff in Ames and noticed the green grass in the median where the snow has melted, don’t worry, YOU ARE NOT HALLUCINATING. I saw it too.

If I had somehow forgotten that grocery stores and two red-heads don’t mix, I surely was reminded of it a few days ago. Picture 1 red-headed boy in blue-race-car-grocery-cart seat #1 crying because he had been poked in the eye by red-headed girl sitting in blue-race-car-grocery-cart seat #2 (actually I think she had scratched his eyeball with her fingernail…not good). Not to mention red-headed boy was also mad at his mommy because she would not take him to the gym until after the grocery trip and nap. Then picture red-headed girl crying because she no longer wanted to sit in blue-race-car-grocery-cart. Picture crying of two red-heads for the last 15 minutes of the 45 minute grocery trip by the mommy who was frantically trying to scurry through her grocery list and get outta there. Then picture the mommy trying to sweet talk two red-heads into stopping crying. Picture sweet-talking not working. Picture mommy bribing kids with Burger King to stop crying (Burger King kid’s meals that I had in my purse, but had earlier been refused by red-heads because it wasn’t McDonalds). Picture Mommy remembering that she was mad at McDonald’s because they wouldn’t serve lunch in the drive-thru 3 minutes before 11am. Then picture entire grocery store giving ‘the look’ to mommy…..you know the can’t-you-control-your-kids-look (because I surely don’t need to remind you that red-heads don’t cry quietly). Picture Mommy finally making it to the check-out line to wait her turn to unload her cart while every eyeball in the store stares at screaming kids and then stares at Mommy with a different kind of look that says ‘Do Something!’ Then picture Mommy giving a helpless look back to onlookers that says ‘I’ve tried EVERYTHING!’ Then picture this McDonald’s boycotting, race car driving, family of 6 shopping, sweet-talking, dirty look provoking, on-the-verge-of-losing-it-Mommy running into her old boss who takes one look at the situation and says, “Boy, you have your hands full!” Then picture Mommy……losing it. No screaming. No yelling by Mommy. Just tears. Sobs. This Mommy who had lost all control (and who maybe never had it in the first place) was All Done. Defeated with a capital D. Actually, better just make that all caps. DEFEATED! So there we were, 2 scream-crying red-heads, one sobbing Mommy who couldn’t calm them down, and one old boss who just entered into the most uncomfortable situation in his life. (Pretty sure the guy scanning my groceries would have also picked to be any other place in the world but there.) Picture silence all around except of course for the crying red-heads and crying Mommy unloading groceries. Then picture grocery scanner guy smiling and then saying, “Did they plan this?” Crying Mommy smiles in relief and thinks Yes they must have planned it. And someday I am going to plan on going to the grocery store all by myself. And it will be peace-filled and glorious. But then my red-heads will be all grown-up and I won’t get to kiss their cute crying faces, and I won’t get to put them in the cute race car grocery cart, and I won’t get to hear the nice people stop and say ‘What cute red-heads you have!’, and I won’t get to stand for 5 minutes in the sticker aisle while my red-head searches for the perfect ones, and I won’t get to hear my other red-head exclaim in delight as she sees an Elmo balloon in the flower shop. Yes, this Mommy comes to the conclusion that she better enjoy this while it lasts. Because someday, she’s going to miss this!