what's up

Here's what's up:


Punk is back at college. We miss him like crazy. I mean yeah he stays up until three in the morning and eats all of the Doritos, but it's a small price to pay for the love and laughter he brings everywhere he goes. Having him home, meant a house full of friends, several trips to the movie theater and lots of late night snacks. He taught us to play One Night Werewolf and it was the most fun we'd had in months. We love that he loves school, but we're all having to adjust.

The girls are back at school too.
For Kooka this means a six am wake-up call, school until three, rehearsal for the Rock and Roll show until 5, work until seven dance until 9:30. Throw in her volunteer hours for National Honor Society, AP classes, homework, a little guitar, a boyfriend, and maybe four hours a of sleep a night - and we're lucky we see the kid at all. When we do it's incredible. She made dinner for us last night, and had her friends over for a sundae bar - it's always something with this one.


Tiny has purple hair. She wasn't supposed to. Well, she was, but not so much of it.


We'd made a deal that she could dye one strip of her hair temporarily if she accomplished 100 brave deeds. It took her four months but she did it. So, after much research I bought temporary hair dye meant to wash out in ten shampoos. Except it washed out after we rinsed it. It wouldn't stick. We tried twice.  I called my beautician friends, I asked their advice about coloring it purple. Most of the advice was something like:

"What the actual f#¢+ ?"
"No."
"Are you kidding?"
"You will regret this like nothing you've ever regretted."
"Did you not learn your lesson from the fiasco of 2017?" (see earlier post where Kooka was hired for a salon commercial and it took two months, $80 worth of product and a $200 salon visit to put things right).

But I did it anyway. And it worked! First I had to bleach the ends of her hair.
No easy feat - she's 8, it was like trying to give highlights to a golden retriever with ADHD. After that we added the purple juice which stuck pretty well. She's hoping it lasts until February's "Favorite Book Character Day" at school, where she has requested that I sew her a full on dragon costume.

With wings.
And horns.
And a tail.
And real ears. Dragon ears not cat ears.
And the wings should light up.

Lord. I'd sooner dye her hair again. Why can't she just be Hermione for the 4th year in a row? Ug.

We've also been busy with This Life Rocks - collecting warm weather clothing for people who are struggling this winter. Kooka helped with collecting and tagging. Tiny helped with all of it - including working with another group and taking it to a Minneapolis park so people who needed it could find it.
Rico was even able to go with us. He mostly manned our table in the coffee shop, but saving a place for twenty people is big job too - so is talking to every single one of them - but we all have our strengths, and that's certainly his.

The brace is still on. He still needs the walker. But he can drive - and even with that hip brace on, still parallel parks better than me.


Comments

Lisa McDermott said…
I think the purple hair is awesome and hair grows out anyway. Pick your battles and make your precious memories. She'll never forget that you did this with her.
Ed L said…
The day that he (or I) can't parallel park, it the day we should give up driving!