Back in December 2009, I was standing in the lobby of the U.S. Consolate in Guangzhou, China, with friends who had just become parents through the miracle of adoption.

What could be more fun than eating sushi on the water in Fell’s Point on a summer evening? We were about to find out.

My husband and sons made it home as the rain was starting, but there were no fish for dinner.

Over the past few weeks, I have been going through some boxes of photos and mementoes. The idea is that I will organize them and maybe even discard some things I don’t need.

Sometimes people do terrible things. They hurt people deeply. They hurt children. They let down people who look up to them, people who trust them. They lie about what they do, and sometimes they tell the people they are hurting to lie, too.

It’s not really summer around here without at least one taste of steamed crabs.

Colleen McCormick and Don Hudson were taking off from an airport in Mexico with their children last week when their plane started shaking and crashed.

Our 8-year-old wants a dog. He’d probably settle for a cat, but he really wants a dog.

We’ve had a mixture of rain and sun this week, and one night I slipped out of the house to run to the store for strawberries.

Then I thought of something. It was the feast of St. Ignatius. When you can do nothing else, you can pray.