Search Results for: blog ten things im thankful for about adoption today

Review of Artful Adoption Books: Three Names of Me

Yesterday I wrote about a children’s adoption book with beautiful artwork. Today I present another one. Three Names of Me is written by Mary Cummings in the voice of her Chinese-born daughter Ada. I would judge the writing to be for ages 6-12. The illustrations are done by Chinese-American illustrator Lin Wang, who combined watercolor and colored pencil to create a style she calls “ethereal realism”. Like the illustrations in Over Land and Sea, they appear realistic and detailed, yet at the same time soft. The use of light and blended backgrounds in Three Names of Me does produce a … Continue reading →

November in the Adoption Blog: Month in Review

I began the blog on All Saints Day with a tribute to certain “Saints” in U.S. Adoption and Pioneers in International Adoption. Then I wrote a tribute to the founder of my daughter’s Korean adoption agency, who has lived an exciting and multifaceted life and is remarkable for his humble concern for children. In honor of National Adoption Month, I wrote two blogs on Top Ten Myths about Adoption. For Part One, click here. For Part Two, click here. Then I wrote a blog about events on National Adoption Day, Saturday November 17. These events included finalizations of thousands of … Continue reading →

Ten Things I’m Thankful For about Adoption Today

1. Those birthmothers who choose life in the face of pressure to do otherwise. In many cases this is a brave, brave action. If my daughter ever asks if her birthmother loved her, I can answer in the affirmative—because otherwise she wouldn’t be here. 2. The birth family members who provide honest medical and social history for their children. This helps us give them better medical and developmental care, reassures them that they have a history like everyone else, and frees the mind from wondering too much about their past and lets it go on to other things. 3. The … Continue reading →

Give Them a Chance

Posted on by

A few days ago, I reviewed the redacted file that the state gave us when we adopted four of our boys. It has the photographs that were taken of the three oldest children when the state removed them from the place where they were living. Seeing the pictures enabled me to benchmark where they were then and where they are now. Our oldest was four and a half when this occurred. He was aware of their living conditions and I can see fear and anxiety on his face in the picture. He was very anxious when he came to live … Continue reading →

My Children Met Their Biological Grandparents.

Adoption Reunions were hardly heard of before the early 1980’s when the talk show hosts started putting biological families back together in front of a live studio audience, broad-casted at 4:00 p.m. coast-to-coast. There was no bigger leader in the reunion shows then Oprah. At that time I was married to an adopted man. We were only 18 and 19 when we got married and we had two children by the time we were 23 years old. My ex-husband had been adopted during the early 1960’s when everything about adoption was very different. Back then there was a real good … Continue reading →