As Mike and I started the application process for international adoption we couldn't decide when to tell our parents and extended family. Would it be better to just tell them now when we don't have a lot of answers? Or would it be better to wait until we are little further down the road so we have plenty of answers?Thankfully, the decision was made for us when the application specifically said please make sure you tell immediate family members before turning in the application. So, we started to plan.
Even though we weren't physically pregnant, we wanted to have a fun way to surprise our parents with the announcement. It is the surprise of a child no matter how they enter our family so we wanted to make it special and we wanted them to be together if at all possible. Yay for timely birthdays!
My birthday is on February 1 and this year that day happened to fall on the weekend. We had to do a little coaxing and planning, but both sets of parents decided to come celebrate my birthday. They thought they would be surprising me with gifts, but we had our own Birthday Surprise up our sleeves.
My birthday fell on Saturday and the plan was to just hang out at our house, open gifts and then go have dinner. So, the moms said it was time to open gifts and as usual they spoiled me. All while opening them though I was getting that nervous excitement right before you tell someone happy news. As I finished, Mike went upstairs and grabbed two gifts as well. Only these were for our parents.
We decided to have the moms open a gift. Inside the gift was Russell Moore's book Adopted for Life. This is a great book and I would recommend it for not only those thinking about adoption but for all church members who should know why supporting adoption is so important. I love this description of the book, "The gospel of Jesus Christ—the good news that through Jesus we have been adopted as sons and daughters into God's family—means that Christians ought to be at the forefront of the adoption of orphans in North America and around the world. Russell D. Moore does not shy away from this call in Adopted for Life, a practical manifesto for Christians to adopt children and to help equip other Christian families to do the same. He shows that adoption is not just about couples who want children—or who want more children. It is about an entire culture within the church, a culture that sees adoption as part of the Great Commission mandate and as a sign of the gospel itself." You won't regret purchasing this book!
So, when we handed them a gift on my birthday they were a little confused. Thankfully (more liked divinely in my opinion), they were sitting next to each other on the couch and the dads were close by watching it all unfold. The moms unwrap the gift and see the book title and Mike and I could see a small glimmer of understanding, then they opened the front cover and saw this inside...
That was when we could see all the lights come on in full understanding and the moms first started crying and then my favorite part...and I wish I had a video...the moms both jump off the couch and jump up and down and start hugging each other shouting "we are going to have grandchildren close by!!" (Keep in mind that each of them have two grandsons, but my moms are half way around the world and my mom-in-laws are in Oklahoma). Meanwhile, the dad's are trying to figure out what just happened :-) We quickly filled them in, they decided to hug us and not jump up and down like school girls....that would have been an even better video!
Thus began the questions and explanations and a fun day of being excited about the future. We are so thankful for our parents and their support through this decision. We already know what wonderful grandparents they are and we know they will welcome our child(ren) with open arms...and spoil them rotten in the process :-)
Well, that is it for another installment of adoption info. There will be more to come. Please continue to keep Ukraine in your prayers. There is still so much unrest there. But there are adoptive triumphs as well. You can read about a family who was stuck in the middle of it all here.
As you can guess, I have done a great deal of reading about adoption and of course read many articles and blogs about it as well. This blog was a great reminder for people to be cautious with the questions and remarks they make to adoptive families both before and after they bring their children home. People don't usually say these things with a mean spirit, they are just a little ignorant sometimes. Sadly I have heard some of these and thankfully I haven't heard many of them. Just wanted to share for those interested so you make sure your filter is in place....don't we all need a little more of that!
Thank you all for your support and love...we are truly thankful for your prayers. Hope you have a great weekend friends! Love from the Forest!
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