We Did Not Choose Transracial Adoption

Here is the latest post for Adoptive Families Circle. If you are not a member you won't be able to comment, but if you would like to comment, please come back here and let me know your thoughts. I love to hear from you all. It makes my day!

"Most adoptive families encounter intrusive questions that biological families don't typically have to deal with. My husband, my children, and I belong to three different races, and our family is always being asked how we came to be together. I have yet to understand why that seems to matter to strangers on the street. I think that many people have a need to "figure out" any situation that looks strange to them.

This need to categorize our family also appears to include understanding why we chose to adopt children of a different race. We have been asked all kind of questions on the subject. We've been asked if we were trying to take a social stand against racism. We've been asked if we preferred black children to white or Hispanic children. We've been asked if we could not "get one" who "looked like you." We've been asked if we thought we would wait less time if we chose a child of color. We've even been asked if our children were "cheaper," which always bothers me."

Will come click over here to continue reading? And if you know anyone who would enjoy reading it, please share it or tweet it. Thanks, y'all!

Does DNA make a family?

Friends, here is the latest post for Adoptive Families Circle. It is very similar to one I posted here a while back (in fact, it was the foundation for it!) but if you are fairly new you may not have read it before. You won't be able to leave comments at AFC unless you are a member, so would you kindly come back here and leave your thoughts? I would love to read them!

How much did she cost?" "Why can’t you have biological children?" "Why did her birthmom not want her?" "Aren’t you afraid of how he will turn out?" "Do you know who her REAL parents are?"

When we walk around the block, or through the grocery store, or just about anywhere else, there's no hiding the fact that we're a family formed by adoption. Not that I would want to hide it -- ever. But I do sometimes cringe at those intrusive, tactless, ignorant questions that would never arise in any other context.

Please read the rest over here: http://www.adoptivefamiliescircle.com/blogs/post/does_dna_make_a_family/

It Happened at Daycare!

Here is the latest entry for Adoptive Families Circle. They won't let you comment there unless you are a member, so if you have some comment-love for me, please, please come back here and talk to me!

"When you have a multicultural, multilingual, and multiracial family you get used to some strange comments, bizarre questions, and amazing assumptions.
Some you are prepared to deal with, some you learn to handle as you encounter them, some are forgettable, and some stay with you and don't let go. There is one such interaction in particular I remember and it happened at daycare."

Read the rest of the story here:

http://www.adoptivefamiliescircle.com/blogs/post/transracial-families-talking-about-adoption-myths/

They Aren't Really Your Children!

My husband, Matt, our kids, and I were sitting at the counter of an ice cream shop licking away, trying to keep the sweet cream from running down our arms, and enjoying watching people hurrying up and down the busy avenue. A woman walked into the shop and without stopping to buy anything said to me, "Those are not your children, are they?"

In shameless self-promotion, here is the latest Adoption Family Circle post. Please join me here to read the rest of the bizarre conversation that ensued!

I have not fallen off the face of the earth (yet).

I have been MIA for a couple of weeks now (ok, more than a couple). I'd like to say it is because I have been oh, so busy with my very important life that I have not had time to write. And that is partially true (not the very important life part). I'd like to say that my presence has been required in many other places and I have had to prioritize. And that is partially true as well. I had a deadline to submit a post for Adoptive Families Circle by this week and since they are paying me... (well, does a free subscription for a year count as payment? Can I call myself a professional blogger for such a fee? Let's pretend and say yes, ok?).

But the real, honest-to-goodness reason I have not posted lately is because I simply have had nothing to say. 

No, really.

My kids are still doing cutesy things worth telling but not interesting enough for a blog post (I need some more interesting children. Anybody want to trade?). There have been adoption questions, funny stories, strong opinions, and spiritual awakenings, but nothing has grabbed me. Nothing has said, Blog me, blog me, I need to be a blog! Know what I mean?

 I follow some amazing writers who write to hone their skills, who can take the mundane of a daily moment and transform it into a post that will move you to tears, to laughter, to action. I read people who want to be (or are) professional writers, who should be published today, who have built a following because of their amazing power to reach your heart with words.

Me? I have no great aspirations here. I don't write every day. I don't even write every week (obviously!). I write when something happens and I think: Whoa! I have to blog about that.  And so far these last few weeks, nada, zilch, nothing. Lots of ideas floating in my head, none that have materialized to anything worth your eyes.

I want to write posts of substance that will encourage you, help you, interest you, maybe even convict you. Anything. But definitely not waste the precious few minutes I know some of you steal to read a blog here and there. So I remain committed to myself to writing only when I feel moved to do so, even if a few weeks go by. Please bear with me when I disappear. I promise when I do find something blog-worthy, it will be because I feel strongly that I need to share it.

Don't you find it ironic that I'm posting a non-substantial post about only writing posts of substance? Just a little bit.

For the time being, I will continue to read your wonderful stories and leave you a comment or two to let you know you have touched my life. In the meantime, will you please stop by AFC and read my latest post on our little family? They have "hired" me to talk about the bilingual nature of our family so there it is.

I'll be back. Stay tuned.

Adoptive Family Circle

So I started blogging for Adoptive Families Circle, the online community of Adoptive Families Magazine, and I am very excited about it.

I am SO excited about it that I wanted to announce it BIG here by placing the AFC logo right here and doing all this fancy linking to the posts, etc. But... being as computer illiterate as I can be, I never did figure out how to put the logo right here and my friend Heather, who is my unofficial IT person, is out of the country on a mission trip to Costa Rica. So...since my second post came out this week and I STILL have not announced my new venture in my own blog, I decided to just do it, even if it is in a boring, non-spectacular and non-flashy way.

I am blogging for Adoptive Families Circle! Yeah!

There. Announced.

Why? you ask.

Well, they have lots of bloggers that have adopted transracially, but none that have a bilingual family so they liked that side of our story (and of course they thought I was adorable. No, they didn't say that but a girl just knows, right?).

Anyway, I will be submitting once a month or so and I guess I will have to let you know in this non-fancy way each time, unless Heather takes pity on me and comes to help me in between saving the world.

The cool part has been being part of a new community and stepping out of my bloggy comfort zone to a wider audience (which is also scary since I have yet to have a nasty comment, but when you blog bigger I guess it will come and then I'll cry). The part that I have not liked at. all. has been the editing process.

Do you remember in school when the teacher gave you a paper back and there was more red than black left in the page? Just.like.that. These editors are ruthless. They don't even like incomplete sentences, which are some of my favorites. But, what can you do? If I want to see my little story posted, I have to submit to the man (or the two women in this case).

Anyway, please click over and read this. Oh, and leave a comment, if you have a minute. This post has been up for two days and all I hear are crickets and I'm starting to get a complex and I'm thinking maybe I should stop and I'm beginning to identify with Sally Fields and that is just worrisome.

So, without further ado...this is the link to my second post (if you really want to read the first one, it will be easier to find it from there).

http://www.adoptivefamiliescircle.com/blogs/post/race_and_children_adoption/

If you have followed my blog for a while you may recognize this one because it is an edited (ugh!) version of one I posted here very early.