Mathews

Congratulations to all the families!

Congratulations to all the new forever families.

Congratulations!

This here is truly a wonderful picture. Congratulations to this forever family!

We adopted an older child (our second). He was over a year old when he entered our home. Adopting an older child can be just as exciting as a newborn - believe me, we've experienced both situations. I would ask each of you that are PIW to gather the pertinent information then prayerfully consider this situation. I am so glad we did just that almost 8 years ago!

Congratulations to all.

Welcome Julie, We adopted in 1996 from ABRAZO. I have been a forum member since 2001. This forum is a great place to gather information and gain support.

I completely agree.

Congratulations Rich & Kristen!!!

Congratulations to the Ventura Family!

Congratulations!!!

Our family will be praying for this dear Birthmom as she makes decisions in the days to come.

Congratulation to the new forever family!

I've been reading this topic for the past couple of days. As most of you know, we are a transcultural family. Yes, sometimes we get those "weird stares and off color comments". We have learned to respond positively and move on and not let those comments be barriers to our family. I must share an experience with you that happened recently relating to our son. He is playing on a basketball team and one of the children on that team made a rude comment to our son. The comment was directed to imply that due to our son being a different color he was not an "American". It hurt, but after some tears and loads of hugging time between our son and us his parents, we decided to make the best out of the situation. So the next week (game day), our son took an extra $1 and bought his teammate a Gatorade drink and began talking with him and invited him to attend AWANA (Bible class at our church). This past week our son's teammate attended the AWANA class and today told our son he had a great time and wants to come back this coming Wednesday. The barrier of our son being a different color was no longer an issue between our son or his teammate and it's all due to how we as a family reacted to the comment. Yes, we were upset by the comment and yes, we were hurt cause our son was deeply hurt. We could have made a HUGE scene over the comment, but decided as a family we would move forward with the love of Christ. It has made all the difference. My son has seen how reacting in a positive way is much better and more effective vs. reacting in a negative way and the beauty of it for our son and his teammate is they each have made a new friend! There will always be those that live on this earth that don't agree with the decisions on how we grow our family but it's up to us (as parents) to seek within our own hearts and find the peace that passes all understanding on how our family is to be grown. I will be praying for those of you that are making decisions as you consider Elizabeth's request.

Welcome to all the beginner Parents in Waiting, We adopted through ABRAZO over 10 years ago. You will be truly blessed by working with the ABRAZO staff.

Welcome to the Forum!!! Elaine is right, we are a close knit community. Most of us have never met in person, but we have shared some of our most heartfelt thoughts together as a family. We adopted our daughter in 1996 working through ABRAZO. I would also encourage you to give them a call. You won't be sorry.....

I have to add our family's situation here. We have an open adoption experience through ABRAZO with our first child. Our daughter will be 10 yrs. old next month. Our second child's adoption (son) was international from S. Korea. We do not have any open contact with his birthparents, but we do have access to communication with his foster family living in S. Korea who loving cared for him from age 3 weeks until he traveled to the U.S. to become part of our family. This is very important to our son and we are thankful to have that connection for him. He is age 7. We were not required to travel to S. Korea. The agency we worked with had social worker travel to S. Korea and escort our son home to us. This worked very well for our family situation. While we waited, we received monthly updates with color photos of our son including all medical records going back to his birth. As far as the question, which is best International vs. Domestic adoption, I also believe it is whatever situation works best for the family involved. For us, the International adoption was a perfect fit after our domestic adoption working through ABRAZO as our daughter is full Asian and we felt very strongly we wanted our second child to be full Asian also. Some of the differences to consider in doing an international adoption is the paperwork is very time consuming vs. a domestic adoption. The wait time is sometimes longer for your child to enter your family and of course the biggest difference is with an international adoption, you do not have the opportunity to build a strong open adoption relationship with your child's birth family before, during and after. To sum all this up, whatever situation works best for your family is ultimately up to your individual family. Adoption is a wonderful option to grow a family. We would not trade either of our children, they are both equally loved and precious to us. Kim Mathews

Welcome Jenn and Dave, We matched with our daughter's birthmom in August 1996 and our beautiful daughter was born in September 1996. She is now turning into a teenager right before our very eyes. Enjoy the orientation and return back home ready to get that nursery ready. Your little bundle of joy will be here before you know it. Have a great day!!! Kim

Congratulations Sandi and Scott on the arrival of your beautiful baby girl.

Congratulations Trisha and family. Enjoy the time in Texas with your baby's birthfamily. That time is very precious.

Congratulations to both families.

To all the Orientation attenders: Have a wonderful weekend!! You are going to have a terrific time. The excitement brings back many memories of our trip to orientation in the spring of 1996.

Well, what a great Valentine's weekend this family is going to have. CONGRATULATIONS from Ohio!!!!

http://www.angelfire.com/journal/adoptionh...elp.html#GRANTS I am posting this again as some of the new adoptive parents are asking about this. Hope it helps.

We received three grants when adopting our son. The organizations we connected with did not ask us to generate funds from our friends/family. The funds from the organization was raised by private individuals and managed by the grant organizations prior to the grant being awarded. We do receive information from those organizations throughout the year asking for donations and alerting us of upcoming fundraising opportunities and the end of the year, we usually receive a letter asking for a direct donation. Hope this helps.