3 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Could have been better for your Intl. adopted child, April 26, 2005
This review is from: Mom and Me (Hardcover)
I love the idea of sitting down with and without your child and creating a magical and unforgettable personalized book about your relationship with your child.
The chapters are:
Like a House
Life Before You Where Born
My Birth
My Firsts
My Life As a Toddler
My Mom's Perfume
My Mom by Heart
My Mom and Me
My Mom and Her Life
My Mom and Her Work
From Mom to Mom
My Mom and Her Family
My Mom As a Baby
My Mom As A Little Girl
My Mom as A Teenager
My Mom As a Young Woman
Meeting My Dad
Our Family
Those Eyes
I think this an awesome book and would give it 5 stars if they had just tweeked a few of the pages by asking someone who's adopted what they thought about maybe 3 or 4 pages. They do get kuddos for actually thinking about and including your adoptive child both domestic and Internationally adopted but, I think they did so late in the book writing so to speak and really didn't give it as much thought as they could have. Some domestic adoptions also have very limited information on the birth mother.
For example:
Page 6 - Life Before You Where Born
It shows a drawing of a very pregnant mom and a space to put your child's 1st ultrasound and what week the ultrasound was taken.
But I still loved the book and plan to work around it and add a 5x7 referral photo of our daughter.
Page 7 Tell me Mom... Mom, please tell me about my life inside of you! This page has a photo of a stork's neck & beak holding 4 green bunddles to write:
1st green bundle asks: How did you know you were pregnant? How did you feel? What did you do when you learned the news? They could have used How did you know I was going to be your child?
If you go left to right the 2nd & 3rd green bundle are OK for your adoptive child, but would be left blank unless you put some more referral photos in these 2 bundles. The only problem there is that usually you only get 1 referral photo 2 or 3 if you are lucky.
4th green bundle - this is where it looks like when doing the final draft of this book said, oh we should include adopted children too! It's question is If I was adopted, how did you and Dad find me? Where did I come from? Did you wait a long time?
OK, but now blank for any child who wasn't adopted - so I guess you could add a baby picture there.
Page 9 My Birth
I love that it says " To have or adopt a child is like plunging into mysterious water- the water of an upcoming life that is filled with love. And even if a mom has had other babies, for her, each new birth is another jouney.
Across from that is a little cloud for you to write on Who cut my umbilical cord? Adopted children have so little if any information on their births
Then you put in the date of your child's birth - that's ok
Next - When and at what time was I born? With International adoption at least in China that is information you seldom get.
Week of the day - you can go back and find out on a calendar.
How did it go? (I guess they where talking about your birth) - no usable and another blank space & sensative spot in an adoptive child's life.
The other questions on this page are written well and can be used by all - What did I look like when you first saw me? What did you think? What did you say? Did you take me in your arms right away? If yes, how did it feel? Was Dad there? If yes, what did he say or do? Were there other people there? This one could have been left out or added to Dad's section.
Page 14 My Life As A Toddler - great for those of us who have adopted a baby. You could use this for the referral information that came with your photo, but information is also sometimes limited
And then the other 36 pages are awesome. I love the little sealed area where they included a little pad to put your favorite perfume on. I love that this is a book that both you and your child can do together and have your child draw and answer questions about you her mother.And that later on in life your child and look back and see what she thought and at what age as well as things your child might not have known about you as a child yourself.
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