Why Creating a Lifebook for Your Adopted Child is Important

Then we adopted a baby. I couldn't find a baby book or adoption book that had my son's story and I kept hearing the phrase "life books." Every child's story is unique.

So I headed to the local craft store and waded through the hundreds of stickers, trying to find baby ones that didn't include clip art of storks or quotations about pregnancy. Eventually, I started creating my own transparencies to use as scrapbook overlays, so I could have pretty pages about everything from "the wait" to Adoption Day. Now it's hard to imagine that I nearly let these memories pass me by because I didn't want to invest a bit of time into an album.

Why did I think it was vital to scrapbook about my child's adoption?

1. Adoptive moms can be total strangers, but quickly become best friends over sharing our own experiences of choosing to adopt to the day we brought our child home. The stories of our children, from their perspective, are just as special! It can be easy to take the simple route and buy a book where you fill in the blanks, but it's impossible to fill in all the pages, because, for example, it may depend on if your child was adopted internationally or domestically. Does she know her birthfather or not? It's hard to read our child her story when there are blank pages (and kids always ask about those blank pages.)

Plus, when you scrapbook, you can make an album specifically for your child to flip through in language she can understand, depending on her age. As your child gets older and asks more questions, you can incorporate these pages into the book wherever they fit. My son recently started asking, "What if God had sent you a different little boy? Would you have loved him?" This is a perfect opportunity for a new page for his album, describing how God picked him out just for us.

2. Photos are fun to look at but I've been surprised at how quickly the memories that go along with them can fade. When I look back at pictures taken just six months ago that I didn't take the time to journal about, I realize how many cute things my son said that I've forgotten already. What was that joke we laughed about for fifteen minutes? I can remember the giggles, but not the whole story behind the photos that keep the memories alive. And every child loves to hear about all the funny things he did or said when he was young!

3. Adoption is one of the most amazing gifts we will ever experience in our lifetime and I want my son to realize that we recognize it as such. Even as he watches me put together an album, or grows up reading it on my lap, is a sign to him that He is precious to us. When you share about your child's birth family, visits you may have with them, how your family was formed, or your child's place of birth, it's telling your child their story is worth telling! Our child should never believe that her story or life before us makes us sad or threatens our role as parents. Adoption scrapbook albums are a way to reinforce that her whole life is worth celebrating, not just the time since she became a part of your family.

As an adoptive mom, I have grown to see scrap booking not as a frivolous hobby, but a significant way to record a miracle that God gave us--the honor of being our long-awaited child's parents.

Adoption scrapbook albums are a great deal more than what some people call a "brag book" or photo album. These books, whether called international adoption lifebooks or just an adoption book, is a special account of pictures and memories, a custom-made story book of your child's life, and a keepsake for him to always know how much he is treasured. There are always concerns about how adoption affects a child, but through an adoption scrapbook album, I hope our son will know that we have always embraced and celebrated how he made us a family--through the joy of adoption.

Make a gorgeous adoption lifebook quickly with tools from Scrapbook My Adoption. Complete books using overlay transparencies, digital scrapbooking adoption files and embellishments, make it easy to have an personalized lifebook your child will treasure.