Books about Adoption

While sifting through the board book boat they have at our library last week, I came across quite the gem titled I Love My Hair. I plopped it in Abs' library shopping cart (they have kiddie sized carts and it is soooo cute!!... gotta love a library!!) along with the other books and didn't really give it a second thought.

I Love My Hair

Later that night, I was reading it to Abs and fell in love with that book, page after page. What a great resource for me, as a white mother reading to her black daughter, about a subject I know very little about: black hair. 

It made me wonder what other great books I might not know about that might help with my kids understanding when it comes to race and adoption. 

I thought I would highlight a few great books that were given to us that we just love. I'll link each one to amazon to make it super easy for you to gift one of these books to a friend who is adopting. 

A Blessing from Above

My all-time favorite book on the subject of adoption is A Blessing from Above, and Abs absolutely loves it too. I bawled my eyes out the first time I read it. It's a Little Golden Book, so I was (pleasantly) surprised to see a Bible verse about adoption on the title page. 

It's about a kangaroo with an empty pouch (yes, cue my infertility water works) who sadly sits under a tree one day, all alone. From an overcrowded nest of bluebirds falls a baby bird, right into Mama Roo's pouch. 

The storyline sweetly covers all angles from Mama Roo's loneliness to the Mama Bird's happiness that her baby bird will be safe and loved. It is an easy segue into a conversation with Abs about her story. Love this book. 

I Love You like Crazy Cakes

Another great adoption book is I Love You like Crazy Cakes which is specifically about an adoption from China, but it's still a great resource for working through the adoption process with your kids. 

It's written from the point-of-view of a mother's journey to China to bring home her daughter and all that this process entails. You feel the hope and joy of the mother and the support of her family and friends when she brings her baby girl home. 

We're Different, We're the Same

This next book isn't particularly about adoption, but about being different. Sesame Street's We're  Different, We're the Same is a super cute way to help your little one understand that even though their eyes, hair, skin, are different, we're all the same in that our eyes help us all see, our noses help us smell good food, etc. All children would benefit from this book, not just adopted kiddos.

I'm bummed my list of recommended books only consists of FOUR. What books have you guys found that help with adoption and multicultural issues? Please share your great finds!

Adoption Tax Credit

It's Tax Day!

Which for us, is one of the best days of the year..... the adoption tax credit!

Because Caleb is a Financial Wizard, we've always known about this credit, but unfortunately many adoptive families (and even accountants who help people with their taxes) do not know about and do not receive it. 

I am not a Financial Wizard and I do not understand the first thing about taxes or even navigating PayPal. So I am the last person in the world to write anything about a tax credit. But maybe that's a good thing here because hopefully I'll be able to shed light on an unknown topic in an understandable way. 

So here's the deal. The adoption tax credit is a credit- not a deduction, and it's better that way.

For 2016, the maximum credit amount is $13,460. Here is a scenario online I found: 

If your family spent $10,000 on an adoption, and you owe the IRS $7,000 in taxes this year, then the adoption tax credit is applied and you pay ZERO this year. Plus, you have the remainder of the amount you owe carried over to help out next year (in this scenario that is $3,000). 

  

Which brings me to the second great point about this credit: you carry over unused credit each year until you hit the max credit amount of $13, 460. 

Our example: AB's adoption was not finalized until 2014. All total, our domestic adoption expenses for her hit at exactly $15,000. Last year, we didn't hit the max amount, so we're still able to receive the credit on her this year. So we didn't even touch on Joshua's credit this year!

One thing to note. No matter how much your adoption costs, you only get credited up to the max amount of $13,640 (2016). It changes every year due to inflation, so it might be even more next year. 

Who qualifies? Domestic, International, Foster, and Same-Sex Partners (step-parent adoptions do not)

What counts as "qualified expenses"? adoption fees, court costs, legal fees, travel, lodging, and meals directly related to the adoption

If you have adopted since 2011, but have not applied for the adoption tax credit, click here for more information on how you can claim your credit now. 

Also, don't be surprised if you get notified of an audit. There is a 100% audit rate when filing for the adoption tax credit. We have our taxes handled by a professional whenever we are using the credit just to make sure everything is on the up and up when that audit comes in. Still worth it!

Thanks to Abby Bette's tax credit last year, we were able to swing Joshua's crazy expensive adoption. Don't miss out on it!

And can I just reiterate the fact that I do NOT understand taxes! Please leave any insights or better explanations in the comment section. My goal was to help make people aware that this tax credit exists, but I'm not sure I really did a great job explaining it.

Simmons Family Adoption Story

Tyler and Felicia were the first couple I knew to go through an adoption process. I remember seeing their announcement on facebook, hardly a year after they had gotten married and thinking it was such a big thing for people my age to go through. 

I completely believe that sharing stories like theirs helps people become more comfortable with adoption. To someone reading their story today, an adoption from a place like the Ukraine might seem really scary or just plain impossible.

But knowing that newlyweds could navigate the process and seeing Reed's beautiful smile assuages those fears.

Thank you, Simmons Family, for sharing your story. It is beautiful, just like you guys!

 
If you’ve been in the adoption world very long, you know one of the most common questions an adoptive couple gets is -- What’s wrong with you, why can’t you have your “own” children?

Adoption was something we discussed before marriage. We didn’t know when, how, or where our adoption would take place, but we knew it was something we had the desire to do. Surprisingly, two months before our first anniversary we started the journey to our first born.

Once we started researching where we wished to adopt from, we realized sadly we didn’t qualify for much in the adoption world. We hadn’t been married 5 years, we weren’t infertile - at least to our knowledge- we had no underlying conditions that prevented us from having biological children and the list continues. The first country we found that would allow us to adopt was Ukraine.

We chose to complete our adoption independently with the help of a lady from Florida who reviewed our paperwork and hired a translator for us once we were in country.

 In a Ukrainian adoption you do not have a pre-selected child. You specify the conditions of a child in which you would be interested in adopting. Six months after we started our adoption and after much of our paperwork was completed, Ukraine had a major change in their adoption law. You could no longer adopt a child under 5 years of age. At the time, this was devastating. After much prayer and discussion we decided to proceed with our adoption and change the home study to an older child.

Once you send all your paperwork to Ukraine, they review it and select a date and 30 minute time slot for you to come and look at pictures of children. Yes, I did say 30 minutes to select our child!

We sent our paperwork in January and one afternoon in August while at work I received the news that we would select our child on September 13th! We were told to be prepared for up to 12 weeks in country.

Once our 30 minutes began, they brought out several binders with information of children with a small 1 inch square picture in the top right hand corner. As they flipped through the pages they gave us details of each child - in Russian. Our translator tried to help us understand, but it was all happening so quickly.

I remember looking at the clock and knowing we only had 5 minutes. We had seen all the children they had offered, and we hadn’t felt that connection with any of them. We asked for more -- the lady offered us one more binder.

Our story, our world, our son was on the very last page of that binder as our time on the clock disappeared.


The 36 hours that followed this meeting included everything except sleep. Yes, we met our son after 36 hours of trains, paperwork, Ukrainian car rides, paperwork, and a little bit more paperwork! We were given the opportunity to spend 5 minutes with him before making our final decision. The moment he walked into the room and ran into my husbands arms we were his.  
There was no decision to make - God had made us parents in that very instant. 

To this day, Reed is the most talkative, joyful, compassionate, loving, giving little boy. He is the best big brother to his younger siblings.There isn’t a moment that goes by when he isn’t smiling. There are struggles in any adoption, especially older child adoption, but the pros are far outweighed by the cons.

We spent the next 5 weeks in Ukraine preparing to bring him home to his forever family. The judge in his region was very against us being his parents because of our age. The judge felt we were too young to become his parents. Thankfully, we had wonderful advocates on our side and the judge allowed us the opportunity to adopt him.

October 7, 2011 he became ours forever. We became a family of 3.

To this day, Reed is the most talkative, joyful, compassionate, loving, giving little boy. He is the best big brother to his younger siblings.There isn’t a moment that goes by when he isn’t smiling. There are struggles in any adoption, especially older child adoption, but the pros are far outweighed by the cons.
 
Looking back now, I thank God for each step of our journey.

 I clearly see now in all the bumps, struggles, and doubts we encountered in our 13 month journey were what got us to our son.
 
 We would have never been given the opportunity to adopt him if the laws hadn’t changed. His timing was perfect - our son was in the region of Ukraine that has been taken over by Russia. All of this meaning if we had waited just one more year before beginning our journey we wouldn’t have gotten our boy.

So, now when I hear the question - What’s wrong with you, can’t you have your “own” child.? I smile - knowing just as we are God’s own and He adopted us - Reed is our “own”. Maybe I laugh a little knowing after Reed we had two biological boys and neither of them look or act like their Daddy more than him! God truly is amazing in so many different ways and seeing Him shine through our adoption was nothing short of amazing.