1. ANNOUNCEMENTS:
   - Happy 2007
   - Ask the Adoption Doctor
   - Become a Blogger!
2. FEATURED ADOPTION BLOGS
3. HIGHLIGHTED ARTICLES
4. ADOPTION NEWS
5. FEATURED ADOPTION PRODUCT
6. FEATURED WAITING CHILDREN
7. MEET NEW HOPEFUL ADOPTIVE PARENTS
8. ADOPTION GEM - inspirational thought
9. ADOPTION BUZZ - message board discussions
10. JUST FOR THE FUN OF IT - clean weekly humor
11. FEATURED ADOPTION PROFESSIONAL
12. ADOPTION CALENDAR - events, seminars, & chats
13. ADOPTION POETRY
14. SPEAK OUT - contributions from our readers

Adoption Network Law Center - Why wait? Our stats thru Oct. '06 show most families selected by a birth mom were matched within 4 months. Let 2007 be the year you start growing your family! Call for a free consultation.

Happy 2007!
This week's issue is abbreviated as staff and contributors to Adoption Week enjoy the holidays. Over the next few weeks, we will be bringing new features to this publication, starting with this issue! This week we've added an international waiting child to the section "Featured Waiting Child" making it "Featured Waiting Children". Now both domestic and international children will be highlighted. Keep watching for more enhancements to Adoption Week.

Ask the Adoption Doctor
Get your questions about international adoption-related medical, psychological, social work, and legal issues answered online at no cost. Every month, the adoption medicine specialists and associates of AdoptionDoctors.com will answer your questions about your concerns in these areas. These questions and more are part of a new feature that has been added to our International Adoption site: Ask the Adoption Doctor. Visit Ask the Adoption Doctor, check out the newest questions and the archives, and submit your own question.

Adoption Media is Hiring Bloggers
If you love to write, know how to check your spelling and grammar, have a passion for the topic and for passing along information, experience, and resources, here's what you need to know: ...learn more

Africa Adoption Blog - Oprah in South Africa
I’m not much of a celebrity follower, but I do have some faves. One of those is Oprah (although I have to shamefully admit that the only show of hers I’ve seen is the one she did on the Fistula Hospital ...more

LDS Adoption Blog - Happy New Year (and Haitian Independence Day) Part 1
The beginning of a new year can be a busy time for anyone, but we find ourselves particularly busy due to the traffic jam of first-of-the-year holidays we celebrate in our family. Mercifully ...more

Kazakhstan Adoption Blog - Post Placement and Annual Reports
As with most countries, as the number of children who join forever families grow, guidelines that weren’t in place during one year – come in to effect or are enforced during another adoption. Our requirements ... more

Read and comment on more adoption blogs at http://www.adoptionblogs.com.

Home Study Process
Individuals wishing to adopt must be approved by a home study agency to do so. Home Study can be done by a Licensed Social Service Worker (SSW) or an licensed agency within your state of residence ...more

Explaining Adoption to Your Children, Family and Friends
Children are growing up in many different kinds of families today. Race, religion and sexual orientation are all blending together and changing the "traditional" family structure. There are stepparent families ...more

What Children Understand About Adoption At Different Ages - article by Lois Melina
Children cannot understand adoption until they can understand reproduction - usually around the age of 6. Nevertheless, many experts believe children should hear about their adoption before this age ...more

Read the entire text of these articles at e-Magazine.adoption.com, and submit your adoption-related articles for possible publication in this newsletter. All submissions will be subject to the applicable terms, restrictions and conditions of Adoption Media, L.L.C.

Fostering Adoption - TheDay.com
As a licensed foster parent, Michelle Scarlett had taken in children before. ...more

Teen Mother has Change of Heart - Beacon Journal Gazette
It's hidden beneath a brace on 17-year-old Stephanie Bennett's hand. Written in purple magic marker is the name of her daughter: Evelyn JoAnn ...more

Foster Care System Seeks More Open Hearts and Homes - Tuscaloosanews.com
Five one-gallon jugs of juice are lined up on the floor beside the kitchen cabinets. Car seats, clothes, bottles, toys and other basic necessities for children are stored in two backyard sheds. ...more

Read more headlines at news.adoption.com.

International Waiting Child

Anyeli
This is yet another beautiful, healthy child waiting in a foster home in Guatemala. She is ready for assignment to a paper ready family. ...more

John & Meredith (IL) John & Christine (NY)

John & Amy (MI)

Are you pregnant? Visit parentprofiles.com (a service of Adoption Profiles, L.L.C.) to choose who you feel will be the right adoptive parents for your baby.

Are you a hopeful adoptive parent? Explore tools to help build your profile. (Sponsored by Adoption Profiles, L.L.C., which is solely responsible for its content)

Sharing With Others From Experience - Guilt, Shame, Reject, Alone, Denial, Lost Special Needs Adoption - What Are You Doing Today? Foster Parenting - What in the World Should I Do? Concern is Not The Word General Adoptive Parent Support - Need For Adoptive Parents Guatemala Adoption - My MIL Totally Forgot About My Daughter for Christmas Domestic Adoptions - On Average, How Long Did It Take To Get Matched For an Infant? General Adoptive Parent Support - A Few Questions...


For more on-line adoption discussions, visit forums.adoption.com.

Important Questions
Ponder these questions as you start the new year...

Contributed by: Clean Jokes.com

Share your family-appropriate humorous adoption story or joke for possible publication in this newsletter. All submissions will be subject to the applicable terms, restrictions and conditions of Adoption Media, L.L.C.

Children's Hope International
  Located in several states
  Phone: see listing for local phone numbers
  E-mail: Children's Hope International
  Services:   • Adoption Agencies • Adoption Facilitators • Home Studies • International Adoption
  Countries:   • China • Colombia • Guatemala • India • Russia • Vietnam

Find adoption agencies, attorneys and other adoption professionals in your area at adoptiondirectory.com. When you contact adoption professionals using our directory, please make sure to let them know how you found them.

See what your own directory ad could look like.

To view local listings, regional seminars, many other adoption events, and to list your organization's events, visit adoption calendar.com.

I am searching for my birth family. I was born January 31, 1961 in Camden County Georgia. I was placed with my adoptive parents at 3 weeks old. There has always been an empty space in my life not knowing my heritage. My 11-year-old daughter is another reason for my search. I want medical history for her. If anyone has any information - no matter how insignificant it may seem - please e-mail me.

I adopted two children from New Jersey foster care, Michael (born 1/22/1999 in NJ) and Melissa (born 12/6/1996 in Las Vegas, NV). At the time, I was a new foster parent and did not meet the kids' birth parents. Melissa loves and misses her birth mom (Kelly from Las Vegas area) so much. I would love to hear from anyone who knows of her whereabouts or those of any other birth relatives. I have applied to New Jersey's mutual adoption registry to no avail. I feel bad that I did not meet Michael & Melissa's birth parents and hope that I can locate them soon. Hopefully, knowing they are doing well would help her birth mom also. Please e-mail me. ~ Laurie

I've been registered in the reunion registry on Adoption.com for over 4 years now, but have only been actively searching for the last year and a half. I found identifying information from the state of NH, and a social worker with the state helped me make contact (through letters) with my birth parents. While neither of them seem interested in continuing contact, or even in answering the questions that I continue to have (which hurts, but that's their choice, and their loss), I have just received the most wonderful Christmas present.
    Because of the reunion registry, my biological sister, born almost exactly a year after I was, found my contact information, and called me and we're now communicating, sharing photos and information, and are even discussing a face-to-face meeting. My adoptive parents seem hesitant, my adoptive sister is enthusiastically supportive, and my friends want to know when we're road-tripping to visit this "found family."
    To everyone out there who's still searching: be patient. Have faith. Sometimes, you just have to wait for it to be the right time and place for the other parties involved. To all of you staffers on Adoption.com and Adoption Week, thanks for everything. Keep up the good work, and know that you're making a difference in people's lives every day. Happy New Year! Thanks, Cami

I am looking for my daughter Michelle (spelling wrong) whom I gave up for adoption from Sparrow Hospital, Lansing, MI. She was born on September 9, 1968. Catholic Social Services took her from the hospital and the last I knew she had been adopted by a family who had a small manufacturing company. Please e-mail me if anyone has any information or hopefully if you Michael (?spelling) and looking for your birth mother. I love you and always have, I made a wrong choice at that time. I was scared and confused and was alone with no one to turn to and if felt it would be better for you if you were given a better life than the one I could of given you. God Bless you and I pray that you are looking for me also. Love Carla

Hello, I am searching for my brother Walter Delp (my mother's name for him at birth). He was born on November 18, 1955 in a clinic in Manassas, Virginia. The adoption date was 11/29/55. It was a private adoption so I have no other information except that my mother thought the woman's name was Jody Carpenter but this is purely speculation. She could not get any further information from the doctor who arranged the adoption, a Dr. Rengarts. That is the only other information I have. I don't know if the clinic is still open, but I am sure that the doctor has passed.
    I have posted this on other sites, but to no avail...perhaps he doesn't know he is adopted. That is entirely possible. My mother died in 1971 and I have been looking for my brother and also another sister for about seven years now.
    I do have some good news. I did find my sister a couple of years ago, she had been looking for many years for her family. It is just like she has been one of the family all along. I am just glad we got connected and am hoping to do the same with my brother. If there is someone out there who has any information, I certainly would appreciate a reply. ~Lillian

To "A Heartbroken Birthmother"--As a Birthmother myself, I think I would have done exactly as you did, and tried to catch a "glimpse". It has been 22 1/2 years since I gave up my baby girl for adoption (I was only 17 when she was born). I long everyday for a chance to know her name, what she looks like, if she is like me or her father, and, of course, if she is healthy and happy. I pray that she has had a happy life and ever since she was 18, I pray that the time will come when she wants to know me. I had a completely closed adoption, and wish all the time that things would have been different and that I could have had an open adoption.
    Don't feel guilty for wanting just a little bit of your son to hold dear in your heart. I only wish I had the same. Good luck to you as you wait for him to find you and God Bless!! BKS (iso birthdaughter born 5/24/1984 in Hutchinson, KS). Have a wonderful day!! ~Brenda

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