Growing Intentional Families Together Blog
Read our blog to find out the latest on adoption.
Adoption. We’ve GOT to talk!
Adoption. We’ve GOT to talk! Adoption is complicated and overflows with coexisting ambiguities. It both creates and...
Set Your Parenting Course for 2024
To set your parenting course for 2024, review the past, make adjustments, enjoy your successes, identify your priorities & ask yourself these questions.
Adoption: Possibility, Parenting, and Coaching
Adoption means living in possibility, believing we can build families & love children not born to us. Hope isn’t enough however. We must meld hope with action.
Informed, Adoption Attuned Parenting Is a Gift
Gift-giving holds center stage at this time of year for most of us We feel pressure to find the perfect present and...
Adoption Matters. Talk about It.
It’s National Adoption Month. You’re ready to do your part to spread awareness about adoption. Before you start posting & talking up adoption, ask yourself what do I not yet know? Does what I currently know form a complete picture? How much do I know about perspectives beyond my own, like that of adoptees and birth parents? Read more…
Sustaining Regulation and Building Resiliency
Sustaining Regulation and Building Resiliency is one of our main parenting tasks and it is not always easy because our lives not only unfold in the security of our homes, but also against the backdrop of the world at large. The world feels more unsettled and dysregulated than ever, doesn’t it? Sadly, much of the stress and concern about world events, national politics, and the multiple challenges of daily life can easily overflow into our family lives. Even though our family relationships are our most important, often they feel the brunt of our frustrated, overstressed selves.
Our partners, family members, and co-workers are also buckling under the weight of similar pressures. That’s not a match made in heaven. Just the opposite, it is a pairing that demands our alert selves, our fullest commitment, and our strongest intentionality. Yes, friends and family will generally forgive our snark, inattention, and our blow ups. That is, if they are the exception, not the norm. And if we make the necessary attempts to acknowledge and repair.
Growing Adoption Success
Adoption success. What does that look like? To you? To your child? As a family? Each will define success differently. How can you create a shared definition? Adoption success doesn’t just happen. It requires intentionality and commitment. Work towards building a family life in which everyone’s needs are met and which is steeped in truth-telling, truth-acknowledging, and truth-seeking.
Preparing for the Unexpected as an Adoptive Family
If you are an adoptive parent, you have probably experienced many encounters with the unexpected. For most of us, a...
Learning through Extracurricular Activities
Learning Happens Outside of School Too. Aug. 16, 2023 Last week’s blog looked at how good habits, healthy routines,...
School Bells Ring Soon. Get Ready! Set Goals.
Parents and students all hope for a good year, one that is filled with learning—both academic and relational—and grows their ability to be in the driver’s seat of their lives. (After all, the point of parenting is to put ourselves out of a job: to raise kids that can succeed on their own.) So, how do we accomplish this vital goal? Operating purely on intuition is not enough.
You need a map
