by GIFT Coach | May 21, 2014 | Adoptive Parenting Skills/Tool, Faith and Values, Post Adoption Challenges & Behaviors, Strengthening Family Relationships
Remember when we were kids and we craved our parent’s attention? We’d call their names and plead for them to watch whatever we were doing: a cartwheel, an energetic dance or, perhaps leaping high into the air. It was as if, our actions lacked value until...
by GIFT Coach | Apr 16, 2014 | Adoptive Parenting Skills/Tool, Faith and Values, Post Adoption Challenges & Behaviors, Strengthening Family Relationships
Intentional Families recognize the importance of having fun as a family. Creating special family holiday traditions is a great way to accomplish this. Whether the event is religious like Passover and Easter, or secular, holidays are important events in a...
by Gayle Swift | Dec 18, 2013 | Blogs by Gayle Swift, Difficult Discussions, Post Adoption Challenges & Behaviors, Strengthening Family Relationships
Holidays bring excitement, a desire to spend time with family and visit friends, and to add to the bank of treasured family memories. Such high expectations can be realized. But, in families whose children have a history of tough starts and trauma, often the holidays...
by GIFT Coach | Dec 5, 2013 | Adoptive Parenting Skills/Tool, Strengthening Family Relationships
At GIFT Family Services, we constantly look for ways to help families connect and create positive relationships and moments of togetherness that build healthy bonding in a family. A Facebook video posted by the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University...
by GIFT Coach | Nov 20, 2013 | Blogs by Gayle Swift, Faith and Values, Strengthening Family Relationships
We adoptive parents are thrilled to have our children in our lives. For most of us, the adoption process required determination, commitment, and persistence. Adoption changed everyone in the family, not just the adoptee. We all–parent, child, siblings,...
by GIFT Coach | Nov 8, 2013 | Adoptive Parenting Skills/Tool, Faith and Values, Infant Adoption, Strengthening Family Relationships
In honor of National Adoption Month, we are sharing the insights of adoptees. We invited them to share any thoughts which might assist families currently raising their children. Our first guest blogger is Parker Swift, pictured at left at 22 months. He is now 28. I...
