Arts and Crafts

Well, I almost lost it yesterday. Thus far, I’ve been able to keep my cool on the adoption front. You want me to take a class on multi-racial issues? Parenting Issues? No problem. You want medical tests taken, forms signed? No problem. You want copies of our taxes? No problem. You want to talk to my close friends? No problem. Any piece of information the social worker thinks she needs to be able to give her word to a woman that her baby will be absolutely loved and cared for by us is fine by me. But yesterday, things got ugly. What they were asking from me now took me to a place I had no business being in. A place that made me feel deeply uncomfortable and even panicked: the craft store Michaels.

It probably goes without saying that I am not a crafty person. My mother could have earned Academy Awards for how she received my various arts and crafts projects when I was a child. So I’ve been a bit concerned about the book we need to put together which will be presented to birthmothers. Basically, it contains some pictures of ourselves, our family, and some text explaining who we are and what our lives are like. The guidance I received from our social worker was to keep it simple and have it reflect our personalities as much as possible.

Do you have any idea how many scrapbook products Michaels sells? Reams and reams of papers. Vellum. Cardstock. Cutesy stickers. Photo edgers. Photo mats. Ribbons. Buttons. Special scissors to make cute edging of the paper. Things I had never even heard of and had no idea how to use. Foolishly I had gone in two hours past when I should have eaten lunch and my low blood sugar just made my frantic reaction to the place worse. It was honestly the first time I have felt that resentment that many adoptive parents feel about having to go through some step that biological parents don’t to become parents. It is one thing to investigate every aspect of my life, but it is quite another to demand that I do arts and crafts! Indignant and dejected, I decided to go home and regroup. I had clearly underestimated the strength I would need to tackle this project.

While talking to my social worker this morning, I confessed my freak out to her praying that craftiness wasn’t high on the scale of parenting attributes they look for in adoptive parents. And thank god I did because she answered all my fears by telling me that more and more people are making their books through Shutterfly. Instead of panicking over cutting straight lines (which no, I am not capable of doing) and my horrid handwriting, I can use a template and just add my own pictures and some text!! Now this, I think I can handle. I can even do it in my jammies.