Adoption
Life Books??
Hi, we are in the middle of getting licensed for "legal risk" foster-to-adopt. At one of the training classes last night, we were told our family needs to make a "Life Book" that will be shown to those picking which child our family is placed with. They said a life book needed to have family photos, house photos, vacation/holiday photos, neighborhood photos, etc.
This has me really stressing b/c I didn't knwo we had to make this. I am also not quite for sure what they are actually wanting in here...and it is a big piece of how we are chosen for a child. Has anyone else made one? What exactly did you put in there? Just photos?? Or did you write info in there too?? Would love examples!!
Thanks!
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Re: Life Books??
Did the trainer indicate they would show you what they're looking for?
We're doing domestic adoption, and have a profile put together. I don't know if it's exactly what you're looking for, but if you PM me I can send you links.
There are sites like scrapblog.com that you can use to make these.
ETA: I misread your post and thought it said lifebooks for the child, not for choosing a child. So nevermind on all of this since it would be for the child once s/he is placed with you. It does sound like they are wanting more of a profile book/photo book for placement purposes. I don't think they should call that a lifebook, but oh well. Sorry for the confusion!
Lifebooks are not scrapbooks. They are a way to tell your child's story, both good and bad. It is not always something you would show anyone else due to private or sad parts of the story. There is a book that you can buy that will take you through the process. It isn't a big book, so I do feel it is overpriced for the content it provides, but I would recommend reading it anyhow. Book is here
https://www.amazon.com/LifeBooks-Creating-Treasure-Adopted-Child/dp/0970183275/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267027309&sr=8-1
My review from when I read it here:
https://towardsfamily.blogspot.com/2009/07/book-review-lifebooks-creating-treasure.html
There are premade kits such as below, but I think you can spend a lot less money just by reading the book and then making your own based on what's appropriate for your child.
https://www.resourcewk.com/rw3_004.htm
It definitely sounds like you are making more of a profile for them to look at; a life book is what you would make for and with your child after they are placed with you. It's all about their life and their background. (I have the book that the previous poster mentioned; I do recommend it once you are ready to start working on a Life Book.)
Our profile was information that we wrote out about ourselves about our relationship, how we met, where we work, why we want to adopt, our families, etc. We were allowed to include 5-7 photos. I just pm-ed you with a sample of what we wrote.
Yea, I agree with PP. This definitely sounds more like a profile than a Life Book. In our profile, we put a section about each of us as individuals and we like to do together, how we like to spend our free time, info on our community, and then section on what we thought were important family values. We included lots of pictures of us taking part in our hobbies and with our family/friends (that would be involved in the child's life).
Scrapblog is probably the easiest online application to create a scrapbook with. If you can click and drag, you can make your book. That's what I used to create our profile. I will shoot you a PM with a link to our profile so you can see it for an example.
Be sure to check with your agency on the specs for your profile (size, length, areas that they require you touch on, etc). All agencies are different.
Good luck!
Erica