Weekly Reading List 7-6-09

Hope everyone had a wonderful long holiday weekend! I got back from Vermont last night and took today as a vacation day, so I am enjoying some leisurely lounging around the house before I have to go back to work tomorrow. I only checked my email quickly twice while I was gone, and it was nice to be unplugged as I planned...but don't worry, I have plenty of good reading to share this week!

Go watch the trailer for this documentary, Unlocking the Heart of Adoption....I had no idea of the origin of the phrase "put up for adoption" before I saw this, and I will never think of it the same way again after...this is definitely a DVD on my "must-see" list now!

This story at Resist Racism, about an abusive adoptive father, turned my stomach, but I think it's important to face stories like this so we can work towards making sure they don't happen again. I had a whole rant prepared in my head about how it's situations like this that demonstrate why the homestudy process should really be even more rigorous than it is, but then this post at Grown in My Heart said it for me.

Also at Grown in My Heart, I found this post about Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder. This is not a common issue in children adopted from Ethiopia, but I thought these resources might be helpful for anyone who is struggling with this.

Here is information about a bill that proposes to change the immigration status of children adopted internationally by US parents. Interestingly, here is a post at Resist Racism that suggests maybe it's not such a great idea to make it even easier for people to adopt:

"My first thought? Trafficking. My second thought? Parents who meet criteria in another country for adoption but who lack homestudies in the United States. My third thought? What about parents with citizen children who are being deported? What about those children’s rights? My fourth thought? Why can’t international adoptees sponsor their biological relatives for immigration to the U.S.? And where’s the adopted parent lobby for that one?"

I think it's important to look at all sides of an issue before making up my mind about it, and for me the jury is still out on this one.

I loved this post at The Mom Slant, Mistakes are the Portals of Discovery, because this is the kind of parent I am hoping to be someday.

Finally, in this week's "good lord, where does the time go" moment, Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing was released 20 years ago and The Washington Post has a review of the anniversary DVD. I saw the movie when it first came out but haven't seen it since, and I'm thinking I might learn a few new things from watching it again now that I have a slightly different perspective on race than I did back then.

The weekly reading list will return to it's regular Sunday schedule next week, but in the meantime I hope you enjoy what I have shared this week!