Four Feet More

Because our two children joined our family through adoption, they have a different background and perspective on life than most of their peers. We celebrate the fact that they were chosen to be a part of our family and have been very open about their adoption. To this end, we are always interested in finding great children's books dealing with adoption, especially those relating to children from Russia. A book we discovered recently is Mishka: An Adoption Tale, by Adrienne Ehlert Bashista. I love this book because it deals with the unique situation in Russia where prospective parents make two trips to adopt their child. First, they fly out to meet their child and sign the papers declaring their intention to adopt him or her. Then they return home to wait for a court date before making the second trip to adopt their child. For us, the wait was only a month, but others have waited much longer (one family I know waited a year!). This books tells about that wait from the perspective of those left behind in the orphanage, in this case a little boy and the mishka (teddy bear) his soon-to-be parents gave him during their first visit.

We learned a bit from the Baby Home about how Eamon reacted to the wait in between trips. He didn't understand where we had gone and why we were not visiting him. He knew we wanted to make him a part of our family, but our absence made him very concerned and nervous about when we would come to get him. Caretakers at the orphanage told us of Eamon lying in his bed, shaking with fear that we would never come back. The picture of our family that we gave to him was crumpled from being held tightly in his little fist. When I learned of this, I wished that we had given him something cuddly to hold on to, rather than the hard, plastic toy truck which was our gift to him during that first trip.

Before we initiated the adoption process, I bought a teddy bear for the child who would one day be my son. It is a red, white and blue speckled bear with a USA patch on its chest (a bigger version of a TY Beanie Baby). We didn't give this bear to Eamon when we went to Russia on Trip 1 because I was afraid that it would stay at the orphanage and we would never get it back (these fears were well-founded because the stuffed rabbit we got for Vika was never seen again). However, when we brought Eamon home, I presented him with his Mishka, and it has been his constant bedtime companion ever since. He calls the bear "Russia Mishka" and the bright red, white and blue colors of its fur have merged together into kind of a dull lavender from being well-loved.

Eamon and Vika both connect Mishka: An Adoption Tale to their own experience, even though Vika was not as affected by the wait between trips as Eamon. This story is nearly as much of a favorite as A Mother for Choco, another great adoption book. If you have children adopted from Russia, especially if they were a bit "older" at the time of their adoption, I recommend adding this book to your child's library.

Below are some other adoption and Russia themed books that my kids enjoy. I wrote about Nikolai, the Only Bear here, if you'd like to learn more.