This Week in Twitter

Sharing some of our favorite posts and links from Twitter this week!  As always, please remember that all links are for information purposes only and are not warranted for content, accuracy, or any other implied or explicit purpose.









From Parent Map.com
     Nursing your adopted baby - Ages 0-2 - Ages and stages - Health and development - ParentMap.com


From Adoption Circle
     Here's a free, helpful tool to find out what kind of adoption is right for you. Takes only a few minutes!

    Adoption in the media can be a tricky topic with kids. Read movie & music reviews from adoptive parents.

From Michele Borba
     Tornados, Tsunamis, Osama: Ways to calm your child about scary news  

From the Dave Thomas Foundation
      Presenting the new foster care and adoption interview series.

From Gummy Lump
     Getting Rid of the Pacifier? Try this...

Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.


If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

All Strung Up

On June 5th, Hope Cottage is having our Annual Founder's Day Picnic.  No one knows for sure how long the event has been going on, but we do know Hope Cottage has had a picnic the last 30 years running straight.  Considering that we have 92 years of Annual Holiday Parties under our belts, I think it is safe to say Hope Cottage has had "dinner on the grounds" about the same amount of time. 

This will be my second picnic and it is a fun, casual event.  We serve hot dogs, cold drinks, cookies, games, entertainment and reunions.  I hear through the grapevine that "everyone" is coming.  I wish someone would define "everyone".  Event planners like to know - are we feeding 50 or 500?

Exciting this year because we have some of our older Hope Babies attending, along with some of our newest Hope Babies.  Definite photo op!

It is liable to be quite a show.  Right now we are running a campaign - if we get 500 people to like us on our Hope Cottage Fanpage on Facebook before June 5th, then ten children will be given the opportunity, at the picnic, to "string up the staff" - aka cover us with silly string.  I personally wanted us to have to do the macarena, but my co-workers quickly vetoed that.  AND we will video the string deluge and post it on our Youtube channel.  Fun times!

 I wonder what outfit goes best with silly string?

Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.

If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

Picture Tuesday - More Hope Babies and their Moms

In honor of our Mothers and Mother's Day, Picture Tuesday during the entire month of May will feature pictures of Hope Babies and their moms.  Enjoy!

Yes, all six children are Hope Babies!

Both boys are Hope Babies!



Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas.  Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services. 

If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

Twitter is More Than What You Had for Lunch!

For information junkies, Twitter is crack.  All those facts and figures at your fingertips! You think  Facebook causes you to lose track of time?  Just wait until you try Twitter!  But wait - I am not knocking Twitter, I am praising it.  So much information, so many resources at your command.  You can even organize your "tweets" by subject matter.  Woo-hoo - you are speeding off down the information highway in your snazzy convertible!  Today's blogpost highlights resources that might be of interest to our Hope Families and other adoptive parents.   As always, please remember that all links are for information purposes only and are not warranted for content, accuracy, or any other implied or explicit purpose.

And don't forget to follow Hope Cottage on Twitter.  We tweet as
@LeslieatHope (general information)
@helpathope (post adoption information) 
@EducationatHope (information from our adoption education department)
@devillegolf (information on the Annual Friends of deVille Golf Tournament benefiting Hope Cottage)

From America Adopts
Why adopted adults have a right to know who they are.  Link to the article.  

From MLJ Adoptions
Angelia Jolie Talks Openly About #Adoption.  Link to the article. 
From Adoption Circle
Do you need to create an adoption video profile? Here's a great example of how to do it!

A new adoptive mother struggles to find balance with her newly adopted baby & daily life. Can you relate?  Link to the article. 

Book Giveaway: Melissa Fay Greene’s “No Biking in the House Without a Helmet”

From National Adoption Day
RT @AdoptUsKids: RT @natadoptionday In total, more than 35,000 children have been adopted from foster care on National Adoption Day.

From NPR
NPR: Transracial #Adoption Parenting Dilemmas.  Link to the show. 


View Twitter as the great information provider that it is - all succintly packaged up in 140 characters. Check back with us next Thursday. We'll share more of Twitter's best on all kinds of adoption and parenting issues! And share this info with your friends.


 
Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.

If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

What Do All Those Letters Mean?

The majority of  staff at Hope Cottage are social workers and they all have these letters after their names.  Their credentials that tell us their education and licensure level, but what do they all mean?  For those outside the profession, it is all Greek!





BSW - Bachelor of Social Work, an undergraduate degree in social work

MSW -  Master's degree in social work or social welfare (required for advancement into an LCSW). This degree  represents two years of classroom study and, in each year, an intensive supervised internship. Master of Social Science (MSS) and Master of Science in Social Work (MSSW) degrees are equivalent to the MSW.


LBSW - Licensed Bachelor of Social Work.

LPC - Licensed Professional Counselor (LMHC in some states). This is a Master’s level mental health service providers, trained to work with individuals, families, and groups in treating mental, behavioral,and emotional problems and disorders.

LCSW - Licensed Clinical Social Worker.  This is a social worker who is trained in psychotherapy.  The Licensed Clinical Social Worker has a graduate academic degree, has had supervised clinical work experience, and has passed a national- or state-certified licensing exam. This advanced professional can receive health-care insurance reimbursements.


LMSW - Licensed Master Social Worker.  The Licensed Master Social Worker has advanced training, a graduate academic degree, has had supervised clinical work experience, and has passed a national- or state-certified licensing exam.

LMSW-AP - Licensed Master Social Worker, Advanced Practitioner.

LCPAA - Licensed Child Placing Agency Administrator.  Each child placing agency (i.e. Hope Cottage) is required to have one LCPAA on staff.  Requires professional references, management experience and a Master's or Doctorate degree or a Bachelor's degree with two years related experience.

Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.

If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

Picture Tuesday - Me and My Mom

In honor of Mother's Day and our wonderful Hope Cottage families, every Tuesday in May will feature pictures of Hope Babies and their mothers.  Enjoy!

This Hope Baby had five other siblings - all adopted from Hope Cottage

Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.

If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

Resource Thursday - Adoption Blogs

Blogger was down from Thursday around noon until Friday night, so our Resource Thursday post for the week is a few days late. Never fear - we are here featuring bloggers who write on adoption.


It is proven that we, as humans, benefit from a shared experience. You receive wisdom from those who have walked on the path before you and you receive and give support to those who are walking along beside you. That is why we have support groups. The only person who can know what a cancer patient is going through is someone who has been there and the only people who can really understand your adoption journey are people who have made that same trip.



The advent of the internet has opened up our world. No longer are we limited geographically to support groups in our locale. Cyberspace has made it possible to interact with people from across the globe.  For an information junkie, the internet is like crack.


Blogs came on the scene in the late 90’s. First termed “web log” and then later blogs, this digital form of communication evolved into on line diaries where people wrote about their day, their job, their thoughts and opinions on every subject under the sun, and then some.

The wonderful thing about blogs is they can and should be conversational in nature. Readers post comments, you comment back and soon you have a dialogue. In a quest to share, to vent, to comment, to seek opinions, it is only natural that people would blog about their adoption experience. Here are some blogs that are written specifically about adoption. Please remember that all links are for information purposes only and are not warranted for content, accuracy, or any other implied or explicit purpose.

Help your favorite blogger out.  When you read something you like, comment on it - you never know what kind of dialogue you will spark!  What is your favorite adoption blog?  Share it with us and we will recommend it to our readers.  And THANK YOU for reading our blog!  Be sure to share it with your friends.

Production Not Reproduction – The author has two children whom she adopted domestically. She blogs on her life and a myriad of adoption topics such as open adoption and transracial adoption.

Life from Here: Musings from the Edge – The author struggled with infertility finally adopting her child through an open adoption.

A Real Family - Normal is over-rated and not nearly as interesting or fun. The story of how a young, single White girl and two Black teenagers redefine the traditional family model and become the All-American Family. The author created this blog in hopes of encouraging others to consider adopting older children.

Goggy Coffee – A dad journals his life as a husband, a guitar instructor and a father of a multiracial family.

Peter’s Cross Station – A same gender couple shares stories about their lives with their adopted daughters.

Ramblings of a Single Dad – A single father writes about life raising his son.

Adoptive Dads - A guys' perspective on parenting--blogs from dads though adoption and foster care.


Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.

If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

Meet the Staff - Meredith Bomkamp

Meredith Bomkamp, BSW

You have to admire a child who has perfect attendance in church choir for six years. That child was Meredith Bomkamp. Nothing could stop her from being there every Wednesday night!


Meredith joined Hope Cottage this past February as the Foster to Adopt (FTA) Program Assistant.  She and co-workers have been diligently expanding our Foster to Adopt program, recruiting and training the families, making sure they are prepared to parent children in the state foster care system who are free to be adopted.

Meredith has lived in the metroplex her entire life, growing up in Garland and then Mesquite. She earned an Associate of Arts degree from Eastfield College and her Bachelor’s of Social Work from the University of Texas at Arlington. Meredith says this of her career choice, “I always knew I wanted to work with families. I was a substitute teacher throughout college and decided the classroom would not allow me to make the difference I wanted to make. So I changed my major from Education to Social Work and never looked back. I worked for CPS and after a few years decided that I wanted to work more with adoption and the building forever families.”

Meredith and her husband, a  police officer, have five children between them. Suffice it to say, juggling schedules and activities for five children doesn’t leave much time for leisure at the Bomkamp household. We are glad Meredith is here. She is a great addition to our Foster to Adopt team.

Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.


If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

Picture Tuesday - Me and My Mom

Every Tuesday Dallas adoption agency Hope Cottage shares pictures from its archives.  In honor of Mother's Day, enjoy photos of Hope Babies and their Moms.  If you have a picture of a Hope Baby(ies) and his/her mom and would like them to be included in a future post, email the picture to lclay@hopecottage.org.

Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.


If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.


If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

Love is a Special Thing - The Mother's Day Song



The Olivers - early 1980's



Composer Janie Oliver always wanted to write a song for Mother’s Day. But for the longest time it was much too painful. You see, at the same time Janie yearned to honor her mother and the love her mother had for her family, Janie and her husband struggled with infertility. Janie and her husband chose adoption to build their family. They adopted their son, Jeffrey and nine months later, a second son – Christopher, appeared on the scene. Yes, after adopting, Janie and her husband found themselves pregnant. Two children nine months and two days apart kept Janie from her composing, but the desire to write a song honoring mothers still lingered in the back of her mind and on her heart.

Their two sons were extreme opposites. Jeffrey was an easy child, loved to snuggle and rarely cried. Christopher was extremely active, always in motion, rarely slept soundly and didn’t like being held closely.

When Christopher was a few months old, Janie walked into his room to get him up from his nap. He was blue, not breathing and unresponsive. He was in the middle of a SIDS episode. Janie rushed him to the hospital and waited as the doctors worked on him. He survived the episode and the doctors called Janie into the exam room. She rushed to pick up her son and when she did, he just snuggled down in her arms – the first time he had ever done that. Janie rocked him back and forth and as she did, her Mother’s Day Song began to form. She later laid her sleeping baby in the crib, and while he slept peacefully and still, she wrote the words and music to “Love is a Special Thing” . It was in honor of her own mother and grandmother and with graditude for her two precious boys that came to her in different ways to make her a mother twice within one year.



The boys are all grown up!

That was 30 years ago. For many of those years, the children of Park Cities Baptist Church and their mothers have performed Janie’s song on Mother’s Day, as they will do again this Sunday. Children singing the first verse, mothers singing the second verse and everyone joining together on the third verse and ending chorus. There isn’t a dry eye in the entire congregation. In honor of all our mothers, here is that song - “Love Is A Special Thing”.


Love Is a Special Thing
by Janie Oliver
Lorenz Publishing Company  GGA-382

A mother’s love is a very special thing.
Gentle and soft as the lullaby she sings.
Warm and embracing with power like a king
Love is a special thing.

The love of a child is a very special thing.
Fragile as snowflakes and butterfly wings
Simple and trusting, and promising as spring
Love is a special thing.

This love that we share is a very special thing.
It fills my heart and it makes me want to sing.
Sharing and caring, such happiness it brings
Love is a special thing.

For love is of God
Love is of God.

And God’s love for us is a very special thing
Full of compassion and boundless as the sea.
Holding me close and yet, letting me be free.
Love is a special thing.

So cherish it and treasure it
For love is a special thing.


Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.


If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.


If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.



Meet the Staff - Cara Filipski

Cara Filipski, MSSW

What would you do if your brother told you you could fly like a bird off the top of the basement stairs if you just used his back as your launchpad? Would you do it?  Cara Filipski was five years old and completely trusting of her older brother.  She perched on his back and catapulted herself forward in her attempt to fly around the basement like a bird.  Says Cara "I was young and thought my brother had my best interest at heart...well he didn't."  Cara hit the bottom of the stairs and knocked out her front tooth, which had to be glued back into place.  "If you see my school pictures during the next two years, you can easily see the glue surrounding my front tooth."

All this occured in Downs, Kansas (population 1,200) and home of the Kansas Storytelling Festival where Cara grew up with her two older brothers.  She received her Bachelors in Social Work in 2003 from Fort Hays State University in Hays, Kansas. (Go Tigers!)  Cara moved to Dallas  because she wanted to be near her brother (hopefully NOT the one who turned her into Tweety Bird).  Since arriving in Dallas, Cara has completed her Masters degree in Social Work from UTA, met the man of her dreams, married, and started working at Hope Cottage.

Making a difference in the lives of children and families is something Cara has always wanted to do, inspired by the aunt who has been a social worker for thirty years. 

In her free time, you can find Cara shopping for pink as she and her husband are expecting a baby girl in July.  Cara's most recent read is Saving Max by Antoinette Van Heugten and her favorite movie is "Annie". 

Cara's primary responsibilites at Hope Cottage are working with our birthmothers.


Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.


If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.


If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.

Picture Tuesday - Me and My Mom

Every Tuesday Dallas adoption agency, Hope Cottage, posts photos from its archives.  In honor of Mother's Day, enjoy these photos of Hope Babies and their moms.  If you have a picture of a Hope Baby(ies) with Mom, email them to lclay@hopecottage.org for future posts. 

Hope Cottage is the oldest nonprofit, non sectarian adoption agency in Dallas. Since 1918 Hope Cottage has been building and nurturing strong families through counseling, education and adoption services.

If you have questions about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 214.526.8721.

If you are a woman facing an unwanted pregnancy and would like to talk to someone about adoption, please call Hope Cottage at 1.800.944.4464 or 214.404.4546.