Family Book

[MissHL]

Morning Ladies and gents!
Me and my partner have been asked to put together a family book for the children we are adopting as a way of introducing them to us before the actual introductions...we have been told to include photos of ourselves, the bedroom, house etc....
I'm just wondering if any of you have had to do similar and can throw some ideas or inspiration our way?
Thank you!

How old are they? We used a soft kids photo album with peek a boo bits etc. We also used a talking butterfly photo thing for DD2 because she was younger.

@EightWellies they are 1 and 2

At those ages I’d keep it very simple, not too many pictures and not too many people in them. I’d echo the idea of a soft photo book or a book you can voice record into - another idea I saw was of having a cuddly toy in school picture which you give to the foster carers with the book which can act as a transitional object for the child.

Congratulations on being matched - exciting times!

We're hopefully about to be matched with a 1 and 2 year old! Have done soft cover photo book with only about 6 pages for photos. Have got them a cuddly toy each which we will (hopefully!) give at start of intros. These toys are in each photo e.g. sat in cot/high chair/In garden.

We've also been advised to WhatsApp foster carer with some audio of us reading a story and singing nursery rhymes.

Really wishing you all the best and don't be afraid to ask sw or fc for some guidance

I hadnt even thought about a soft toy!
Gosh I thought I was so prepared! With them both being so young I want to keep it as simple as possible but still personal, we have scrapbook type books to put out pictures in etc, I'm usually quite creative but right now I feel totally unprepared!

Some people do build a bears for their cuddly toys, recording a message on it then sleeping with it to get the children used to their new parents' smell and voices.

We did one of these albums for our one year old as much more interesting for them.

Manhattan Toy Whoozit Photo Album Soft Cloth Book for Baby https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00067TZSK/ref=cmswwrcppapiii_z2w8DbE6NBHGV

You could also do one of these each.

Talking Products Voice Pad, voice recordable photo frame, 40 Seconds https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0749MTY18/ref=cmswwrcppapiii_PZw8Db91VE2W2

We did soft story book with around 6 pictures in (parents, grandparents and dogs), a soft toy for in his cot, a comforter for in his cot and also a blanket. The blanket turned out to be the best thing as a transitional object as nit only did he have it in his cot but we used it in his pram, the car seat during intros, even in Asda on the trolley on our first shopping trip. I washed it beforehand in same soap powder as FC but also sprayed it with a bit of my perfume. He was1 at the time. Good luck !

Hi

We’ve just got our adoption order so I’m a bit further on but we didn’t do any of the book thing they mentioned in training we just gave the FC some pictures of us. But to be honest we had such a good relationship with the FC we saw little one so she got very use to us. If we’d have listened to the SW we’d have seen her once from Feb - June!!

Keep it simple.

Photos of yourself
Photos of your house
Bedroom
Family pets

I did mine with a large photo per page and just a brief sentence

'Hi (child's name), we are going to be your Mummy and Daddy and we can't wait to meet you'

'This is going to be your new house'

I also took a picture of our local park and said we couldn't wait to play with her on the swings.

Doesn't have to be long or detailed, A4 size laminated.

We did a snapfish type photo book. One picture per page on a bold background with simple line of text. Very like a children’s book. We put picture of mummy, daddy, our cats, the house, car, garden, bedroom and the park.

We also made two copies one which is his and one to put away for later. We also have the FC A4 laminated pics or ourselves to go up in their house.