5 Holiday Traditions For Your Open Adoption

The Holidays are a time for traditions. If you have an open adoption, you can extend your love to your child and perhaps the adoptive family by including them in your holiday traditions. So why not take advantage of this by partaking in a shared tradition? These can be as simple as a FaceTime call on Christmas Day or as involved as a family dinner. This list will outline a few traditions you and your family might consider adopting or maybe even use as a branching-off point for your creative idea. Whatever you choose, a simple shared tradition can be a great way to enhance your holiday season. 

Here at Adoption Choices of Florida, we want you to make the most of your Tampa adoption and the holiday season. We aim to provide you with the best support at every step of your Florida adoption process. We combine expertise and compassion to provide you with the support you need. Even after your adoption process has concluded, Adoption Choices of Florida is your primary resource for all your adoption concerns.  

1. Schedule a Facetime Call:
   
   Whether you are limited in your communication with your child because of the rules you agreed to during the adoption process, or you are limited by distance, it can prove difficult to physically visit your child. Many birth mothers find it much more convenient for them and the adoptive family to schedule a call. This can be something you do anytime during the holiday season, and it can be as involved as you would like it to be. For example, you and your child can schedule a call on the same day every year and sit down at the table with a nice cup of hot chocolate, catching up and sharing your excitement for the holidays.  
   
2. Schedule a Holiday Visit to Your Child:
   
   If both the terms of your open adoption and the distance between you and your child allow for you to visit them, then why not take advantage and go see them? Visiting your child around the holidays can be a great way to maintain a relationship with your child and their adoptive family, as well as keep you from feeling like you have missed out on these integral moments in your child’s life.
    
3. Share a Scrapbook:
   
   For many people, holiday traditions look like sitting around the dinner table and partaking in a shared activity with your family. While you may not have the opportunity to have your child next to you this holiday season, you can get a little creative and have the next best thing by making a scrapbook together. This would be a long-term project that you can start at any point in your child’s life. Essentially, you would decorate a scrapbook and fill it with pictures of your holiday season and then send it to your child where they, with help from their adoptive family if necessary, will decorate it in their way and with their own pictures. Over time this will develop into a veritable time capsule where you can reflect on the holidays over the years.
   
4. Share an Ornament With Your Child:
   
   Sharing an ornament is also a very simple and common tradition that you can adopt this holiday season. For example, some birth mothers like to purchase an ornament for their child and mail it to them to put it on their tree. The tradition then becomes about you sending these ornaments to your child so that they can build a little collection over the years. Other mothers like to purchase both an ornament for themselves and their child to both have an ornament for their tree, which gives them a symbolic way to include their child in their celebrations.
   
5.  Celebrate with your Child The After Christmas:
   
   If both your family and your child’s adoptive family celebrate Christmas and you can travel to your child, then maybe seeing them the after Christmas can be a great option for you. This can be an opportunity to partake in your child’s life in a way that they will always remember. Maybe you cannot visit each year, but you can make the trip this year. Doing so will be a grand gesture your child may cherish for years to come.  

Holiday traditions are one of the most celebrated aspects of the holiday season. They can be a great way to make the most of the season and express your affection for your loved ones, so why not extend these traditions to your child? Open adoptions grant a birth mother certain freedoms, and the holidays are one of the most popular times to exercise those freedoms. So this holiday season, whether you are looking for ideas for traditions or need encouragement to develop one on your own, Adoption Choices of Florida is here to help.  

If you are a pregnant woman in Florida considering adoption and have any questions or concerns about the adoption process, please don’t hesitate to reach out. For more information on adoption, visit us at Adoption Choices of Florida or call us at: (833) 352-3678 or text us at 904-559-1251