A new symbol

Throughout my adult years one of the reasons I've been able to nurture the creative side of myself is because my husband and I were DINK's. First the reason was settling into a community, then grad school for both of us. 

After that life happened, but kids didn't. Not that I minded terribly - being a regularly employed person gave me pocket change to spend on creative hobbies, and being a coaching widow four months out of the year gave me the time to pursue said hobbies. 

However, after 13 1/2 years of wedded bliss Ryan and I finally got serious. The slow(er) pace of our previous life disappeared in what seemed like an instant! We submitted the interest forms to our chosen adoption agency last September, were listed as a potential adoptive couple in December, matched in January, and met our birth mother in March. The little one is due in July. 

I put this poster on Facebook for our "birth" announcement.

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As you probably know, private infant adoptions (our chosen path) is not cheap, but after considering the other options open to us, this was the best fit. As a fundraiser my husband wanted to sell those debossed silicone wristbands, which did not appeal to me. We did find a no-minimum supplier and ordered a few, but never quite got around to an actual fundraiser.

However, I was on the hunt for something I could wear that would symbolize adoption and not be quite so... tacky. I stumbled on this symbol on Pinterest of a heart with a triangle inside. The heart is the child, the triangle the birth mother and adoptive parents. Or the triangle could represent the child, birth parents, and adoptive parents all surrounded with love. 

But, like so many Pinterest links it took me forever to track down the source. This one happened to be an expired Etsy listing, but the picture had been picked up by an adoption blog. By this time I. wanted. this. necklace. 

Good thing it just appeared to be made out of copper wire! And I knew how to solder. I experimented with a few life-size sketches to get the ratio of triangle to heart where I wanted it. Here is the end result. I was pretty pleased with myself!