Before I ever knew we would not always be adopting babies-- actually, before I knew we would even adopt at all -- I began a photo wall to display pictures of our babies. It climbs the staircase from our living room to the upstairs bedrooms. The wall features two pictures of each child, one a baby picture and the other a recent photo. After we had four children by birth, we began adopting babies. Our oldest two adopted babies were 20 months on homecoming. I was thrilled to realize that the tradition would still work. Because I'd chosen to feature a toddler photo instead of a newborn one, their pictures fit right in on the wall with the other kids. For years I've loved that lineup of baby pictures.

Yesterday I spent several hours reworking the photo wall so that there would be space for our new daughters. They sit exactly in the center. Our four biological kids (ages 19, 17, 15, and 13) are above them, age wise. Below them are our two Korean boys, age 9, and our other two Ethiopian girls, ages 5 and 2.

I had to scoot the pictures together so that everyone would still be visible from the living room, not trailing off into the upstairs hallway, unseen. But I got everyone squeezed in there. Ten kids on the wall is an imposing sight. It brings me to my knees, praying we can do right by all those beautiful faces, and the hope they represent.

But when I look at the pictures of our new girls, I feel sad. I don't have baby pictures.

I decided to give them two frames on the wall anyway, and featured some nice photos taken by traveling families. I'll update them again after the girls get home, and soon enough the two pictures will show them younger and older, as the other photos do.

But, oh, I long for baby pictures. Even a kindergarten picture would be a treasure. I hope the girls have something, anything, that we can put up, some tangible remembrance of their past. No, they weren't with us when they were tiny. But that doesn't make that time less treasured to me.

So I'm praying for a picture. And if I don't get a picture, I'll cry a little and then satisfy myself with asking them questions so I can write their stories down. We will treasure every scrap of the past that they have.

But I hope that along with treasuring the past, whether inked on paper or carved into their hearts, we will also find a way to build on it in the present--- and then move on to make new memories to put on our photo wall together.

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