I need to start on Dinara and Noah’s Lifebooks. I just feel so inadequate I am having trouble getting started. I’ve bought the actual books from Creative Memories. I have bought some stickers and other decorations for the pages. I know how I want it to look. But I am paralyzed.

The main reason I am paralyzed is because I want to create something perfect. In some weird sense I want to document every possible thing I know about their pasts so they will have it all in one place. One place they can go to for comfort. But I’m not sure this appropriate.

In another way, I want to create something technically beautiful. Something of heirloom quality and I feel inadequate in my scrapbooking skills. I want something that looks timeless… and I want it to feel cohesive throughout the book. And I want each book to be unique even though they share many of the same elements since it was the same trip.

I need to decide what my goal with each book is. Is it to tell a story? Is it to educate? Is it to document every detail? What are my 3 main objectives. And then use those objectives to help guide my decisions.

Then there are all the issues. I have a 70-page (single spaced) journal that documents the first several weeks of their lives with us at the orphanage and beyond. Do I incorporate that into the book somehow or keep it separate? Is the Lifebook the appropriate place to document every little shred of information I have about their pasts? What about privacy? Should this book only be for their eyes or should I keep in mind a wider audience, as they might want to share this part of their journey, heritage and culture with pride in the future? Do I include only the “positive” side of the experience and their story in this book? Where exactly do I start the story… it’s about their life not just their adoption. How do I handle the relinquishments? Where is an appropriate place to end the Lifebook or do I keep adding to it?

It’s overwhelming because I want it to be so special. It’s so important to me. I don’t want to screw it up. I don’t want it to be just acceptable but ideal. But the inertia of creating something perfect is debilitating.

I keep hoping I have a day where it just hits me that I feel secure enough to do this. But I’m not sure it’s going to happen. I think I just need to start. Part of me wants to wait a bit till I have done more scrapbooks of our family so I am at least more technically proficient. But truth is, this is something I don’t want to put off much longer. Its time to put a stake in the sand and do the best job I can at telling their story.

I might start with retelling our adoption journal tale here… maybe it will motivate me and help me by flooding my spirit with the incredible journey of meeting my children on the other side of the world.

I might just do that.

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