A few days ago leaving the beach she said something that was beyond her years and in response to that I said to her “ Izzy you are so smart” and she said to me “ only because you’ve taught me Momma” and I said “awe…Izzy that’s so sweet” and she said “ no, really Momma. I’m serious. I wouldn’t know anything if it weren’t for you”

Uh!!! I could barely keep driving. Rob looked and me and put his hand on my hand and said “it’s true! She is an amazing girl because you’ve taught her to be one”.

Ok, so all of this settled into my brain tonight.  I just recently watched Somewhere in Between which is a documentary about teenage girls adopted from China.  It’s basically about their journey and their struggles. It completely wrecked me watching it. One of the girls gets to go back and basically by a miracle stumbles upon her birth family and gets to meet all of them and forge a relationship with them. It was heartbreaking and beautiful all at the same time.

At the same time we’re approaching Izzy being home with us for five years.  I can hardly believe that she’s been home five years already and at the same time it’s like she was never anywhere else. EXCEPT THAT SHE WAS!

And that’s where I am today. How is it that it can be “I’m only so smart Momma because you’ve taught me” and yet she is also a child of another mother and father.  This dichotomy is overwhelming sometimes. She is so American in so many ways.  Just like any other almost 8 year old here in the states. Yet, look at her she is absolutely beautifully Chinese. I know that to me I feel like we live in two worlds. How must she feel? It seems like it’s not a big deal right now. And maybe these feelings of “somewhere in between” won’t surface till she’s older or maybe they won’t surface at all. I feel them though. I feel them for her. I have deep roots in my family. I love the knowing the names of my great great great grandparents.  It makes me feel connected to something bigger than me. Something that runs deeply and connects all of us together. Will my youngest three kiddos feel that?  Will they feel this family connection? Or will they constantly long for that which is unknown?  

I look at Izzy sometimes and it shocks me how much she is like me. She says things like I do. She even talks with her hands like I do.  Every now and then though she does something or says something that seems so foreign to me and I know deep in my heart that it’s a trait from her birth family. I love it. It’s not a bad thing in anyway but I wonder if she notices those things too. Does she feel different when she does that or says that because she knows she didn’t see it or learn it from us.

I wonder. I hope. I pray.

My greatest wish for Isabella Ting Braniff this Gotcha Day of five years home with her family is that she is rooted in the family of Jesus Christ. That she comes to really understand her value in His eyes. Truly knowing that she is first and foremost a child of God. Before she is mine and Rob’s daughter. Before she is a daughter of birth parents in China. Before she is Chinese or American. Before all of that I want her to know what she means to our heavenly father!

I absolutely believe that if she understands that then the rest will be much easier.  That is my greatest priority in raising her.