In our little family of three, we don’t look alike. My husband is Spanish and Caucasian, I’m (mostly) Mexican, and our son is Chinese. We’re all tan and have dark hair and eyes, but our features are very different. Obviously. However, we also have many similarities; Kai and I have beauty marks on the same spot on our necks. And Kai and Ryan have matching marks on their… I’ll leave that one to the imagination! Kai likes when I point out the fact that he has brown skin like Mama and short, dark hair like Baba.

For Kai’s sake, I’m glad that we do have these similarities, but I also love our differences! I love Kai’s monolid, Asian eyes. I could stare at them for hours… and I have! They are so different from my very large, round eyes. But they are beautiful. Our noses are different too. I have a very prominent nose ridge, and Kai’s is more subtle. But, it is the the best nose in the world to munch and kiss on. And we do share another common trait, giant lips! Oh, how they are perfect for yummy kisses. His face, as a whole, is entirely different from ours and 100% perfection! I adore the differences so much more than I ever thought I would.

When we initially settled on international adoption, being a conspicuous family was something that I was a bit worried about. I remember thinking that everyone will know that we are an adoptive family all of the time. And now I think everyone knows that we are an adoptive family all of the time… YES!!! I love spreading the message of adoption and I love talking about international adoption whenever I’m able to. And, in all honesty, there have been only a small handful of times when people looked inquisitively when I said that Kai was my son. It could be the fact that we live in San Diego, which is extraordinarily culturally diverse, but I like to think that most people simply do not care. A family is a family, and a family with a common ethnic heritage is no “better” than our family, just different. I love differences.  I love that love, not DNA makes a family. I love being a conspicuous family.