With the leaves beginning to change colors in some areas, what better time of year exists than the present to acknowledge the beauty of trees and family together. If you can schedule a visit during the fall months, making a family tree would be a great thing to do with one another. If not, you could make one and mail it to your placed child and he could do the same thing.

This is, of course, a project that you should first discuss with your child's parents. The closeness of your relationship will most likely dictate how they will respond to the idea. If they don't really consider you part of the family, it may be met with some resistance. However, if they frequently include you in family activities, treat you like one of the family and have said that they consider you to be part of their extended family, a quick discussion about the topic should yield positive results.

To keep the project simple, consider doing one branch of your child's family tree. (Please see my "awesome" illustration above!) Include the child near the center (trunk) of the tree. Place the biological parents on one side and the adoptive parents on the other. If you want to, you may include siblings. As you can see in my illustration, siblings may or may not provide an issue for various families. For birth parents that are no longer together and do not have any other children but have children of their own (along with spouses) this could create a bit of confusion with lines. The same applies to adoptive families who have biological children from previous marriages or other unique situations. Talk with your child's adoptive parents to decide what line of thinking would be most age-appropriate at this point in time. If you're going to be recreating this project every year it is quite possible that next year will bring more understanding and more people to the tree.

To make it a true Autumn project, go outside (together if you're visiting or enjoy a walk by yourself if you're doing this alone to mail!) and find some colorful leaves. Add them to your tree.

If you are together, you can do something fun (and somewhat messy) by making the leaves of your family tree with paint and hand prints. A very cute version of this tree is found at Preschool Rock. Even if you don't want to do this version every year, it would be a great idea to do one year! If you're actually working on it during the fall season, you could make your hand prints green but the construction paper leaves could be reds, oranges and yellows!

The above linked craft page also has the idea to include the child's picture on the bottom corner of the paper. This is a great idea for what we're trying to accomplish here, especially if it is something that you will be doing every year. As you collect the finished trees over the years, you will be able to see your child's grow and change in the pictures over the years.

I do suggest that each family display their tree in a frame during the year (until the next one is made). The child will have something physical to look at to see how her branch works while the biological parent(s) will have something beautifully created by their placed child hanging on their wall.

While this series of ideas has been mostly about birth parents creating traditions with their placed children by means of open adoption relationships, mothers who placed during the closed era and now in reunion can join in on the fun as well. Perhaps for a birthday present, Christmas present or an "I'm Thinking Of You" present, consider doing something a little more adult. Martha Stewart Crafts (yes, I said Martha Stewart) has a great idea of a photo family tree branch that I'm sure many placed children would love to receive. Consider placing pictures of yourself as a young child and as close to the time of placement as possible and then pictures of siblings. (If you are lucky enough to have pictures from the hospital, definitely include those but make copies so that you can have them for yourself as well!)

Really, it's a beautiful idea and end result craft whether you choose to do one with and/or for your young child or for your adult child!

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For more on Creating Traditions, read:

1. Special Day Plate.

2. Handprint Project.

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Awesome Photo Credit: Jenna Hatfield's Mad Illustrating Skills.