Thursday was adoption day at the county courthouse in Grand Rapids, Mich., and one boy brought his kindergarten teacher and classmates with him to the hearing to witness the occasion. Michael Orlando Clark Jr. was one of 37 children adopted that day, according to Kent County’s Facebook page.

When my husband and I married, after a two-month courtship, I didn’t know how to cook. Some experience with baking constituted my home-ec resumé, but man does not live on cookies alone (as much as my man would have liked to). As we were both enrolled in college, he insisted I sign up for a noncredit cooking class, an idea that would never have occurred to me. His instinct for self-preservation might have prompted the suggestion, but in practical terms, that was the best class I ever took—much preferable to food poisoning. 

A young woman in a flowy pink shirt sits next to her mom in the waiting room of an OB-GYN office in Midland. She’s quiet and seems a little nervous. Unmarried and 21 years old, she’s 32 weeks pregnant.

Two months ago the announcement brought back many memories. Next Aug. 13 in Dyersville, Iowa, the Chicago White Sox and the New York Yankees will play a regular season game at a most irregular place: the site where Kevin Costner starred in Field of Dreams (1989).

When WORLD in 2005 described the lifestyle of Terri and Jim Cooney (see “Leading by example,” Jan. 22, 2005), they had recently completed their ninth adoption, a teenager from Ghana severely burned by a witch. Their 2,000-square-foot house in Harford County, Md., was a hive of activity. Kids they had taken in—many with physical and emotional disabilities—were regularly hanging onto Terri, who stayed home with them while Jim taught school.

It’s hard to erase the memory of your mother’s tears—especially when you know she’s crying over you. Oh, how I made my mother cry.

Parenting With Words of Grace

William P. Smith