Bringing up Baby

I'm back home after a trip to Delaware (the maligned state of children's literature,) on the occasion of a baby shower. One of my college roommates and her husband has recently returned from Vietnam with their brand new baby boy. I've become fairly well-versed in the process and procedure of international adoption, as I have not one, but two friends, who are adopting from Vietnam. And sort of like the case that when I was pregnant I suddenly noticed how many pregnant women there were in the world, now that I have a vested interest in adoption, I have noticed a lot of books around on the subject. Three recent ones that come to mind are:

Motherbridge of Love (Anonymous and Josee Masse, illus.)
The Red Thread: an Adoption Fairy Tale (Lin, Grace)
We Belong Together: a Book about Adoption and Families (Parr, Todd)

And a few that are not strictly about adoption but about the fact that some families are made up of unexpected pieces:

The Thunderstruck Stork (Olson, David and Lynn Munsinger, illus.)
And Tango Makes Three (Richardson, Justin, Peter Parnell and Henry Cole, illus.)
Owen and Mzee: the True Story of a Remarkable Friendship (Hatkoff, Craig, etc.)

Owen and Mzee have become a bit of a cottage industry (sort of like Bunnicula and Good Night Moon.) You can choose the original book, a sequel (of sorts--it rehashes a lot of the original,) a board book edition, and an easy reader--not to mention Mama: a True Story in which a Baby Hippo Looses his Mama During a Tsunami, but Finds a New Home and a New Mama, by Jeanette Winters, wherein the title is longer than the book!

Anyways, the weekend was lovely, the shower was impressive, the gifts were literary (I've never seen so many board books in one room this side of my local Barnes and Nobles--and there were only two duplications!) and the baby of the hour himself was a charmer. Congratulations!