Two pieces of exciting news. One, I'm on vacation this week with my family. Staycation, actually. We're going to go to the local beach, eat at the snack bar, visit my grandparents (he's 91 and went sailing last week!), and enjoy our home. But I'm not going to spend time at the computer. No email or writing essays or tweeting and the like. So if you post a comment this week, and I hope you will, please know it won't receive a response from me until I'm back online.

The second piece of exciting news is that four of my favorite authors/bloggers agreed to write guest posts for this week away. All four of them center around the topic of adoption. So please stop by to read about the following (and, heads up, there are some giveaways in store for people who comment):

Jennifer Grant, author of the new memoir, Love You More: The Divine Surprise of Adopting My Daughter, reflects on her new understanding of family in light of Jesus' remarks in Matthew 12;

Sara Hagerty, who blogs about her family and faith at Every Bitter Thing is Sweet, writes about why she and her husband Nate decided to change their daughter's name after they adopted her;

Margot Starbuck, author of The Girl in an Orange Dress: Searching for a Father who Does not Fail, who is both an adoptive parent and an adopted daughter, writes about some of the difficulties of being and raising an adopted child;

and Ellen Painter Dollar, author of the forthcoming No Easy Choice and blogger at Choices That Matter, writes about the question posed to many a parent dealing with infertility or the likelihood of passing along a genetic abnormality to a biological child: "Why not just adopt?"

I commend all of these women and their stories to you. Check in as well for links to other articles about adoption and ways to support orphans worldwide. Have a great week, and please share the gift of the essays you'll read while I'm away!