Many families like to honor the date when the adoptive child meets his or her parents. And with a growing number of Americans who acknowledge this adoption day, it now has a new and more fun name: Gotcha Day.

Some families celebrate this day with a special gift and a cake, others go out for a dinner or invite friends, or take special pictures. Over the past few years, the idea has been getting so popular that there are now Gotcha souvenirs, Pinterest tutorials and even postcards. Honoring the day they met reaffirms the importance of it to the child and to parents. Below, we are going through three ways to celebrate the big Adoption Day.

Throw an Adoption Day Party

The typical way to celebrate this day is to throw a party with cake and gifts; it is like a child’s birthday party. Make or bake a special cake and place the number of candles equal to the number of years the child has been living with you. You can also invite your child’s friends and give gifts.

Maybe your child prefers to have a more intimate party and celebrate this day without friends. In this case, has a small family-only party, prepare your child’s favorite meals and give small gifts.

Create a Family Journal

Create a family journal with your child. This will help him or her feel that they are a part of your family. Tell the child that the Gotcha Day is a celebration of family and the child. For example, you can make pictures and then put them in a journal for the child to go through it and remember fun times he/she had with family.

You can also write funny family memories in the journal might include memories of vacations. You could even have your child write or draw something. This is a helpful alternative to a more traditional birthday party to celebrate the important day. A journal emphasizes the importance of family connection and intimacy.

Create New Family Tradition

Gotcha day is a perfect opportunity to create a new tradition that will mean a lot for your family. It is also a unique opportunity for you and your child to spend more time together. Choose an activity that everyone likes that is important for your child and repeat it every year: for example, these can be photographs taken when you just brought a child home, or a story of the adoption that is told in an affirming way. However, this depends on a child.

If adoption only brings bad memories and a child had a hard time being taken away from his/her birthplace, you can create a benign tradition that will make new memories instead of emphasizing previous experience. This can be a trip to Disney, a zoo, or a museum.

You can use these three ideas to celebrate the Gotcha Day. However, if your child is not comfortable with the idea of celebrating this day, just forgo it altogether. Just show your child love every day. This can come in a form of a moment when you sit on a couch, a hug or a pat on the back. Or you can just leave notes like “I love the way you worked hard to do something” to show that the child is an important part of your family.