Local 8-year-old William Bushong recently helped illustrate “Gracie’s Journey Home,” a book written by Faith Harralson that details a true story of how adoption touched and changed a family forever.
The book is actually about a cat — Gracie — that the Harralson family adopted, but it’s symbolic of Faith and her husband Steve’s experience adopting their daughter Olivia.
The Harralsons began fostering children when they realized it would be nearly impossible to conceive their own child. They fostered for more than seven years before adopting Olivia, and they are currently in the process of adopting their second child.
Harralson said the book stemmed from a cat next door that kept lingering on their windowsill and always wanting their attention.
“I just decided one day that this story is a lot like my husband and I, what we walked through,” she said. “We’ve fostered many children, we adopted our daughter Olivia, and so we were kind of fostering this cat.”
The cat was homeless but was still taken in by the next door neighbor. When the neighbor moved away, the Harralsons ended up adopting the cat “so she would have her forever home and she would get to stay in the neighborhood.”
Once she decided to write a story about the cat, Harralson knew she wanted a child to illustrate the book.
“Being an educator and teaching kindergarten for five years, I love giving kids a voice and any opportunity that they can have to write a story or to illustrate,” she said.
Harralson made a Facebook post asking for any families that have children interested in illustrating to submit their artwork, and Bushong’s stood out to her the most.
Bushong, who is a student at Audubon Elementary School, was overjoyed to be selected.
“I participated in that contest and I won, so (Mrs. Faith) FaceTimed me saying if I wanted to, I could illustrate the book. I said ‘heck yeah’ because I just love illustrating and drawing.” Bushong said.
Harralson had the dialogue for the book, so she met with Bushong to get the process started.
“I just took him around the house introduced him to Gracie, told him how it happened, and then I allowed him to come up with illustrations that he thought would fit best and kind of empower him and give him an opportunity to shine with this gift of illustrating,” Harralson said. “Then we came together weekly to look at a few illustrations together and decide what needed to be tweaked, what worked really well, building on that partnership.”
She credited Bushong with pushing through even when it was tough.
“I think there were a few times that William got frustrated, but he really persevered and worked really hard in coming up with the best work,” Harralson said. “He really operated in excellence and it was just fun working with him. He came up with ideas that I never thought of, and he would draw special little additions on each picture, and it fits so well, and he really captured the heart behind the book.”
Bushong was happy to see his work in the final product.
“It just makes me feel proud of myself,” he said. “I also feel happy and I’m also proud of my family because I didn’t just do this by myself. Really often, I had to get help from my mom and my dad [Denise and Ben].”
Harralson said 20% of all proceeds from the book will go to families who are fostering or adopting.
The book is $12.97 and can be purchased here.
