Family Opens Shop to Help Others Adopting with Legal Fees: ‘Paying It Forward’

Brittany Berrie knows the challenges of adoption, but after a kind gesture helped her adopt her daughter, Gracie, they wanted to do the same for others.

The Adopted Closet is a nonprofit shop Berrie opened inside the family’s garage in DeWitt, Iowa, and online, the Quad-City Times reported Monday, adding the clothes were all donations.

Proceeds are used to pay adoptive families’ legal bills, and it was Berrie’s way of paying forward the special gift her loved ones received while navigating adoption. They hoped to fund every adoption in Scott County on National Adoption Day in November.

In a social media post on Friday, Berrie announced the shop’s grand reopening was about to take place with a photo showing the garage full of clothes and other items ready to be sold.

She met her oldest child when she was a newborn, having learned about Gracie the evening before she was born. Berrie and her husband began caring for her on a full-time basis, later becoming her legal guardians.

But it would be several years until they could adopt her because the cost was a huge roadblock.

According to the Adoption Network, private U.S. newborn adoption fees may be anywhere from $35,000 to $50,000.

Things took an unexpected turn in 2020 when Berrie’s cousin, Casie, learned Gracie had yet to be adopted. The moment Casie heard the reason why, she offered to pay the legal bills.

After filing for adoption in January 2021, it was finalized that summer.

Berrie wanted to thank her cousin, so she had a clothing sale to raise funds for another family’s adoption, making $3,000 in one weekend, thus inspiring the family to create the nonprofit.

Gracie will debut her own clothing line later this year in the store and online, with jackets decorated using pieces of other donated clothes.

Although Berrie was not aware of how much her own adoption expenses were because her cousin kept that information to herself, she understood that having Gracie and assisting others was all that mattered.

“That’s how we can thank Casie, just by pushing on and paying it forward,” she commented.