The response

I called my father after I spent a few minutes alone with the picture. I wanted to really look at these two children. My husband said that the girl looked like me and the boy was built like the men in my father's family.

My father was overly "jokey" about the subject. But having been his daughter for nearly 40 years, I know him. He was trying not to be hopeful. He said he knew what I was trying to do and he wasn't in it. I could hear between his words that at 70 years old he was not up for the search and possible rejection and disappointment. He is not 100% positive that the children are his. He "thinks" the boy is but has reason to doubt the girl and because they are so close in age, he has reason to doubt either. (More on the series of events that led to the distance between them in posts to come)

My sister's response was basically, we lived all these years without them maybe it was God's will that it be like this.

So I scanned the photo. Enhanced the images and sent them via email to my father and sister.

When I called my sister the next day, she had been online searching for them at whitepages.com and other general sites.

She now felt like I did. Our potential siblings now have a face and seeing their eyes, has made them real.

Armed with the information on the back of the photos and my father's sketchy memories from 50 years ago, I am ordering copies of their birth certificates next week.

An unexpected ally has emerged to assist in this search. My mother.

My parents are divorced and she said she has always felt a bit guilty about not looking for them sooner. When she and my father married she didn't want anyone to know he had been married before so the kids were part of the omission. She said there was a point that she informed my dad that she was going to tell us. She thought that it was best that we knew. So she'd be excited for us to find them and find out once and for all if they are our brother and sister.