First, creation is ABOUT the unveiling of the children of God. "Let us be making mankind in our image."
Second, mankind itself is waiting in anticipation. God has set Himself to this task, and He will complete it.
Third, individual creatures (that's us) are waiting and groaning and it isn't necessary that any of us know what we are groaning for. We all have an inborn sense that SOMETHING is missing in this life as grass. Hence religion, ideology, politics, hero-worship, both hedonism and willful self denial, and other temporary comforts and prides.
There is an order to these things.
Lastly, creation doesn't reveal God's eternal attributes, as that is not what that verse says, decently translated. There's nothing 'eternal' about creation that can be plainly seen, with death, decay, and destruction clearly seen.
What creation reveals clearly are the "unseen" attributes of God. The Spiritual attributes of God. How and why God works. Atheists can perceive these things just as easily as Christians, but the theologies they build are of roughly equal value, to my mind.