American Adoptions -- America's Adoption Agency
 Thank you for taking the time to learn more about us as potential adoptive parents for your child. We have a great deal of admiration for you and the choice you are considering, and hope to provide you the answers you seek during this emotional time. We are Jon & Rachel - two proud parents of 4 young children, and are thrilled with the prospect of adding another baby. After reading this profile, we sincerely hope you have a better understanding of who we and our fun, loving family are. We look forward to learning about you and the kind of life you'd like for your child! |
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We have always wanted a large family and feel incredibly blessed to have four amazing children; however, it has been quite the journey to get to this point. After we had our first daughter, Olivia, we suffered many miscarriages trying to have another baby. It was a difficult time in our lives that led us to our faith and choosing adoption. We filled out all the paperwork and were ready to turn it in when we found out we were expecting again. In a surprising turn of events, we were blessed with three more children! Through our journey we have always had a deep desire in our hearts to adopt. It is a commitment we made years ago that we are hoping to now honor. We hope that adoption is not only an exciting way to build our "large" family but also a testament to our children and family of our commitment to faith.
When it comes time for the holidays there are traditions galore, as I am sure in most families. We host an annual Halloween costume party for the kids where you will find a mermaid and a dragon at the same table decorating a craft or carving a pumpkin. At Christmas time our elf "Zelf" (as the kids named him) returns from the north pole to watch over us and report our good doings so we all continue to stay on the "good" list! We also have a cookie decorating party inviting all the children we know to cover our tables in frosting and sprinkles. The house is always a buzz with giggles and Christmas music playing in the background.
Although holidays are a time we traditionally think of family traditions, we also have many traditions that occur throughout the year, or even daily. In the summer time you will usually find us roasting marshmallows over the firepit while the kids gallop around the yard with our lovable yellow lab Samson. Come fall we take our annual trip to the apple orchard where the kids enjoy finding the best apples and having Jon lift them to reach the highest apple they can get. We try to find new orchards to relive this wonderful experience over and over and capture as many pictures as we can. When football season starts our Michigan State gear comes out and it becomes a regular event not only to watch the games and cheer on our favorite team, but also to sleep in our MSU shirts for good luck! This continues long into the basketball season and is probably one of the kids favorite traditions! But daily, our children wait in their rooms at night after Rachel has tucked them in with anticipation as Jon comes to pray over each child individually illustrating to them how they each have their own special place in our hearts and family.
We believe traditions are an essential part of bringing a family closer together and giving each member a link that will tie them to their childhood long into their adult life. We hope to continue these traditions and start many more as the years pass.
Family vacations are treasured times and memories for us. Although this year we took the epic trip to Disney World (and hope to make it a new family tradition), our hearts still lay on the beaches of Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. Every year Rachel's parents have rented a large home for the entire extended family to come and enjoy a week long extravaganza of family fellowship and fun. The house is usually filled with sounds of cards shuffling, boisterous laughter, and the time voices of cousins sharing stories with one another. Between the family bonding, spotting sea turtles, long windy walks on the beach, and digging up sand dollars we find ourselves longing to return year after year. We hope to not only continue this tradition in the near future but with our own grandchildren as well.
