Caleb has always had an interest in foreign languages and cultures. So much so that he majored in Japanese and received a minor in Mandarin Chinese while in college. Besides Japanese and Mandarin, he is also interested in learning Spanish and Korean. To Caleb, languages allow you to connect to people from all kinds of cultural backgrounds and walks of life. He can't wait to share this love of learning with his future child and hopes to raise him/her bilingually.

When he's not learning languages, Caleb can be found cooking. Caleb has been interested in cooking since middle school, and frequently makes dishes from Japanese, Korean, and Chinese cuisines.

Katie enjoys reading books, doing puzzles, and playing video games. She reads on average about 100 books per year and volunteers at the local library once a week. Her love of reading is something that she would like to pass on to a child, including reading to them every night before bed. Katie also enjoys watching Korean dramas or baking competition shows on Netflix.

We often play board games together or with friends and family a couple of times per week. Our town has a great board game community, and we can't wait to have many board game nights with our child.

Our goal as parents is to raise a child who will grow up feeling unconditionally loved, supported, and accepted for who they are. While we can't wait to share our hobbies with our child (language learning, soccer, cooking, board games, etc.), we also want to foster their own individual interests.

Education is very important to us and both of our parents encouraged us to pursue higher education. We hope to cultivate a strong sense of curiosity in our child and instill a love of learning. We hope to bring our child to museums, national parks, and (of course) our many excellent public libraries to enhance their education.

We are excited to bring our child on trips as well. We went to Japan in 2019, and hope to bring our child on international vacations. We want to encourage our child to learn about different cultures, customs, languages, and cuisines to broaden their worldview. Besides Japan, some of our top destinations are Germany, South Korea, and Brazil. Domestically, we can't wait to go on road trips with our child, and especially bring them to Disney World.

We believe in recognizing and celebrating differences. Our child may have a different cultural background than us, and we want them to not only know their heritage but to feel proud of it. Through open adoption and dialogue with our child's birth parent(s), we hope to know our child's cultural background and incorporate their traditions into our lives. If there are any recipes, holidays, stories, languages, or anything else from our child's background that would help instill pride in their heritage, we would love to have those be a part of their childhood.

The university here in Madison attracts many international students, so we have many opportunities to expose our child to different cultures. We also have friends who come from a variety of backgrounds and nationalities.

Our neighborhood is very diverse and includes grocery stores from around the world including African, Indian, Hmong, and Mexican. We frequently shop at these stores and hope to bring our child to places like this.

We both decided to move to Madison, Wisconsin for college. Madison is frequently listed as one of the top cities to live in America, and (in our opinion) it's not hard to see why. We have access to great medical care and educational opportunities, thanks to UW Madison. There are many parks within walking distance in any neighborhood, great libraries, and a free zoo.

We live in a very diverse neighborhood in Madison, there are African, Mexican, and Hmong grocery stores nearby-where we can often be found shopping. Our house is very close to a couple of playgrounds, a nature path by the lake, a splash pad, and a library.

We bought our house in 2021 and specifically chose it because we could see our family growing up in this home. We have a two-bedroom brick ranch-style home, with a large backyard with apple trees, and a cozy finished den area in the basement. Caleb loves our large kitchen and is currently learning how to set up a large garden in the backyard. Katie loves our large living room and our den with our electric fireplace for reading.

Our families include Caleb's immediate and extended family, and Katie's "chosen family" here in Wisconsin. Caleb grew up with two younger sisters and is now having a great time being an uncle to his only nephew. One of our favorite family traditions is Thanksgiving with Caleb's family. Caleb and his youngest sister team up to make most of the holiday meals. After enjoying the turkey, stuffing, pie, etc., we all play board games all day. Katie, Caleb's dad, and our nephew all watch football together too (Caleb finds that football...puts him to sleep). We can't wait to share this love of food, family, and board games with a child. We are both very close to Caleb's family and can't wait to have a child grow up with them.

Katie's chosen family, Alan and Karen and their children, often get together for barbecues and go out for breakfast on Saturday mornings. Katie has been (unofficially) adopted into her chosen family for almost 20 years. Alan is a great cook and has taught Caleb many of his superb recipes. Their daughter recently had a little girl, and its been so much fun being aunt and uncle to her. They are all so excited to see us become parents, and can't wait to become grandparents/aunt/uncle to our future child.

Hello,

To start, we want to thank you for considering adoption and taking the time to learn more about us. We recognize that this must be an incredibly difficult decision to make, and are grateful that we have a chance to know you better. We have always wanted to grow our family through open adoption, and for our child to have awareness of where they came from.

We met in college in 2008 on a blind date set up by a mutual friend and hit it off immediately. We talked for over three hours on our first date and found that our interests, values, and hopes for the future were very much the same. We've been inseparable ever since, and have gone on many adventures together. Some of those include Disney, Chicago, Universal Studios, and (our personal favorite) Japan.

Our friends and family would definitely describe us as "nerdy," we love all things Marvel, Star Wars, anime, and Nintendo related. Our home is filled with all kinds of geeky posters, games, and books. We even have a Godzilla-themed bed for our cats.

We value education very highly and were both encouraged by our parents to pursue our academic goals. This has continued into the present, we both take continuing education courses through local universities and are avid readers. Caleb studies four different languages (Japanese, Mandarin, Korean, and Spanish), and Katie reads over 100 books every year and is an active member of a local sci-fi book club.

Education aside, we also consider honesty, compassion, respect, acceptance, and kindness to be very important. We believe in respecting and honoring differences, and hope to raise our child to recognize and feel proud of what makes them unique.

We hope that by getting to know you, that you will remain an important part of our child's life. We will always tell our child how much he or she means to you, and make it clear how much you love and care for them. If you have holidays, language, recipes, etc from your background that you want to pass on to your child, we hope to find meaningful ways to incorporate them into our child's life.

We also hope that, throughout both the adoption process and our child's life, that we can have a relationship with you. You are, of course, in the "driver's seat" when it comes to this, and we will always respect you and your boundaries. We plan to send you pictures and videos, share milestones, and create a baby book to share with you. We are also very open to phone/video calls and visiting in person, if you are comfortable.

We want to thank you again for taking the time to learn about us, and for reading our letter to you. We are so excited to start our journey into parenthood and to grow our family. Know that if choose us to parent your child, your child will grow up being unconditionally loved, and will always know and be surrounded by people who care about and celebrate them.

Caleb & Katie