Before we even knew each other, we both did an adventurous trip separately. Emily and a few friends rode their bicycles from Banff, Alberta to Denver Colorado, carrying their tents, sleeping bag and food for an entire month on their bikes! They rode through the beautiful Rocky Mountains, averaging about 65 miles a day, and seeing breath-taking sights for a total of 1,700 miles!

Simultaneously, Randy thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine with a friend, carrying their food, water and tent in a backpack. Every morning they would wake up in the mountains to filter their water and make a quick breakfast before they started a long day of hiking, which they did for 6 months and a total of almost 2,200 miles!

Needless to say, this love for the outdoors is a passion for us both and something we dream of introducing to our child. It's exciting to imagine our child joining us for walks in the woods and watching them catch their first fish in the stream. We not only value the physical benefits of spending time outside, but also the social fun we have hiking, camping and biking with other people. It is a blast! We also love that we have the fun of living in a vibrant city and simultaneously spend time in the beautiful outdoors.

Our lifestyle is one that is grounded in our values. Because we value the outdoors and our wellbeing, we enjoy lots of walks in the neighborhood or in the local park, and we envision this child spending time helping to grow vegetables in the garden, and play dates with the neighbors next door. We also enjoy going camping, creating art and traveling. We have had the opportunity to hike the Inca Trail in Peru and walked the Camino de Santiago trail in Spain.

Because we value family, this child would have lots of times eating delicious meals with grandpa and grandma and then having fun jumping on the trampoline with their cousins.

Because our faith is important to us we walk or bike to church, because it makes us feel more connected to our neighbors and we love getting outside. Our church is racially and ethnically diverse where we learn to build bridges instead of walls and to be peacemakers.

Because we love people, we look for opportunities such as helping to serve meals in the community, volunteering at the winter shelter, and helping in the community garden. Emily designed and painted a beautiful mural in our city as she is an artist at heart!

We have purposely chosen to live in a diverse neighborhood because we believe that our lives are enriched when each ethnicity is celebrated for its own unique history, culture and traditions. One of our core values is fighting for racial equality in all areas of society. We are proactive about being part of communities that are diverse and have the same openness towards different racial and ethnic backgrounds. For example, our church service is multilingual and we celebrate and learn from our relationships with friends who come from different ethnicities than ourselves. We envision our child having play dates and creating lasting friendships with these relationships at our church and in our neighborhood. Our extended family, church and friends have children who are adopted and are unconditionally loved and celebrated for their unique personalities, gifts, and histories. When racial equality is threatened we believe it is our job to speak up and put into action the justice we believe in. This is the foundation of how we would teach our child to grow up; knowing they are safe, loved and celebrated.

We live in a great neighborhood in a small city that is diverse and full of life. We are proud to say our city is considered one of the best small cities to live in the United States. We have a park directly across the street from our house that has lots of green space, a playground with a kid's pool and a basketball court that is always full of other children. We are fortunate to consider our neighbors our friends and value those relationships.

We have a beautiful three-bedroom home with a spacious back patio and front porch. Our kitchen windows face the east and the sunlight fills the kitchen each morning making it beloved place to spend time together. We spend a lot of time in our back yard planting seeds in our garden, with the excitement of watching the first strawberry turn red and tasting the first ripe tomato.

One of our favorite things to do in our neighborhood is to walk down town and participate in the many multicultural events and festivals like the Latin Music Fest, Chinese New Year and Black History events. We also enjoy eating at ethnically diverse restaurants from Thai Food to Ethiopian. Our church is located in our city so we either walk or bike there. Shopping at the Farmer's Market in the downtown square on the weekends and walking to the many different beautiful parks is also a weekly routine.

We are fortunate to have both of our families live within a 20 minute drive from our home. Both sides of the family value our relationships and intentionally spend time together.

Emily's parents live on a beautiful farm with lots of space to climb tress in the orchard, feed the chickens and watch the cows munch on the grass. We have a tradition of getting together for Sunday meals followed by kickball games with our niece and nephew or playing hide and seek all over the house.

Randy's family enjoys watching sports games together after eating a meal at his parent's house. We have summer traditions of going on hikes, sitting around a camp fire as a family and roasting hot dogs and marshmallows with our nieces and nephews.

Each year we love traveling with both sides of our families, camping, cozying up in a cabin or swimming at the lake.

Our siblings are eager to be aunts and uncles as our family expands. We feel so fortunate to have parents that are actively engaged in our lives and have a lot of love to be the best grandparents for our future child and provide support for us as parents.

Thank you for taking the time to learn more about us. We are humbled that you are considering us as potential parents for your child. The decisions you are making sound unbelievably difficult, however, we promise to give your child a safe, stable, nurturing and compassionate home.

We have tried to have children for over 6 years, but were unable to conceive biological children. As we worked through the difficulties of accepting this, we realized our love was big enough to expand our family through adoption and would be the biggest desire of our heart to be considered by you.

We met each other later in life after our paths crossed through mutual friends. Having that time to figure out who we were as two separate adults allowed us to grow and mature before getting married and has created a strong foundation for our relationship. We had our wedding at Emily's parent's beautiful farm 7 ½ years ago! We danced the night away with a promise to stay committed to each through life's grief, joy and hope.

Randy is the Director of the Chaplain department at our local hospital. His passion is to walk with people during their hardest times in life by providing emotional and spiritual care. He spends a lot of time listening to others and helps to remind them they are not alone. As the director he thrives in leading his team of Chaplains so they get the support they need.

Emily is a Family Liaison working with caregivers who have children enrolled in the Head Start preschool program. She enjoys supporting parents on whatever journey they are on and loves having a classroom of 3-5 year-olds greet her every morning! Working in the preschool setting has taught Emily how important a safe and stable life is; full of opportunities for all children to succeed and thrive in life.

We are so excited about the future of being parents and know that our hearts will be brimming over with love! We cannot wait to continue old traditions with this child such as decorating the Christmas tree and planting the garden together. We also want to start new traditions as a family of three instead of two. We know that parenting is an adventure and we are so thankful for grandparents and aunts and uncles on both sides of our families who are committed to supporting us and helping with childcare. This child will be loved beyond measure!

We look forward to building our own relationship with you and learning together how to love this child in the best way possible. We envision keeping you updated through email updates, with pictures and stories as well as letters that celebrate milestones in your child's life. We are open to making yearly visits when the time is right for you. We are committed to always speaking highly of you and honoring you with our words and actions. We cherish the role you play, in whatever way you decide.

Thank you for letting us share our hearts with you,

Randy & Emily