James is an immigrant from South Korea. He moved to the United States with his parents and grandmother when he was five years old. James' family primarily speaks Korean and practices Korean cultural traditions like Chuseok which is a mid-autumn harvest festival, playing Yunnori on Seollal, which is a traditional board game that is played on New Year's Day, and making delicious homemade kimchi, a traditional Korean side dish of salted, spicy and fermented vegetables.

Jessica is Mexican/American, first generation. Her mother's family is from Zacatecas, Mexico and is large and family oriented. Jessica's father was Caucasian and was from Oklahoma. He passed away when she was five, so culturally Jessica is more Hispanic because she was raised almost exclusively with her mother's family. Jessica's family speaks mainly Spanish and has a strong connection with Mexico. They celebrate Mexican cultural traditions like celebrating Dia de la Madres, Mother's day, on May 10, having piñatas at birthday parties and making homemade tamales for Christmas, a dish of seasoned meat wrapped in cornmeal dough and steamed in corn husks.

River brings us great happiness in our lives. Having her in our lives has taken us to parks that we would have never explored and routes we would have never taken. She is a core part of our lives, joining us on flights to see family and coming with us on our vacations. She is also very loved by our families. James' parents adore her and is usually the first one they ask about when they talk over the phone. Frequently James' parents give River a new toy during our visits. Pets are also a responsibility, by adopting River we made a promise to take care of her and make sure that she has a mentally and physically stimulating life and it is our responsibility to ensure her health and safety.

James has a passion for photography and loves capturing moments –which is perfect because Jessica loves to scrapbook. James also collects cameras and has learned to process film. He is currently learning voice acting. Connecting with friends and family is important to James and he expresses it by cooking meals and entertains folks with a wide variety of board games.

Jessica has over 65 indoor plants from a variety of types. She loves to propagate and share them with friends and family. Jessica also spends much of her time volunteering and mentoring under representatives people in tech. She is a board member of a nonprofit organization that teaches women and non-binary people technology. Staying connected with friends and family is very important to Jessica and she sends out yearly holiday cards and loves to host family and friends for dinner parties, board game days and for holidays. She also collects strawberry knick-knacks.

We both love going on outdoor adventures with River, our dog. All three of us hike and bike trails, play ball at parks and beaches and doing our daily walks around the neighborhood so River can play with her dog friends. We both also love to travel, especially to places we've never been to. We love to learn about the different cultures, traditions and food.

We live in California. Our home has three bedrooms and two baths in the suburbs. One of the bedrooms is our office, where we work from home and the other room is the nursery for our future child.

Our community is family oriented and has a pool and children play area as well as large grassy areas. Jessica grew up swimming and is looking forward to sharing her love of the water. We live within a five-minute walk of a large, newly renovated park that has a toddler play area, small child play area and large child play area. The park also has large grassy areas, basketball courts, skateboard arena and more.

We live within a 10-minute drive to the ocean/bay and several parks and trails.

We love to go bike riding together with our dog and are looking forward to getting child seats for our bikes.

We also love to go to museums and to the theater which are in the major city that is only 30 miles away.

Our extended family all live in southern California and are pocketed together. We enjoy flying down and spending our holidays and vacation with them.

James and his family immigrated to the USA in the late 1980's from South Korea. James' parents are small business owners. They both enjoy cooking traditional Korean meals like bibimbap, bulgogi, dongchimi and kimchi. James has a younger brother who also works in the family business. The family primarily speaks Korean in the home.

Jessica's mother immigrated from Mexico to the USA in the late 1970s when she married Jessica's father, who was an American. They had three girls, Jessica being the middle child. Unfortunately Jessica's father passed away when she was five from cancer. Jessica's mother is a retired OB nurse. Jessica's older sister and her husband have two wonderful boys and she is currently a stay-at-home mother. Jessica's younger sister recently bought an avocado farm in southern California and has started a tiny house lifestyle. Jessica's family is close and has a larger extended family. Jessica's family primarily speaks Spanish and the younger generation speaks Spanglish (mix of Spanish and English).

We will never be able to put into words our thankfulness for entrusting this gift to us. We are excited to be able to grow our family and share our lives with this child.

We have been together for over 17 years and we've delayed growing our family so we could finish our education, be financially stable and emotionally ready. Having met in college our love started at a young age. We grew with each other, through happy times and through hard times and because of this we have a strong foundation for our relationship, built on communication, trust and love.

As a result of our hard work over the years, our work schedules are flexible so we can be at the school plays, soccer games and reading books at bedtime. This was something that was important to us, as our parents were busy with work. With everything we have done, we can provide many opportunities and support to this child. We want to give them chances to discover themselves and provide amazing experiences.

We want to provide them an environment focused on growth and trying. As a family who loves learning and trying new things, we will share that same foundation with them. Be it at school or at home, we will encourage them to try new things.

For this little one, we are looking forward to doing so many activities with them. We want to travel and have them learn about different cultures and try different foods, and learn about the world. We are looking forward to teaching them different languages, playing sports and staying up all night comforting them when they are sick.

As we raise this child we want to be transparent with them and let them know, from the beginning, that they were a gift and that their birth mother chose us out of love. We would love to be able to provide as much information as possible about you and your family for this child. We are also hoping that we can do a few family trips to visit you and your family so this child has the opportunity to connect with you and see "where they are from." We have already brought books to help explain and normalize the idea of adoption and we fortunately live in a very diverse community with interracial families, older parent families, single parent families and more. Thanks to technology, it's exciting that we'll be able to share photos and updates about this child to you.

Also, for about the last ten years we've been doing holiday cards and we are very excited that this year we'll be the first of many with news and updates about this little one.

Thank you for considering choosing us to raise this precious little one.

Sincerely,

James & Jessica