Dear Expectant Mother,

We want to thank you for reading our letter and giving us the opportunity to tell you a bit about ourselves. We appreciate the difficult decision you have made and we support you in this journey.  We are very excited about becoming parents. We have thought about this choice long and hard and feel confident & optimistic about this next chapter in our lives. We feel we would make excellent parents.

About Us About

We have been building and strengthening our relationship over the past eight years and we married just over a year ago. We met at a yoga class, both staring at each other through our downward dog poses! It only took one date, and we were together from that point forward. We have a connection that is difficult to put into words; we feel safe, calm and secure in each other’s presence.  We simply enjoy being together. We both have a quirky sense of humor, and we spend much of our time laughing with each other. Some of our favorite things to do together are to cook, go to the movies, go on walks, and go to the beach. We love to travel—especially to sea-side destinations. We have been to Maui, Kauai, Mexico and Costa Rica. We also spend a great deal of time with our extended families. We are very close to both of our families, and believe in maintaining a strong family connection. Our families our very excited and supportive about our decision to adopt.  The newest addition to our family is our dog, Bella. We rescued her almost four years ago. We love spending time with her—she is such a sweetie! We take her with us all over: to the beach, to our families, even on road trips to Idaho, Oregon and Washington. She is a great traveler! She has so much fun when our friends’ kids come over to play with her. Our other furry friend is our cat, Meme. She is fine with letting Bella have all the fun as long as she can sleep!

Our Home & Community

We live in the East Bay Hills, which is about 45 minutes east of San Francisco. Our family-oriented community has the beautiful backdrop of Mount Diablo. The schools in our community are top notch. Our friendly neighborhood has lots of trees and plenty of outdoor activities available. We hike on wonderful trails along mountain ridges with our dog, Bella. Down the street we have a wonderful park and a shopping center with a movie theater, restaurants, and a museum. We enjoy biking down to our Farmer's Market, buying wonderfully fresh fruits and vegetables for dinner and sneaking in a frozen yogurt before biking home.   We love our home. We completely remodeled our four-bedroom house to turn it into the perfect “Doug and Kelli Home” all ready to have a little one join us!

Words About My Husband Doug

Doug was raised in Southern California and has three sisters. His parents were married for 45 years before his Dad passed away a few years ago. He was raised in a strong Christian home. Doug has a huge heart and is very giving. He always puts others first. He loves spending time with his seven nieces and nephews,who call him “Uncle Dougie.” They love wrestling and giggling together. Doug is a fire fighter. He moved to the Bay Area from Southern California to get a job with the San Jose Fire Department, located south of San Francisco. He has worked in San Jose for 11 years, but has been a fire fighter for the past 20 years. Doug loves outdoor activities. He is an avid runner. He completed his first marathon at age 14! He has added swimming and biking to his activities, and he now participates in Ironman races. He also loves to surf and windsurf. Did I mention he also goes mountain climbing? His climbing adventures have included Mount Shasta, Whitney and Rainier. His dream is to climb Mount Denali in Alaska. While relaxing indoors, Doug has recently taken up playing guitar. He also enjoys puttering around the house. Over the past few years, he has worked on remodeling the whole house. He worked as a carpenter framing houses before he was a fireman and he has done volunteer work for Habitat for Humanity, as well as friends and neighbors. Doug’s zest for life and great rapport.

Words About My Wife Kelli

The first thing I noticed about Kelli when we met, aside from her physical beauty, was her calm, gentle and kind demeanor. After only a few dates it was obvious that Kelli would make a great mother. She has always had a great desire to have a family. Kelli grew up in Chico, CA and is a graduate of Chico State with a Liberal Studies degree. She moved to the Bay Area after graduation to get her teaching credentials and has been teaching in this area ever since. Kelli has been a teacher for twenty years, and her passion for kids is obvious when you see her teaching her third graders. It is clear she will make a great mother.

Kelli’s is very close to her family, who still live in Chico. They visit with each other pretty much every month. She has two sisters, who are both married, and she has a 22-year-old nephew and a 21-year-old niece. Both her parents are also still in Chico.

When not teaching kids or practicing yoga, Kelli enjoys traveling, reading, and running, either on the treadmill or on the trails near our house. It is difficult to put in writing why someone would make a great parent without sounding cliché, but I feel if you met Kelli you would see in her all the things you would want in someone whom you would chose to raise your child. Kindness, compassion, patience, love, forgiveness, caring and nurturing.

About Our Values

Having a family means the world to us. Having a child has been a prayer of ours for a long time. When uterine cancer took away our chances of being biological parents, we didn’t give up hope that we would still be able to raise a child that was meant for us. We both grew up with strong family ties and values. Both of our families gave us guidance, support, and encouragement. We plan to raise our child with the same values, and with all the opportunities we can for a positive, healthy, happy life. We understand that parenting a child can be an amazing, rewarding, challenging adventure that will stretch us out of our comfort zone and into a life full of transformation, renewal, and unconditional love.

We look forward to giving our child a safe environment full of exploration, laughter, play, and experiences that teach compassion and love. We are fortunate enough to live in an area that has excellent schools. We plan on raising our child with a world of education and experiences both in and out of the classroom. We will introduce our child to traveling, gardening, music and sports. We hope to instill values of giving to others, both within our the community and in the larger world.

We look forward to vacationing with our family in Southern California to Disneyland and Northern California to the beautiful ocean coast and redwood forests. We are both Christians and will raise our child in a Christian home that includes going to church and developing a relationship with the Lord. Most of all we look forward to encouraging our child to develop their own identity and to follow their dreams and what warms their heart.

Thank You

We really want to thank you for taking the time to read our letter as you face the important and challenging decision of the future for you and your child. We admire your strength in going through this process and we appreciate you considering us as the adoptive parents for your child. We look forward to getting to know you and listening to your thoughts and desires. If you choose us as adoptive parents, we will honor whatever decision for contact you are comfortable with, and if you would like to be involved with your child, know our families will welcome you with love and your child with all the love, support, hugs, and kisses imaginable! If you would like to reach us directly, please call us toll free at 1-877-308-4440, or you can email us at dougandkelli.adopt@gmail.com. You can also call our friendly adoption attorney, Susan Romer, at 1.800.U.ADOPT.US or email to adamsromer@aol.com. We hope to hear from you!

Best wishes, Kelli and Doug