Introduction

Dear Birthparent,

Our names are Laura and Lynn, and we are so grateful that you are reading this! We are looking forward to building our family through adoption.  We have friends, neighbors, and relatives who have adopted (or are adopted themselves), and believe that it is a wonderful and important responsibility to raise a child who is adopted.  We want our child to feel connected to his or her culture and/or ethnicity, even as we create our family together.  We recognize that children need to feel connected to all aspects of themselves, and we will be supportive and accepting of our child’s needs.  We will do everything we can to provide our child with opportunities to learn about and connect with his or her heritage.

We know that you are making a difficult and important decision.  We want you to know that we recognize adoption as a decision that is based on a particularly selfless love, and respect you for whatever it is you decide to do.  It is our sincere hope that you are finding peace, support, and love around you at this time.  We would be happy to talk with you on the phone, or meet with you in person, if you would like.   We look forward to sharing letters and pictures with you in the future, so you can feel connected and see how your child is thriving. We are also open to talking with you about in-person contact as that may be an important way for you to communicate that you care and for you to see that your son or daughter is thriving.

About Us

We met at work and knew almost immediately that we wanted to be together as life partners.   We got married a year and a half after we met, surrounded by our friends and family who have been completely supportive of our relationship.  Marriage has been an amazing experience for us, as we have learned so much about ourselves and about each other, and we get closer every day.

When we decided to get married, we knew that we wanted to have children.  We have stable careers, a good financial foundation for daily life and future needs, including education for our children, and we bought a home together three years ago.  Our jobs have a lot of flexibility, and we feel established where we live, so we knew it was the right time to build our family.

Lynn, although she is an only child, comes from a large extended family with numerous cousins close to her age. When she was younger, her family shared a two family house with her aunt, uncle and three cousins. She had family all around. Whenever anyone needed home repair/projects, it was always a family event. Lynn remembers that weekends consisted of lots of food, music and laughter. Lynn also remembers living in a “nice, friendly neighborhood where riding your bikes until dark was perfectly safe.” As an adult her family still rallies for house projects and she has recreated the safe place to live and play in the beautiful setting in which she and Laura live.

Laura has one sister, with whom she is very close.  Lynn’s parents live close by, as do several of her cousins.  Laura’s sister and father are just a few hours away by car, and all of our relatives are eager and excited for us to have a child in our lives.  They are accepting of our love, and our relationship, and want very much to be grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins to our child!

Lynn teaches biology in a performing arts public high school for students who excel in music, dance, theater, and other performing arts.  (You may have seen “Fame!”  It’s very similar.)  This is a great fit for her, as it allows her to spend time with teens, teach her beloved science, and be around other musical people.  Lynn loves music, is currently taking guitar lessons, and can frequently be found dancing around the kitchen.  One of her dreams is to be able to share her love for music with a child – she has already found a children’s music group that allows kids to play and sing and have fun without any pressure to “do it right”.    Lynn has a masters degree in public health, and so wellness and healthy eating are very important to her.  Lynn has every afternoon and summers off, which will allow her to be home with our child.

Lynn also is a Big Sister in the Big Brothers, Big Sisters program.  She has a nine-year-old “Little Sister” who she has been spending time with each week since early in the summer.  This has been a great relationship for both of them.  They go bowling, go to the playground, catch a Disney movie, and recently have been working on a puzzle and baking cookies at our house. Lynn looks forward to continuing this relationship for a long time.

Laura works about twenty minutes away from home at a local college.  Although she doesn’t have the summer off, like Lynn does, it is a family-friendly environment which will allow much flexibility.  Most of the winter, Laura works from home.  Laura also has a degree in public health, and a degree in social work.  Laura loves to work on creative projects, garden and grow flowers and vegetables, and spend a lot of time outside.

Our Home

We are very fortunate to have a beautiful home on a quiet private road, on a small lake.  We have all the wonderful things that this area can give us, and are just minutes from nearby college towns where there is theater, restaurants, live music, and all kinds of kid-friendly activities.  Our neighborhood is very special – people look out for one another, and because we all share the lake, the summers are spent playing Frisbee in the water, swimming, and just sitting and chatting.  We are looking forward to helping our child know about water safety and the joys of living near a lake.  We are excited to take our child in the canoe, and while he or she is sitting safely in a bright orange life jacket in the middle of the canoe, we will be paddling along.

Because we live in such a beautiful natural area, we look forward to helping our child enjoy the natural world.  Laura has already picked a spot for a child’s garden, ideal for playing in the mud and getting dirty.  In the winter, we will be able to sled, snow shoe, and walk on the frozen lake.  This winter, as we took a peaceful evening walk, we imagined pulling our child on the sled behind us.

We have both been very fortunate to travel, both in the United States, and other parts of the world.  We make sure to take at least one trip as a couple, and one trip with our families each year.  Lynn has family in Portugal, so we make trips to visit family there.  We travel a lot with Laura’s sister, brother-in-law, and father.  Recently we went to Spain, and last year we went to Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.  Sometimes we just jump in the car and head to Vermont for a long weekend of horseback riding, hiking, or just sitting reading in front of the fire.  We are eager to bring our child to some of the wonderful places we have been, as well as to explore new ones.

We share a love of animals as well.  Our dog Cleo is gentle and will be a supportive member of the family to our child, and older cats who like to sit in laps and purr.  In spite of being on the older side, our dog loves children, and gets to swim and play with the neighborhood kids all summer long.

We know that it is important for our child to have male role models.  Laura’s sister, Anna, is married to a caring, loving, and supportive man named Nath who has many nieces and nephews, and is looking forward to spending time with our child.  Anna is counting the days until she is an aunt, and Nath is already planning games.  We have asked Nath to take an active role in our child’s life – sort of like a god parent – as he has a strong sense of spirituality and also a very strong sense of fun! He has happily agreed.

Lynn’s cousin Alice, and her husband John, live five minutes from us.  Their daughter is in her early twenties, and they cannot wait to have another child to spoil.   John has warmly agreed to play an active role in our child’s life.  He is a terrific guy who has will be an excellent role model.  Alice and John, along with Lynn’s parents, have expressed interest in helping us with child care for times when we might need a mom’s night out.

Lynn’s parents are eagerly planning to care for our child in the mornings while Lynn is at work.  The college where Laura works has a wonderful child center, and eventually we will have our child there a few mornings a week.  Laura is looking forward to that, so that she can take breaks during the day for hugs and kisses.  However, being able to spend time with his or her grandparents on a daily basis will be wonderful for both the child and the grandparents.

Laura’s mother died nine years ago, and perhaps for this reason, Laura’s father, who lives about an hour away, is particularly looking forward to being a grandfather.  He is supportive of our relationship and of our expanding our family.  He lives outside of Boston, so we can stay with him when we visit the science museum, the aquarium, and the children’s museum, all places that Laura loved to go as a child.

Our Values

We feel a strong connection to family.  We share the same values, and although Lynn is sillier and Laura is more serious, we laugh all the time.  We have made a happy, loving, and accepting home for ourselves, and really want to share it with a child.  We look forward to reading aloud before bedtime from one of our many children’s books.  We can’t wait to bake cookies, go sledding, snuggle on the couch, sing songs, play games, work on crafts projects, and all of that with our child.  We will go apple picking.  We will go to museums.  We will swim in the lake and ice skate in the winter when the pond is a brick of ice.

Education is very important to us, and we have already begun saving for college.  We were raised with an appreciation for education, a love of learning and a passion for knowledge.  We read all the time, often sharing books one after the other so we can talk about them.  We look forward to passing on this love of literature and learning to our child.  We will share our values with our child, and will give them the same opportunity to make choices about their friends, their education, and their life that we were fortunate enough to have.

If you decide to choose us as your child’s adoptive family, we want to assure you that your child will have all our love and encouragement.  We both believe that parenting is both a skill and an art.  We will be committed to learning, to always be thinking of ways we can be even better parents, and to provide unlimited and unconditional love and support for your child.

We will be happy to send photos and letter updates so that you will always know your child is happy, secure, and surrounded by love and to share time, together, if this is something you would like.  Thank you for taking the time to consider us.  If you would like to learn more about us, please call Full Circle Adoptions: Toll Free Birthparent Line at 1-800-452-3678.

Peace,

Laura and Lynn