Jessica enjoys a number of different activities in her leisure time, to include baking, gardening, sewing, running, and reading. She also enjoys spending time at the beach, swimming, floating, and relaxing in a hammock. Jessica has run a number of half-marathons, including some through our national parks!

Michael enjoys playing board games, role playing games, video games, reading, and hiking. He has a weekly in-person gaming session with friends.

Together, we enjoy cooking, taking our dog for walks, sitting and relaxing with our cat, camping and hiking, spending time engrossed in nature, and working on home improvement projects. We also enjoy attending Roller Derby games, seeing plays and musicals, watching TV and movies, and decorating our house for the holidays. We like to try new types of food and drink, either through going to a new restaurant, or picking out a new recipe to try at home. We make a point to travel, both in the United States and overseas.

Some of our biggest traditions are the holidays. For Halloween, we like to decorate our house, and hand out candy, seeing all the costumes the local children wear. For Thanksgiving, we host a dinner for our friends and family, smoking a turkey, and providing a feast that lasts all day long. The day after Thanksgiving we go and buy a live tree for Yule, and decorate it and the rest of the house for the season. On Yule, we again host our friends and family for an all day feast. During the Yule season, we enjoy driving around to look at the impressive light displays that some houses put out.

Every year, we plan on going to at least one play or musical on Broadway. We also plan 3 or 4 camping trips, and try to visit at least one National Park every year. We also plan a beach weekend every summer. In the winter, we like to stay at a cabin, or bed and breakfast, to enjoy the mountains and snow.

We enjoy celebrating birthdays, using it as a chance to focus on and celebrate our family. We enjoy combining gifts with experiences, exploring a new location, or visiting a favorite place.

We live in one of the epicenters of cultural diversity in the United States. This provides us a lot of opportunities to explore and experience culture. We plan to share this with your child, by exploring embassies, visiting cultural centers, attending cultural events, going to museums, and, if we can, travel to places of importance from your family's culture and background. We also have a diverse set of friends, some of whom may share a cultural background with your child. We feel spending time with people that share that cultural background can be important to understanding where they come from, and part of who they are. We want your child to be proud of who they are, and where they came from.

Because cultural diversity is important, we want to expose them to many different cultures from around the world, to give them a greater understanding of people from all walks of life. We believe traveling is an important part of that, giving them opportunities to see people and experience their cultures firsthand.

We live in a Maryland suburb, close to Washington D.C. We have a 5 bedroom single family home, which includes a large living room with a wood-burning fireplace, a family dinning room with a table for 10, a large finished basement family room, and a fenced in backyard, with vegetable and flower gardens, and plenty of space to run around. We have a bedroom next to the primary bedroom on the main floor that is ready to be a nursery.

We live in a diverse neighborhood, with families of all ages, and many children are seen playing together. There is a park within walking distance that has tennis courts, basketball courts, baseball, softball, and soccer fields, an aquatic center with an indoor and outdoor pool, a beautiful pond, and many trails through the woods. Our streets are lined with trees that flower in the spring, and turn a variety of beautiful colors in the fall. Our local library is a short five-minute drive away, and there is a pre-school, elementary school, and middle school within walking distance of our house, and a high school just a little further away. All 25 high schools in our county are regularly included on the US News Best High Schools list.

We live a 10-minute drive from a Metro station, which can reach many areas in Maryland, Virginia, and Washington D.C.; allowing easy access to the Smithsonian museums, the National Zoo, foreign embassies, and cultural sites.

Our families do not live close by, Jessica's family lives in Texas, and Michael's family lives in Michigan. When visiting Jessica's family, we enjoy eating Tex-Mex, spending time at the pool and beach, and attending events with our nieces and nephews. When we visit Michael's family in Michigan, we spend a lot of time in nature, as his parents live in a forested area of the state. We usually eat blueberry pancakes with wild blueberries his parents pick every July. When our families come out to visit us, we enjoy cooking, and taking them to see the different museums, cultural events, and activities scattered around our nation's capital.

Given the distance between us and our extended family, we have built a local family out of close friends. With these family members, we have weekly dinners and movie nights, board game nights, shared holiday meals, and take vacations together. Our most recent vacation involved going to Spain for two weeks, where we visited the Guggenheim museum, took a cooking class, enjoyed time at the beach, and toured filming sites from Game of Thrones.

All of our family are excited for us to become parents, and they are looking forward to having a new member of the family to dote upon, and share family traditions with. Both our local and distant extended families are closely following our adoption journey, and are being very supportive along the way.

We are writing to you today with hearts full of hope and a deep sense of respect for your incredibly difficult journey. We understand that this is a very personal and emotional decision, and we want to assure you that we approach this with the utmost sensitivity and understanding for your time and experience.

We have been together for nine years, and married for seven. We both desire to nurture and guide a child, to provide a safe and stable home where they can grow and thrive. The thought of welcoming a child into our lives fills us with a sense of excitement and joy.

Together, we offer a home filled with warmth, laughter, and a commitment to providing a child with a loving and supportive environment. We believe in fostering a child's individuality, encouraging their passions, and supporting their dreams. We value a lifelong pursuit of learning and education, a desire to see the world and the adventures it has to offer, and being part of and growing a strong community of mutual respect and support.

We both share a love of building our local community, as well as traveling, to experience new people, places, and things. Jessica has a very strong creative side, and spends some of her time baking, gardening, and sewing. Michael enjoys using some of his free time playing board games and role playing games; building worlds of adventure and imagination for his friends. Together, we enjoy spending time in nature, camping, hiking, and exploring remote places. We also enjoy opening our home to our friends, hosting dinner nights twice a week, and often hosting for major holidays; to make sure everyone has a place to go, a warm meal to enjoy, good company, and so no one has to spend a holiday alone.

We understand that you may have many questions, and we are eager to answer them honestly and openly. We are committed to maintaining an open and honest relationship with you, if that is something you desire. We are happy to share letters, pictures, emails, and even phone calls or in-person visits, if the situation permits. We believe that an open adoption can be a beautiful way to honor your role in your child's life while providing them with a loving and secure home. It is important for your child to understand where they came from, to learn about and understand the culture and experiences of their heritage. We will work to foster regular contact throughout your child's life, so you can share in their growth and their journey.

We know that considering adoption for your child is one of the most difficult and important decisions you will ever make. We understand that this is a deeply personal and emotional journey, and we want to assure you that we respect your feelings and your decisions.

We are writing this letter with a sincere hope that you will consider us as potential parents for your child. We are ready and eager to offer a loving, stable, and nurturing home where your child can flourish and grow.

Michael & Jessica