Chelsie and Kathie

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From Us to You

Dear Expectant Mother,

“When my kids were born, I made two prayers. One, that they would be healthy. Two, that they would be happy.” Chelsie’s father spoke these words to us at our wedding. It is the same prayer we have for our future child. Your journey to this point, to reading this letter, we imagine has had its ups and downs. We are grateful that you are reflecting on your future and what you want for your child. We can’t pretend to know exactly what our future holds. We can’t make promises about the exact path your child’s life will take if they join our family. However, we can promise they will be loved unconditionally and given every opportunity to be exactly who they are. We can promise not only to love your child, but to protect, nurture, educate, encourage, and provide for him or her as well.

We have been navigating life together since we met working at a summer camp for people with disabilities in 2010. Working so closely together (you are “on duty” 24 hours a day at camp) allowed us to quickly learn our strengths and weaknesses and how to support each other through both the good and challenging times. Together we’ve navigated coming out to our families, first full time jobs, puppy training (twice), home buying, marriage, and the adoption of our first child. Our lives are full of love. We have surrounded ourselves with a strong community of family and friends. We would love to share this life we have built with another child.

We look forward to introducing your child to our current traditions and creating new ones as they grow up. During the summer, we compete in the family mini-golf classic. We are currently the 3rd generation of competitors and are excited to see a fourth generation join in and win trophies. In October each year, we gather with over fifty of Chelsie’s extended family members, including the ever-growing number of children, to celebrate the annual “All-a-Day” where we spend all day celebrating the year’s holidays (think pumpkin carving, a Fourth of July parade, Thanksgiving dinner, and a Christmas gift exchange). Palm Sunday weekend, we gather with Kat’s extended family for a few rounds of bowling before sitting down to share a meal. Although we have many extended family traditions, we are excited to create our own smaller traditions with our children, like making pancakes on Saturday mornings and receiving new pajamas on Christmas Eve before we snuggle up to read a new book.

During the summer, we enjoy riding our bikes around the local lakes, kayaking, and going on walks with our dogs. In the Minnesota winters, we spend more time inside reading and watching movies. Our children will learn an active lifestyle, how to slow down and be in the moment, a love for the outdoors, and a sense of purpose while being surrounded by family and friends that love them.

Neither of us traveled far until school trips in middle school and high school. Our vacations rarely extended outside of the Midwest. We are now lucky enough to have the means to enjoy extended vacations each year to Hawaii, Florida, or anywhere we think we would enjoy exploring. We plan to provide our children with the opportunity to see the country and the world.

If you choose us as family for your child, we look forward not only to welcoming your child into our lives but you as well in whatever form you are comfortable with. It is important that your child knows where he or she came from and that they joined us out of love.

Thank you for giving us the opportunity to share more about ourselves. We wish you luck in your decision and if you choose to parent, congratulations! We couldn’t be happier for you.

Chelsie & Kat

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About Chelsie

“Where does the rainbow go?” asked the child as he and his mother sat on the porch swing watching the rain. “If you follow it, it leads you to treasure,” answered the mother. “Have you followed it?” asked the child. “I have,” said the mother.

Chelsie is a writer at heart. This is the start of my favorite story. It goes on to follow each stripe of the rainbow until it leads the mother to her treasure, the child. Each color stripe shows the mother’s journey to making a safe and happy home for the two of them. At the end, when she is asked what happened to the rainbow, the mother replies, “The end of my rainbow is your beginning. Now the rainbow waits for your turn to follow it.” Through her writing, Chelsie shows her compassion, insightfulness, and love for others. Her poems always make me cry.

Chelsie is a charismatic person who loves being the center of attention. She enjoys making people laugh and smile and I have not met anyone who does not like her. Kids flock to her, especially my oldest nephew, who does not warm up quickly to others. From the moment she met him when he was only a few months old, he would laugh for her and no one else (save his parents). Chelsie has a special way of making people feel loved and appreciated through one of a kind, handcrafted gifts (her current creative mediums include original writing pieces, Photoshop, and wood). I can always count on her to make a bad day better by taking some of the world’s weight off my shoulders.

When she is not being creative at home, Chelsie loves to be active. She attended her first basketball camp at 5 years old and has been playing sports ever since. She believes that sports have given her the confidence to be who she is with no regrets. She ran cross-country and was the catcher on her high school and college softball teams. During her first year of college, Chelsie learned she loved to play rugby as well. Her college team went on to compete in the National championship and her rugby friends are still some of our closest friends. Although she no longer plays sports competitively, she enjoys adult league games of softball and basketball. Every few years she makes time to coach basketball at local youth organizations as well. Chelsie hopes to cheer on (or maybe coach) our future children in whatever sport makes them happy.

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About Kat

The first time I met Kat, I knew she was someone I wanted to get to know just by the way she was standing. Her posture exuded confidence and when I got to know the loving, giving, and yes, confident, personality that went along with it. I couldn’t help but fall in love with her.

Kat has a beautiful singing voice and I often find myself holding my breath just to hear her hum. She loves going to musicals (easily bringing me to love them as well) and can often be found singing their songs around the house.

I am convinced Kat reads at least a book a week. She especially enjoys fantasy books. She typically reads on her Kindle but every once in a while I’ll see her rereading a hard-cover version of one of the Harry Potter books (she’s a Ravenclaw). Her newest hobby is sewing. She enjoys making gifts for our friends and family including scarves, bags, and baby blankets.

Our niece and nephews adore Kat. If she is not with me when I see them, their first question is about where she is. If we spend the night, she is always their pick to read them their bedtime stories. In the summer, we enjoy visiting Kat’s family cabin. When there, Kat can often be found getting chased by or getting in water fights with the kids.

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Our Families

Kat’s family lives in Wisconsin. We load up the car for the 4.5-hour drive to visit about every other month in the winter and more in the summer. Our favorite time is summer when we meet at the cottage (the family cabin in Wisconsin speak). Between Kat’s two older brothers, her parents, and her aunts and uncles, the family owns the last five properties on a private man-made island. While there, we enjoy lazy afternoons chatting with family at the picnic tables or around the fire, paddle boarding, canoeing and boating, and playing with our niece and three nephews. One of our favorite traditions is the end of summer picnic with live music, kids’ games, roasted corn, and a craft raffle. Everyone in Kat’s family donates to the raffle, including hand turned duck calls made by Kat’s dad. We complete and see whose craft brings in the most tickets and enjoy seeing others excited about what we’ve made.

Chelsie’s parents live about twenty minutes away and we see them almost every day. During the summer we have pizza and wine Fridays where we get together with Chelsie’s parents, grandma, and aunt and uncle. They adore Della and can’t wait to have another grandchild. Chelsie’s younger brother lives in Iowa with his fiancé and her older brother lives in the Twin Cities with his wife and infant son.

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Our Home

In 2018, we decided to leave the city for a small town to be closer to Chelsie’s family. Our house sold in a day and we moved in with Chelsie’s parents. We spent an entire year searching before we purchased our current (and 3rd) home in the winter of 2019. It is a 4 bedroom ranch home with a finished basement. There are 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms upstairs as well as Kat’s home office. The basement has 2 bedrooms (one of which currently serves as Kat’s craft space), a library/study nook, and a family room. The 3rd stall of our 3 car garage serves as Chelsie’s wood shop as after our last move, Chelsie promised Kat no more saw dust in the house. We have a large, fenced back yard that Chelsie is getting ready to add a sand box and swing set to.

Our neighborhood is filled with kids of all ages. The park board is working on putting up a playground and basketball court only a block away. We are only a few blocks from a paved bike trail that takes us into town, straight to the local soft serve shop. Chelsie’s aunt and uncle are only a 15 minute walk away and love when we stop by with Della for a visit. A short drive into the country takes us to Chelsie’s cousin’s hobby farm, filled with ducks, chickens, and cows. Della enjoys feeding the ducks at one of the many lakes before going to the nearby softball field to watch Chelsie coach junior high softball.

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Why We are Choosing to Adopt

We are choosing to adopt because we want another child in our family. We will love being parents to another child and our daughter having a brother or sister. We have a lot of love to give and are excited to share our traditions and lives with another child.

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About Us

We met the summer of 2010 when both of us were hired at a camp for people with disabilities in Wisconsin. Chelsie was a dorm leader and Kat was the ropes course and climbing wall director. Throughout the summer, we learned each other’s strengths and weaknesses and how to lean on each other to get through the hard times and make the most of the good times. When camp was about to end, we knew we could not let the other get away. We finally made our relationship official the last week of summer while packing up camp for the year. We were engaged in 2013 on a surprise hot air balloon ride planned by Chelsie. She was so afraid of dropping the ring that she was barely able to speak the words she had planned to Kat. We married in 2014 on a teaching farm just outside Minneapolis surrounded by family and friends. Since we met, we have been a package deal, preferring to do most activities together rather than apart. Some of our favorite hobbies include playing with our dogs, reading in the backyard hammock, checking out local craft fairs, and singing at the top of our lungs to Broadway musicals.

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Our Sweet Pups

We have 2 dogs, Flint and Kara. Flint joined our family as a puppy in the fall 2011 when we picked him out at the local Humane Society. Kat had been begging Chelsie to get a dog the moment they moved into a rental that would allow animals. He is a 60-pound brown lab mix and thinks he is a lap dog. He enjoys chewing on woodchips and sleeping on Kat’s pillow when she gets out of bed. Flint is very loyal and wants to be wherever we are (translation, we never worry that he will run away)! Kara joined our family, also as a puppy, in the fall of 2017 from a local rescue. She is energetic and talkative. Her liveliness makes Flint act young again too! She hasn’t figured out that dogs barking on the TV are not neighborhood dogs that she likes to bark at.

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What We will Teach Your Child

We hope to teach our children compassion, kindness, and acceptance of all people. We wish for them to be authentically and proudly themselves, while still having an open mind and heart to others’ views and ideas. While Chelsie looks forward to teaching our children how to play basketball and Kat her love of theater, even more, we can’t wait for our children to discover their own interests and to encourage and cheer them on in whatever they enjoy doing.

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On a Typical 3-Day Weekend

We like to use 3-day weekends to visit Kat’s family in Wisconsin since the drive is 4.5 hours. Sometimes we have activities planned with them, but often it involves hanging out with our nephews who live right next door to Kat’s parents. Currently that includes playing Pokémon, biking to the park, boating, and reading books.

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Our Vacations and Leisure Time

Neither of us traveled far until school trips in middle school and high school. Our vacations rarely extended outside of the Midwest. We are now lucky enough to have the means to enjoy extended vacations each year to Hawaii, Florida, or anywhere we think we would enjoy exploring. We plan to provide our children with the opportunity to see the country and the world. Our favorite places to vacation are Disney World and Maui.

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Our Lifestyle

During the summer, we enjoy riding our bikes, exploring the local parks, and going on walks with our dogs. In the Minnesota winters, we spend more time inside reading and watching movies. Our children will learn an active lifestyle, how to slow down and be in the moment, a love for the outdoors, and a sense of purpose while being surrounded by family and friends that love them.

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Our Hobbies

Chelsie enjoys woodworking, sports, and reading. This last summer, she built our daughter a playhouse in the backyard. Kat enjoys sewing, biking, and reading. She recently got a stationary bike to use in the winter and compete against people at work.

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Our Family Traditions

We look forward to introducing a child to our current traditions and creating new ones as they grow up. During the summer, we compete in the family mini-golf tournament. We are currently the 3rd generation of competitors and are excited to see a fourth generation join in and win trophies. In October each year, we gather with over fifty of Chelsie’s extended family members, including the ever-growing number of children, to celebrate the annual “All-a-Day” where we spend all day celebrating the year’s holidays (think pumpkin carving, a Fourth of July parade, Thanksgiving dinner, and a Christmas gift exchange). Palm Sunday weekend, we gather with Kat’s extended family for a few rounds of bowling before sitting down to share a meal. Although we have many extended family traditions, we are excited to continue creating our own smaller traditions with our children, like apple picking in the fall and receiving new pajamas on Christmas Eve before we snuggle up to read a new book.

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Our Relationship with Della 's Birth Mom

When we adopted our daughter, her birth mother asked to receive written updates and pictures every few months. As much as we would love for our daughter to know her birth mother, we respect her choice to not have contact. When we write, we let her know we are open to whatever contact she is comfortable with.

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What We will Tell your Child about You

Right now, all we know about our future child’s birthmother is that she will be one of the most important people in our lives and our child will certainly know and be reminded of this. We look forward to telling our child all about their adoption story and plan on making it part of our bedtime routine. We want our child to know where they came from and understand all of the love that went into their birth and adoption. We will try to answer any questions he or she has honestly. We are optimistic that we will continue to have some relationship with their birth mom and will be able to answer those questions.

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Our Promise to You

“When my kids were born, I made two prayers. One, that they would be healthy. Two, that they would be happy.” Chelsie’s father spoke these words at our wedding. It is the same prayer we have for our child. Your journey to this point, to reading this letter, we imagine has had its ups and downs. We are grateful that you are reflecting on your future and what you want for your child. We can’t pretend to know exactly what our future holds. We can’t make promises about the exact path your child’s life will take if they join our family. However, we can promise they will be loved unconditionally and given every opportunity to be exactly who they are. We can promise not only to love your child, but to protect, nurture, educate, encourage, and provide for him or her as well.