Mickey and Dana

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From Our Hearts to Yours

Warm greetings from Colorado!  We can’t thank you enough for taking the time to read about our story and we hope to connect with you!  We can’t imagine all of the emotions you are experiencing, but we want you to know we are here to listen and be there for you through this extremely difficult decision.  We truly want to get to know you for so many reasons, the biggest being so we can speak of you often to your child.  We want to share your traditions and favorite things with your child and we feel that knowing you is the best way we can do that.  We will always be eternally grateful to you and want you to know you will always be honored and respected in our home.

Your child would be so loved and encouraged to pursue their dreams.  We will support your child’s interests and work to incorporate your culture and traditions into our daily lives.  Life isn’t all sunshine and roses and we will work through difficult times together by having good communication and trust in our relationship. We are two positive and warm people whose hearts are totally open. Should we be lucky enough to connect with you, we can’t wait to get to know you and your child.

We have always wanted to be parents and our life plan always included adoption. We first attempted pregnancy naturally and then through fertility treatments involving IVF.  Our path has led us to adoption and that is the only path we are committed to pursuing.  We are in a stable relationship and financial position where we are fortunate enough to work towards our dream of expanding our family.

We live in Colorado and your child will have a life surrounded with love and support from us, our family, and close friends. We are Aunt and Uncle to 9 nieces and nephews with ages ranging from 3 to 17 that all live in Colorado.  Dana’s side of the family lives in Illinois, Washington, and Massachusetts and we see them multiple times a year – oftentimes with Mickey’s side of the family joining in. We are an extremely close family that plays games, hikes, and regularly takes selfies with the selfie stick (we are on selfie stick number 15 because the others broke or were confiscated at concerts).  Both sides of our families are extremely excited about our adoption journey and totally committed to supporting us and your child with whatever is needed.

A few random things about us, just in case you were wondering:

• Our favorite blizzard flavors are:
  • Dana: Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
  • Mickey: Oreo
• Favorite Fast Food:
  • Dana: McDonald’s
  • Mickey: In N Out.
• Our Uber ratings are:
  • Dana: 4.96
  • Mickey: 4.93
  • We both really like to talk to the drivers and hear their life stories!
• We both work in commercial insurance and are fortunate to have flexible schedules and can work from home a majority of the time.

Thank you again, from the bottom of our hearts.  We would be honored to connect with you and get to know you and your child.

With love,
Dana & Mickey

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Why We are Choosing to Adopt

We have so much love to give!  We’ve always known we wanted to be parents.  Life’s journey, though, brings the unexpected and when we realized we could not have a viable pregnancy, we met this with unity and positivity.  We both have multiple friends who are adopted (both open and closed adoptions) and it’s a topic we have regularly discussed with them. We truly feel that our life path has brought us to adoption and that is the only option we are interested in pursuing.  We love the idea of blending our family and all of the love and new experiences that will bring.

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Our Relationship with You

We are very interested in an open relationship and would love to share pictures/videos and have calls/video chats with you. Depending on your comfort level, we would very much enjoy meeting in person annually. We would like to discuss with you what your ideal relationship would be and work towards an understanding and agreement that will work for all. We really want to hear about your feelings and needs and how we can help support you.

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What Attracted Us to Each Other

People say opposites attract. That was not the case for us! We are extremely similar in that we are both extroverted, social and positive people. One of the things we love about each other is that even though we are extroverted, we both really work to listen to people instead of dominating the conversation. We both appreciate that we work to make everyone feel included and engaged. We met at work when Dana transferred out to Colorado from Illinois and Mickey asked her to play on a flag football team. Dana’s debut at flag football was not a showstopper but it was enough to get Mickey’s attention. We no longer work at the same company together but we remain in the same industry of commercial insurance (you guessed it, no one wants to hear more about insurance)!

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About Dana, by Mickey

Dana is the most thoughtful, endearing, and selfless person I’ve ever met. She lights up a room when she enters and has an innate ability to connect with everyone. She doesn’t like anyone feeling left out and makes it a priority to help people feel good about themselves and is a positive influence. She was in the Big Brothers, Big Sisters Program and is very close to her little sister, Lykeizia today.  Lykeizia credits Dana with helping her get through high school and being one of the first in her family to go to college!

Dana’s also a great athlete on our kickball team (although she talks to the other team more than she pays attention to the game) and a long-distance runner (she has completed multiple half marathons and is training for a full marathon)! Dana will be the best mother and I can’t wait to be by her side every step of the way.

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About Mickey, by Dana

Mickey is extremely positive, patient, and has a personality that lights up every event! Mickey is very athletic, he grew up playing baseball, football, and basketball and still has all of his athletic skills. The first time he went skiing, he accidentally went down a Blue Run and was a natural navigating his way down. He is incredibly proactive, if we go to Home Depot he starts working on whatever project we are doing the moment we get home. Mickey makes everything more fun, from running errands to cleaning the house, he truly makes everything better and more entertaining!  He has so much love and happiness to give and he will be an absolutely incredible father!

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Our Goldendoodle, Indy

We have a 4-year-old Goldendoodle dog named Indy (named after Indiana Jones). He is commonly mistaken for a teddy bear by the kids in the neighborhood as he is very fluffy and friendly! Indy is definitely more of a people lover than a fellow dog lover. Indy LOVES kids and people and is thrilled to see our neighbors on his daily walks. We used to be a lot more on the go and having a dog has helped us be more grounded and at home more, which we love! We have good friends that have Indy’s sister and get together with them regularly for play sessions.

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Lifestyle

There are so many things we can’t wait to do with your child!!  One of the things we look forward to most is going on a hike!  We have some favorite hiking areas within 30 minutes of the city.  The first hike we plan to go on is a 3 mile trail. It’s a pretty hike with a creek running through and there’s even an option to go by a castle!

One of Mickey’s favorite things to do growing up was to play catch with his family. We can’t wait to take your child to our neighborhood park and throw around a football, softball, and play basketball.  Mickey can’t decide on his favorite sport out of the three he played so, we will definitely play all and plan to add in some new sports as well!  We will absolutely encourage your child to pursue whatever interests them – whether that is sports, the arts, or anything in between.  We will support their curiosity to try something new and share stories of how we chose our hobbies.

As we love the water, we will also enroll your child in swimming lessons at a swim school a few miles away from us.  We have friends whose babies are enrolled and they have had excellent experiences and learned a lot about building confidence and independence.

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Home & Neighborhood

Our neighborhood is the best of both worlds, as it’s close to downtown but still has a strong neighborhood feel. It is a historically protected neighborhood so all of the houses have lots of character and are around 100+ years old. Our house is a brick bungalow and the prior owners had remodeled it to make an open floor plan upstairs. It feels very cozy and we have nice space on our front porch and backyard as additional hang out spots.  Our neighbors are a good mix of young adults, families, and older residents and we are friends with many on our street. We have a playground and park 3 blocks away that is always full of kids having a blast. We regularly walk the neighborhood with our 4-year-old Goldendoodle, Indy, and have gotten to know many of our neighbors this way. We can walk to the grocery store, bike paths, restaurants, and multiple parks – walkability is one of our favorite things about our neighborhood. There are many options for schools, many within walking distance.

We love spending time in our backyard and on our front porch.  Your child will have a fenced-in yard to run around with the neighborhood kids!  We have a fire pit in the back and can’t wait to roast marshmallows when it gets cool.  We also think it would be really fun to have our first camping experience in a tent in the backyard – we think about it as baby steps towards going on a real camping trip!

When we are inside our house, we spend a lot of time in the kitchen, as the first floor of our house is an open floor plan.  You can see the whole first floor when you walk in the door.  We really look forward to continuing to explore new cooking recipes for dinner and having your child cook with us.  We love cooking gadgets – our newest adventure has been a pizza oven and a milkshake machine.  We can’t wait to decorate handmade pizzas and make your child their favorite milkshake flavor.

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Our Families & Friends

We are extremely lucky to be very close to both of our families. Mickey’s immediate and extended family all live in Colorado and all within 30 minutes of us! As far as immediate family, Mickey has 2 sisters, 2 brothers-in-law, 2 stepsisters, 1 brother, and 1 sister-in-law.  Between his siblings, they have 9 kids between ages 3 through 17 so your baby will have lots of instant friends! Mickey’s dad and step-mom live 20 minutes away and are very involved in the grandkids’ variety of activities. We see Mickey’s family at least once a month for dinners, watching sports, or hanging out with the kids. Dana’s family lives mainly in Illinois; with her sister and boyfriend in Washington and her brother and husband in Massachusetts (great places to visit!). We see Dana’s family multiple times a year when they visit us in Colorado, or at various family events like the upcoming 21st annual croquet tournament/family reunion in July (spoiler alert – Dana nor Mickey have won yet), weddings, birthday parties, etc.  We are extremely tight with Dana’s extended family and her mom and dad’s sides of the family are also close.

We also have some really close friends in Colorado – Mickey is still best friends with his elementary school crew and Dana met some really great friends upon moving to Colorado in 2010 that we see often.  We are unusual in the fact that most of our individual friends have now become mutual friends and we’ve connected the different groups into one, large friend group.

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Family Traditions

Dana’s family has numerous traditions that we love to participate in. 20 years ago, Dana’s Uncle Butch was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Dana’s grandma, Helen, and Butch wanted to care for his family even after his death so they started a tradition to keep the family connected.  Helen wanted an activity everyone could participate in and with different ages and physical abilities, croquet was the only thing that worked! We now play an intense game of croquet every year in July back in Illinois or Missouri. Dana’s family also has numerous traditions on Christmas involving special dishes, such as Bavarian Cream, and baking up a storm. Mickey’s family traditions include annual pool parties, Easter brunch, and getting together for Sunday dinners or, just because. Both of our families have traditions of getting together for all the birthdays and holidays. We celebrate Thanksgiving with Mickey’s family and travel to Illinois for Christmas with Dana’s family.

As a couple, we have developed our own traditions such as hosting an annual St. Patrick’s Day party, hiking a new mountain in the summer, making the most amazing sugar cookies during the holiday season, dressing up with our dog for most holidays, and playing in a kickball league every summer.

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Racial & Cultural Diversity

We are passionate when it comes to learning about different cultures and ethnicities and we will honor your and your child’s heritage. Our city’s diversity is definitely evolving and inclusion will be a key consideration in choosing schools, sports teams, and activities. We also have a diverse friend group around the world who are excited to help support us and your child.

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Our Promise to You

We promise to honor you and speak of you often. You will be known, respected, valued, and appreciated. We can’t wait to say, “You have your Mom’s eyes” and share stories about you, such as what your favorite foods were growing up. We want to know what family traditions and stories are important to you and will promise to integrate them into our family. We will speak of you often, with gratitude and love.  We will love your child unconditionally and will be there for them in every situation. We will also be there for you and view you as an extension of our family.