Jason and Daniella

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From Us to You

First off, we want to express our gratitude and admiration for you. Whether this decision has been easy or hard, there is no judgment and we are so honored you would consider us as adoptive parents to your child. You are already so cherished by us.

Allow us to introduce ourselves! We’re Dani & Jason. We have been together for 17 years and married for almost 12. We have a very smart, energetic, strong-willed, and independent 7-year-old daughter named Sofia, who is very excited to become an older sister, and a super sweet, snuggly Bernedoodle named Astro. We are a family that loves adventure! Whether it’s traveling near or far, camping, hiking or skiing, exploring new local restaurants, or learning something new – we love to explore.

If we are blessed to be chosen by you, your child would be coming home to a very warm, loving, and fun home and surrounded by a strong community of diverse and incredibly thoughtful family and friends who are all so excited to meet him/her. We are blessed to live in a close-knit neighborhood where most of our neighbors are our friends. Children range from newborn to 13, and they often play in the front yard with one another; throwing water balloons or having popsicles in the summer, or sledding down our driveway on snow days in the winter. Though it may sound like a suburban dream, we are grateful to live in the city proper where there is diversity of thought, cultures, race, and socioeconomic status. As a multicultural household, it’s important to us that our children are raised with diversity of all kinds. In our home, it looks like speaking Spanish, cooking traditional Cuban or Italian meals, big family dinners, and making sure we celebrate holidays like Dia de los Muertos, Dia de los Reyes, or Noche Buena.

We want to assure you that your child will be so loved and a cherished member of our family from the moment we meet. Our love for him or her will be no different than the love we have for our biological daughter, Sofia. And we promise to give them every opportunity possible to live a life they love and deserve, to be open and honest with them, and to love them fully for who they are.

We also want you to know that we look forward to building a relationship with you. We want your child to know you; you will always be a part of their story. We are entering this journey with open hearts and we are full of gratitude for what lies ahead.

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Why We're Choosing to Adopt

We have been together for over 15 years and from the beginning of our relationship we dreamed about growing a family together, and specifically, about adoption. Adoption is something that has been on both of our hearts for as long as we can remember. I think it’s due to a combination of many factors – including personal experience, a heart for community, and learning from close family and friends. For Jason, he has long felt that his greatest calling was to be the best husband and the best father he could be. He has a very close relationship with his own father, and he has a deep desire to share a similar bond with his own children. He’s also had a desire since he was young to do his part in helping leave the world a little better than he found it. Being a strong, supportive father can do that.

For Dani, as a Latina, proud daughter of immigrants, and educator for over 14 years, she has always had a deep commitment to children and their social-emotional health, as well as a commitment to social justice and anti-racism work. We started talking more seriously about adoption about 5 years ago and began having dinners with some close family and friends who have adopted – to learn from their experience and better inform our own decision making.

We feel very blessed and we are thrilled to pursue this opportunity. We both have steady work that we love and we are compensated fairly. We have a home we love and we have an incredible support network of neighbors, family, and dear friends that we can celebrate life’s joys with and who we can turn to for support when things get hard. And we have an incredible 7 year old daughter who is yearning for a sibling and companion. We have spoken at length with her about adoption and she is excited to begin this journey with us. At this point in our marriage and in our life together, we feel equipped and excited to say yes to bringing another beautiful child into our home.

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About Jason

Jason is an amazing partner and father. He is thoughtful and intentional about the kind of person and dad he wants to be. He is incredibly playful and silly with our daughter, and yet can hold the line with her in a loving way much more than I can (I’ll admit I can be a bit of a push over sometimes). He is the rock of our family – holding it down always, whether it comes to budgets, planning, or being there for us emotionally. He is also very hardworking while putting family first always. He somehow still finds time to coach Sofia’s soccer and T-ball teams, he takes her to afterschool programs, instills a love of skiing in her, and sits down and does homework with her. And I have no doubt in my mind he will be just as amazing with your child.

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About Dani

Dani is a phenomenal woman. She is a fearless leader with an empathetic heart and a passionate soul. She is a courageous and brave woman with strong opinions who is willing to fight for what she believes in. She’s committed to instilling these same values in our daughter, and I couldn’t be more grateful for it. Whether it’s at work, in her family of origin, or in our home, Dani is the glue that holds everything together. She is a free spirit with a seemingly endless supply of creative energy that breathes life into those around her. Dani has instilled a love of reading and art in Sofia and she continues to find new and exciting ways to feed these passions. She is the best mom to Sofia I could ever imagine, and I know she will be the same for your child. And she is committed to learning. Dani is constantly seeking out books, articles, mentors, and new research that helps inform how we can be more loving, empathetic, brave and kind parents. I am so, so grateful to be on this journey with her.

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Our Home

We absolutely love our neighborhood. We live on a quiet street just 15 minutes from downtown. We are a tight knit group of neighbors that include a mix of young families and some who have lived here over 20 years. Our street is filled with young kids that love to play tag or jump on a trampoline with one another in the summer and build snow forts and sled together in the winter. Our best friends live across the street and most weeks we’ll get together with them for dinner.
The public school in our neighborhood is a blue ribbon national school (meaning it’s nationally recognized for being really great) that is incredibly diverse and just a 5 minute walk from our house. Our daughter, Sofia, loves the school and that so many of her school friends live within walking distance to us and we bump into them on evening family walks.

Our 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom house, that’s filled with art from our travels, backs up to a path that runs for 70 miles. We use it a ton. In fact, Sofia learned to ride her bike on it and loves to feed the ducks that live there. In five minutes we can walk to a beautiful, large park with fields, tennis courts, a heated outdoor pool and a rec center that provides lots of sports for kids, which we have participated in and love being able to walk to. We also love the trail because we get the opportunity to engage with lots of our neighbors and friends as many of them walk past us when we’re hanging out in the backyard.

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Our Sweet Pup

Astro is the MVP of our family, bringing us immense joy. He is an almost 2 year old Bernedoodle and probably the sweetest pup you will ever meet. He is also an incredibly good listener. The best thing about him is that he’ll meet your energy. If we’re snuggled up on a couch watching a movie, he’s right there with us. If we’re hiking for 2 hours or running around, he’s ready to go at full speed. Our daughter, Sofia, can sometimes play rough with him – hugging him, putting clothes on him- and he is always a good sport about it. He is incredible with babies and people in general – has never once and would never do anything to hurt a fly. He is incredibly smart and obedient. When we go out of town, we have friends begging us to watch him because he is just so well behaved, loving, and silly. We are very lucky!

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Family Time

We are very close to both of our families and feel so lucky that we get to see them often. Most of Jason’s family lives here in Colorado, about 15 minutes from our home. Jason’s parents live in a beautiful home that backs up to a large open space. It’s often the place we gather for family birthday celebrations. Jason’s brother, Tyler, our sister-in-law, Julianna, and their three children – Brooklyn (6), Sadie (3) and Wills (1), live about 20 minutes south of us. Jason’s sister, Sarah, and her husband, Luke, live in New Orleans, and come back to Colorado to visit often. We love spending time with Jason’s family, especially in our “happy place” which is a family place in Vail. We love to spend cozy weekends there all together playing games, cooking, and spending time with one another. We are also close with Jason’s great-grandmother, Pat, who lives about 5 minutes away from us. We get together for dinner with her often. Jason’s parents, Kim and Jeff, are super active. They love to hike and bike in the summer and ski in the winter. They are super generous and love to spend time with their grandbabies. We love to vacation together and recently did a trip to Hawaii with all of them.

Dani is a proud Latina and daughter of immigrants. She is originally from Miami, Florida and comes from a very close, large family that still mostly lives there. Her mom, youngest sister, Francesca, grandmother and aunts and uncles, all of which she’s very close with, live there. We love going home to visit – the language, music, food, humidity and ocean feed Dani’s soul. It’s fun to be able to bring our daughter Sofia there to learn more about her Cuban heritage. Dani’s middle sister, Gabi, our brother-in-law, Marco, and our nephew, Filippo (1), live in New York City where we also love to visit. Dani’s family loves Colorado so they visit us often. It’s not uncommon to have one of Dani’s family members visiting at any given time. Dani’s dad is originally from Italy, but he and her half-brother live in Cozumel, Mexico.

We have a lot of friends from all aspects of life – friends we grew up with, went to college with, work with, live near, etc. – that have become like family to us.

Both of our families and our chosen family (friends) are very excited to welcome a new child into their lives.

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Our Lifestyle

Our family is very active and loves adventure of all sorts, whether that’s traveling out of the country to explore a different culture, camping around Colorado, or going on a day trip to a new town. During the week, we both work and Sofia goes to school. Our evenings involve some fun after school activities, like gymnastics, soccer, or space club, and then dinner together and, if it’s warm enough, a family walk, where we get a chance to connect with one another and hear about each other’s days. On the weekends, we love to do lots of fun stuff together, which could include going to the zoo, fun events around town, playing in the backyard, skiing, camping or any other way to explore the great outdoors we’re lucky to have here in Colorado. We all love to watch and attend live sporting events – we root for the Broncos (football), Nuggets (basketball), and Rockies (baseball). Sofia and Dani are big readers and love to read chapter books together before bed.

Traveling is also a big part of our lives. We both grew up traveling with our families who instilled this love in us, and we hope to instill it in our children. We love being able to learn about, and from, new cultures. One of our favorite things to do in a new country is to visit the grocery store – there are so many interesting things to try and it can tell you a lot about a culture.

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Family Traditions

We are a family that loves to celebrate and spend time with our extended families. Since Dani’s family lives mostly in Miami, every year we swap the major holidays we celebrate with each family, so that in one year we may be in Miami for Thanksgiving and Denver for Christmas, and in the next year the opposite. When we travel to Miami in December, we have a big Noche Buena Cuban dinner outside, take obligatory trips to the beach (it recharges Dani’s soul), and often tag on a post-Christmas trip to celebrate Dani’s mom’s birthday; trips have included Disney World, Key West and the Bahamas. When we celebrate with Jason’s family, we often are in the mountains at the family cabin playing board games late into the night. Sofia and her cousins spend the afternoons playing doctor, board games or having a snuggly movie night.

In the month leading up to Christmas, we have a fun tradition of Krispy the elf who hides somewhere new each morning and comes to visit from the North Pole. We also have an advent calendar that Sofia gets really excited about and we light an Advent wreath each Sunday. We spend quality time on Christmas Eve – baking cookies, making eggnog, and getting ready for Santa and the reindeer – putting out milk, cookies, carrots, and such. Christmas morning we open stockings and each exchange a letter with one person in our family that expresses our gratitude for that person. We then spend the rest of the day sharing quality time together – opening presents, sharing good food, and playing games together!

We also love to celebrate Dia de los Muertos with an ofrenda honoring the spirits of those we’ve lost, Dia de los Reyes with a Rosca cake and putting our shoes out for the three kings to leave gifts, and we absolutely love celebrating Halloween. We do a family costume (this year we were the Jetsons) and have our extended family come over to our house for dinner and trick or treating, as well as a weekend neighborhood block party/outdoor movie.

In addition to the annual traditions, we have day to day traditions. Every Friday is family movie night. We often order pizza and rotate who chooses the movie (though we all have to okay it!). Every night, without fail, we read books and say prayers. Jason sometimes makes up “Orson stories” to tell to Sofia. The stories are about a young boy that lives in a tree house – this tradition was passed down from Jason’s grandfather who always made up Orson stories filled with adventures. It is one of our favorite family traditions.

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Our Hobbies

Our biggest hobbies together are centered on adventure! We love to travel and explore new places. We have a passion for experiencing different cultures, trying new foods, and discovering spaces. We enjoy going to sporting events and music festivals. And we are happiest when we’re on an adventure together outdoors. In the winter we spend most weekends in the mountains skiing. In the summers, we love to camp and hike. This past summer we were fortunate to be able to camp in Colorado, Nebraska, and Utah!

Individually, Jason has a passion for fly fishing, he is learning to play the piano, and he runs a podcast focused on storytelling with one of his closest friends. Dani loves to read, hike, and has recently gotten into kickboxing.

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Racial and Cultural Diversity

We have a multicultural family and live in a diverse city. We celebrate diversity of all kinds in our house (diversity of ability, race, culture, thought, socioeconomic status, etc.) – from the books we read, to the traditions we celebrate, to attending rallies as a family in support of our diverse friends, and having age appropriate conversations with our daughter.

We understand that as a white man and a light skinned Latina woman, we have a responsibility to have these conversations with our children and raise them to value differences, to be agents of change, and to be allies to those different from themselves. For Dani, as a Latina, proud daughter of immigrants, and educator for over 14 years, she has always had a deep commitment to children and their social emotional health and wellbeing and to social justice and anti-racism work. This plays out at home with our own daughter, and we will do the same with your child, welcoming, valuing, cherishing their differences while not burdening them with teaching us how to do right by them, but rather taking initiative and responsibility for that as their parents.

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Education

Education is incredibly important to us and something we value deeply. In fact, Dani has worked for 14 years in education across a number of different roles such as Founding School Leader, teacher, and community organizer. Working towards educational equity and reimagining public education to achieve exceptional results for all students, is something that she is incredibly passionate about. As the daughter of immigrants, Dani has seen firsthand what a good education can do to change the trajectory of her family’s life in just two generations.

Growing up, Dani’s dad would always say “education is the best gift we can give you” and her parents sacrificed a ton to allow her and her sisters to attend an all-girls Catholic school in Miami. Jason went to a neighborhood public school in a suburb of Denver. We met in Boston where Dani received a B.A. in Film and Communication Studies. Jason studied Philosophy and Theology. Since college, both of us have continued to pursue a passion for education and life-long learning. Jason has two master’s degrees – in Theology and Business – and a post-graduate certificate in mechanical engineering. Dani recently completed a post-graduate leadership program for mid-career professionals.

We also believe education is the best gift we can give our children and will ensure that both Sofia and your child receive the best education possible so that they have no shortage of options ahead of them in life.

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Our Faith

We identify as Christian and our faith is important to us. Jason has two degrees in Religion and he spent almost 10 years building and running a faith-based non-profit focused on intentional community and social change. Our interpretation of the Christian faith is that Jesus was a revolutionary, a social change activist and community builder who spent time with those on the margins and who welcomed all. Above all else, we believe that God is love and love always wins. And this is the type of faith we hope to share with our children.

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How We Met

We met in September 2003 during the first weekend of our freshman year of college and our relationship was a storybook college romance in many ways. We were 18 years old at the time. Dani and her roommate went around the dorm knocking on doors to make new friends and when they got to our room, she saw some music posters on the wall of bands we both loved. A shared love of music was the beginning of a fast friendship. We quickly became best friends and our friendship has always been the foundation of our marriage. We started dating during the second semester of that year and stayed together all through college. We both studied abroad our junior year – Jason living in England and Dani living in South Africa – and we were both heavily involved in different activities, including sports, community services, and academics. But through it all, the one constant was our relationship.

We got engaged in 2008 back on campus when Jason was working for the university in residential life at the time and planned an elaborate scavenger hunt connected to many different memories throughout our relationship. We were married two years later in Florence, Italy surrounded by many of our closest friends and family.

We stayed in New England for 8 years after graduating from college and it will always hold a special place in our hearts. It’s where we met, where we began our careers, and where our daughter Sofia was born. But deep down, we both knew we didn’t want to raise kids there and stay long-term. We moved to Colorado in 2015 – driven by a desire to be closer to extended family and to live in a place that is focused around healthy living and spending time outdoors. Over the past six years, we’ve built an amazing community through our neighborhood, extended family, and work colleagues and we couldn’t be more grateful for the life we have here!

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Our Relationship with our Parents

We have very strong relationships with our parents, as does our daughter. We’re blessed to have Jason’s parents (or Mimi and Poppi as they are now called) just 15 minutes away from us and see them often for family dinners, or at their home up in the mountains where we spend lots of time with one another cooking, skiing or hiking and playing games together. They have recently started a new tradition of taking the extended family on trips each year, we recently went to Hawaii, where we create even more magical memories together.

Dani’s parents (or Nonni and Nonno) are divorced, but still friends, and live out of state. Mom lives in Miami and Dad in Mexico and they both visit often. Pre-COVID, we probably saw Dani’s mom almost every other month. We love having her visit as she’s so helpful and fun to have around. She usually always comes for our daughter’s birthday each year to help us celebrate. Dani’s dad visits a few times a year and we usually cook delicious Italian meals with him, take long walks, and play board games together. We are very lucky to have a 4 bedroom home where we can continue to accommodate family visits as we love to have them!

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Our Promise to You

We promise to love and cherish your child from the moment we meet; to give them every opportunity possible to live a life they love and deserve; to be open and honest with them; to tell them about their birth story, about you and how we built our special family together. We promise to love them fully for who they are. We promise that if they are from a different cultural background to us that we will fully integrate, cherish and celebrate their culture in our family. We promise to be open and honest with you along this journey we are navigating alongside one another.