Tucker and Angela

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From Us to You

Dear Expectant Mother,

Thank you, first and foremost, for considering us as a part of your adoption story. No matter where you are on this journey, we deeply respect your bravery and selflessness in considering adoption for your child. Our hope is that during the next several months and beyond, you’re able to find the support and resources necessary to make the best choice for you and your child.

Our names are Angela and Tucker and we have lived in southern Georgia for 2 years and hope to remain here for at least 3 more. We move every few years due to Tucker’s military career and your child will have opportunities to travel and live all around the world. We’ve been happily married since 2014, and pride ourselves on the strength and resiliency of our marriage, one that’s founded on mutual respect and unconditional love. We almost immediately began trying to have children after our wedding, but infertility had other plans for us, and we’ve spent the last 5 years on that emotional rollercoaster. Despite this, we’ve always wanted a big family, and after much reflection and prayer, hope to accomplish this through adoption. We’ve found incredible support from both our families and friends in making this decision.

It feels like we’ve been waiting our entire lives to welcome a child into our home, and almost daily we find ourselves imagining how wonderfully our lives will change when that moment comes. We want to assure you that your child will be loved unconditionally from the second they become a part of our family. They will have opportunities to travel and live all around the world. They will be surrounded by a big extended family who cannot wait to shower them with hugs and kisses and attention. They will spend tons of time outside with us on adventures to the mountains, the beach, and beyond. We will emphasize education from a very early age, but offer opportunities for them to explore creative and athletic activities throughout their whole childhood. We promise to support their every dream and do whatever we can to make those dreams come true. And above all else, we promise you that we will create a solid foundation for this little person to develop into an incredible human being with unlimited potential.

We want to give your child every possible chance at success, and we’re hoping to have you involved, as much as you feel comfortable. As your child grows, we are happy to share these moments of success with you, from holidays to birthdays, major moments in school, and all kinds of firsts. However, no matter what your preferred level of involvement is, we will still make sure to talk to your child about you, often, and always with the utmost respect and admiration for the incredible gift you’ve given us, allowing us to become a family.

Although our story is different from yours, we have faced our own deeply personal struggles over the years and we can empathize with the many tough choices you are faced with at this moment. We want to acknowledge the challenging emotions you may feel, and wish to offer our support to you in whatever way possible. More than words can say, we appreciate your consideration as you choose the perfect family for your little one. We remain eternally grateful to you. May you find strength, support, and peace.

With love,
Angela & Tucker

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Why We are Choosing to Adopt

When we sit back and think about why we have chosen to adopt a child, it really does seem like adoption has always been part of our plan. Even as teenagers and young adults who had not yet met, it is something that we had individually considered, but were putting off until we had a bit more stability in our lives. When we married in 2014, we both wanted to start our family early and were hoping to see little babies running around our house within a matter of years. Unfortunately, infertility had other plans for us, and despite 4 years of aggressive medical treatments and surgeries, we’ve been unsuccessful in bringing home a baby. However, that dream of expanding our family has never faded, and we’re still hopeful that in the near future we can fulfill that vision through adoption. We’ve both put many years of thought, deliberation, and prayer into pursuing adoption and are confident that this is the step we were always meant to take.

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About Angela, by Tucker

Angela has the kindest heart of any person I have ever met. She has an uncanny ability to see what people need most and be able to help them. Her intelligence and her genuine ability to care for people are what make her a great nurse anesthetist, a great partner, and those characteristics will translate into her being a great parent. She is adventurous, bold, and imaginative. I can imagine her sitting with your child and teaching them to read or sing or paint and it makes me so happy. What makes me most excited about Angela being a mother is that she will be able to pass her empathetic views and desire to learn. I know that she will be the most amazing mother.

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About Tucker, by Angela

Tucker really is my best friend. He radiates positivity, warmth, and light which makes people want to be around him all the time. He is comforting in times of stress, he’s the comedic relief in a tense situation, and he’s the voice of reason when things feel overwhelming. He has been my partner through the highest highs and the lowest lows, always by my side, always supporting our family. When I picture him as a father, it makes my heart feel whole. It is the role he was meant to fill. Watching Tucker teach your child to ride a horse, rock them to sleep with a lullaby, or finally tell the world all his “dad jokes” is going to be a dream come true. In my heart, I know that being a parent alongside him will be the greatest joy I’ve ever known.

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Our Relationship with You

The relationship that we envision with you is entirely dependent on what your level of comfort is. During your pregnancy, we are there for you 100%. We will be available via text or phone call 24/7, so reach out whenever you want, but we will do our best to respect your space. If you would like us to be at doctor’s appointments, we are happy to travel as often as we can to support you, but we respect that your comfort and privacy take priority. We are happy to maintain an open relationship after your baby is born, but this will be flexible based on what you want. We would love to send photo and video updates by text, share when major milestones are reached, or even arrange a meet-up. We want to emphasize that there will be no pressure or expectations on you. We have the utmost respect for the choice you’re making and want to assure you that we’ll continue to respect your choices post-placement, whatever they may be.

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Lifestyle

Currently, we both work 5 days a week, with Angela working as a nurse anesthetist at a local hospital, and Tucker working as the Flight Chief of an infantry-like unit at the Air Force base in town. Generally, we have weekends off together and use that time to either catch up on chores and yard work around the house, plan a quick weekend getaway to another southern city, or use those glorious two days to just rest and recharge. If we’re planning for a relaxing weekend off, we’ll make sure to get in lots of outside time, either walking the dogs around the neighborhood, taking our paddleboards out on the lake, or getting in a quick bike ride together.

At least once every few months, we have visitors who come to stay with us for a weekend, either family members or friends from other states. We love hosting out-of-town guests, taking them out to dinner at one of the local restaurants, and showing them the south Georgia way of life!

When we’re able to welcome a baby into our home, we know that our routine will certainly change, but for the better. Angela plans to take on part-time hours at work to spend more time with your baby, and we anticipate our families coming to visit a lot more. As your baby grows up and enters childhood, they may attend preschool initially to facilitate socialization and age-appropriate play. But, with at least one parent being home with your child almost at all times, we hope to take lots more day-trips and expose your child to our favorite adventure spots, create playdates with our neighbors and local friends who also have young children, share and create family traditions, and teach them all of life’s little lessons.

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Our Hobbies

Tucker loves to sketch comics, practice lasso roping, and train for triathlons. Angela loves to bake, shop for new clothes at local boutiques, and play tennis. Together, we have developed some newer hobbies as well!

In early spring, you can find us out in the garden getting our vegetables and fruit trees ready for the growing season. Gardening has quickly become our most productive hobby for sure and last year we were able to supply all our own produce from the garden! Before the weather gets too hot, we’ll also frequently hike together, sometimes even with the dogs, and camp out overnight on the mountain. Our favorite hiking spot locally is the southernmost end of the Appalachian Trail.

On rainy days at home, we’ll both be curled up on our favorite chairs with a book, doing puzzles at the dining room table, or having a Marvel Universe or Harry Potter movie marathon. Tucker also loves to strum on his guitar in his spare time, and Angela plays piano/keyboard. We would love to pass on this love of playing music with your child!

Year round, we love to work out together. Whether it’s hopping on the Peloton bike or lifting weights in the garage gym we created last year, we’re always cheering each other on during workouts. Another one of our favorite activities is riding horses. Riding is a hobby we’ve both enjoyed since childhood (Angela took lessons as both a child and an adult, and Tucker grew up in the rodeo circuit), and one that we’ve been able to continue enjoying recently since Tucker’s parents own three horses. It’s our hope that someday we’ll be able to have a ranch with horses of our own that our children will be able to grow up around.

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Our Dogs, Molly & Brody

We have two dogs that are the light of our lives! Molly is our happy 8-year-old Golden Retriever and the current “baby” of the family. You can usually find her running around the backyard with a tennis ball trying to play fetch with anyone who will throw the ball for her! She’s a ball of energy outside, but when playtime is over, she’s our angelic little snuggle bug and is always trying to get close to us. Brody is our 11-year-old Shetland Sheepdog and even though he’s getting older, he is still full of spunk. Brody loves to play with his red frisbee in the backyard, but on a rainy day, he’s content to nap under the kitchen table and bark at the thunder. He will gladly cozy up next to us if we get down on the floor with him. Both Molly and Brody love carrots and green beans and going for walks. They’re both great around children. We can’t wait to introduce them to your baby, knowing that they’ll be both incredibly protective of your child and patient as we adjust to life as a family of 5.

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Home & Neighborhood

Home has certainly changed over the last several years, as we’ve moved twice because of the military. But home has always been where we are our happiest selves, no matter the geographical location. Currently, we live in a rural community just outside of a bigger city in southern Georgia. In the immediate surrounding area outside our subdivision, there is a daycare center, a private high school, a surgery center/urgent care, multiple pecan groves and a quaint downtown Main Street lined with small shops and restaurants. Our neighborhood is set far back from any main roads and is surrounded by tall Georgia Pines, with a community pool and park which are accessible to all residents. We chose this specific neighborhood because we loved the energy we felt every time we came to visit. We loved pulling up and seeing children playing in the park, families going for walks together in the evenings, community events like July 4th Fireworks, and neighborhood block parties all throughout the summer.

Our house is located on a fenced-in corner lot that backs up to a wooded area with many hiking trails. While we may not be in this specific location forever, we’ve done our best to make it ours by adding in vegetable and fruit gardens, a fire pit, a hammock hung between two huge oak trees, and a screened-in porch which is our favorite place to watch summer storms roll in. Within the walls of our home, we’ve created a calming, cozy, yet modern aesthetic. Our house has a 2.5 car garage, 4 bedrooms, and 3 full baths.

We plan on using one of the front bedrooms as your child’s room, picked specifically because it has plenty of room, a large closet for storage and best of all, it is the sunniest spot in the whole house! While we’re currently using another room as a home office and library, we picture this space eventually becoming a playroom for our future children.

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Racial & Cultural Diversity

Understanding a child’s cultural identity is something that we’ve considered very frequently during our adoption journey. We appreciate that within the United States, there are thousands of different racial and ethnic backgrounds from which a child might come. Over the last few years, we’ve made attempts to explore those varied backgrounds through the books that we read, the music we listen to, the food we eat, the places we visit, and the people we surround ourselves with. If your child is to come from a different cultural background than us, we hope to weave elements of your culture into their everyday lives, especially from an early age. We aim to educate ourselves on the social and political issues that face BIPOC communities and will do everything we can to provide a safe space for your future child to discuss their feelings about being a transracial adoptee. In our current location, we’re surrounded by so many different racial and religious groups that we are sure your child will be able to find role models in the community with whom they can explore their cultural identity in greater depth. We’ve discussed this plan with our families, who themselves are made up of all colors, religions and beliefs, and we’ll receive continued support from them once a child is in our home.

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Our Families & Friends

Despite being geographically distanced, we’re both extremely close to our families. Everyone can’t wait to meet the newest family member.

Angela – My whole family lives in Massachusetts for the time being, with my father, sister, and brother all living just outside the city, while my mom lives in a rural section of Massachusetts. Both my parents still work full-time but are planning to retire in the next few years. I speak to my family by either telephone or text every single day, and I know that if I ever needed them, they’d hop on a plane and fly to us without a question. I also have a very large extended family on both sides, with lots of cousins my age. It’s always so busy when we go home to visit them because we have to squeeze in visits with everyone! My mom’s side of the family is Italian, so picture big Italian dinners, everyone talking over each other when we get together, and tons of hugging. My dad’s family is Irish and are very proud of their heritage as well, having big extended family reunions every few years, playing Irish music at get togethers, and proudly flying the Irish flag on the front porch. All my cousins have started growing their families, so it’ll be so exciting for your baby to meet all the kids when we visit and continue the close-knit family traditions with the next generation.

Tucker – My family is spread out over the western US, with my parents and sister living in Texas and extended family living everywhere from Alaska to Oklahoma to New Mexico. My parents are retired, with my mother and father both retiring from the local Sheriff’s office a few years ago. Now they spend the majority of their time tending to their 40-acre property in West Texas and keeping their 3 horses happy and healthy. My family is fairly religious and attends church services once or twice a week. My niece and nephew followed in the family tradition of military service and are stationed in Japan and North Carolina, respectively. My parents are so excited for us to grow our family that they have mentioned coming out to stay for an extended time when we welcome your baby home.

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Family Traditions

When we started to think about what to share about our family traditions, we realized almost all of them revolve around food! The first tradition we could think of was originally from one of our earliest dates. On our first Valentine’s Day together, Tucker made spaghetti and meatballs, and now 9 years running, we have spaghetti and meatballs for dinner on Valentine’s Day! The second tradition is that every single time we go to New England to visit family, no matter where we stay, we make sure to visit Kimball Farm, which has the most incredible ice cream in the world and has been a tradition every summer in Angela’s family since childhood. A lot of our newer family traditions come around Christmas time and include opening family presents together on Christmas eve before going to Midnight Mass at church, making a really big brunch for Christmas morning, and driving to see a Christmas lights show at least once in the holiday season. When we lived in Washington, DC, we would go to see the lights at the National Zoo, but since we live in Georgia now, we drive a short distance to North Florida and see the interactive light show at the Suwannee River Music Festival site.

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Travel

During our regular day-to-day, we’re both introverts and are happy to stay at home watching movies, lounging with our dogs, or hanging out by the bonfire with our neighbors. But… we also LOVE to travel. Over the last three years, we’ve traveled to England, Ireland and Scotland, taken a tour of three national parks between Arizona and Utah, hiked portions of the Appalachian Trail through Georgia and Tennessee, cross-country skied across Vermont, climbed the White Mountains in New Hampshire, and adventured around Atlanta, Boston, and New York. We’re located just a short drive to the ocean, so during the summer months, you can find us weekending on the beaches of Santa Rosa Beach or Jekyll Island. Our favorite activities, while we are on vacation, are trying out new restaurants and wineries, catching a local baseball game, visiting local historical sites, and taking in the natural beauty of the outdoors. As we welcome a baby into our family, we are so excited to share our love for travel and exploring new places with your child.

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Our Promise to You

We will remain eternally grateful and in awe of the gift you’ve given us. We deeply respect the choices you’ve made when it comes to the welfare of your child, and are profoundly humbled that you’re considering us to be their adoptive parents. We are here to support you during your pregnancy and post-partum period. We promise to teach your child about you from an early age, emphasizing your bravery and strength, and promise to incorporate your heritage and culture into their everyday life. We promise to be the best parents we can be, raising your child with empathy and kindness, teaching them first to be a good person, and giving them as many opportunities to succeed as we can. And lastly, we want you to know that we will love your child unconditionally every day for our whole lives.