We enjoy laughing a lot and being silly. We believe that no matter what happens in the day, we should always look at the positive and find the silver lining. We try to be active when we get home by walking around our neighborhood and exercising. We value eating dinner together every night. We enjoy being with our family and friends as much as possible while still allowing ourselves our much needed “us” time. When we have downtime, we enjoy home projects, gardening, going to flea markets, and trying new places to eat and visit on the weekends. We enjoy traveling and try to take a vacation at least once a year, typically with family and friends.

Jake has two step-siblings and a stepmother. (His father passed away in 2021.) He has lots of aunts, uncles, and cousins where he grew up. His mother lives close to us, and we see her weekly. We have six nieces and nephews from his side of the family. We try to visit them and bring our nieces and nephews down to spend the weekends with us as much as possible.

Nine years ago, Alison found out she has one paternal brother and three nephews. We see each other about three times a year for family vacations and reunions and connect on the phone as well. Alison’s parents live close by, and we see them weekly as well. We both have extended family around our city and get together about once per month and on holidays. We are lucky as we have great relationships with our families and each other’s families as well. We spend Memorial Day weekend with Jacob’s extended family and Labor Day weekend with Alison’s extended family.

We recently built our new home based on our dream of growing our family. Our neighborhood is very friendly. It’s still growing with a mix of young families and retired families. We have a fire station outside our neighborhood and a community sports park across the street. We are close enough to downtown that we can participate in all the local events but far enough away that we get the comfort of living in a quiet neighborhood. Our school district is one of the top in our state. One of the reasons we moved to this city is because of the diversity and inclusion it promotes. We have two cats, Loki and Nebi, who bring so much joy and laughter to our lives.

We knew adopting was going to be part of our life plan. During our relationship and now marriage, we always discussed having children and adoption being part of our life. We have been diagnosed with unexplained infertility, but we know we want to expand our family. We’ve always believed family doesn’t have to be blood related. Alison grew up surrounded by others who have been adopted (her brother, cousin, neighbors, and kids she went to school with), and Jake has just reconnected with an aunt who was adopted at birth.