Adoption Terminology

We met thirteen years ago through a friend who invited both of us to hang out at the same event. When Brian arrived, he called his friend to locate her, and Minela happened to be holding the friend’s phone when it rang which kicked off our journey.

We quickly became friends, started dating, and soon engaged. After a few years of dating and moving around the country, we married in a small courthouse in Texas. We are best friends and use every day to experience life to the fullest. We have always wanted to start a family and when it didn’t happen naturally, we looked towards IVF and now adoption.

Minela is outgoing and loves to be around people and making new friends. She is caring and loving which can be seen when she is interacting with anyone but especially with her nieces and nephews. She loves dogs and animals. She was born overseas and moved from Croatia to the United States when she was 8 years old with her parents and brother and sister. They were all refugees of war. Not being able to speak or understand English, they made America their new home which shows her strength in overcoming obstacles. It took her only 6 months to learn the English language and she is good at spelling but somehow, always gets beat by Brian at Scrabble which we both love to play. We are both competitive.

Brian is also outgoing but also enjoys being home and spending time with Minela and their dog, Harley. He loves watching college football and his favorite team is Florida Gators, which is also why his favorite colors are orange and blue. He loves to stay active with exercise or being outside. He really enjoys his job in engineering and the travel that comes along with it; he has been to Canada, Mexico, New York, California, and Las Vegas to name a few. His favorite weekend activity, besides football, is taking our dog to the park for a walk. It’s become a tradition. Brian is a very courageous, hardworking, loving person. He goes above and beyond in everything he does and does everything in his power to make sure his family is happy and well taken care of.

Together, we have so much love to give and can’t wait to share that love with your child.

We are high school sweet hearts that met through mutual friends over 16 years ago. Our married life, 7 years ago, began in Salt lake City, where we first became parents when we adopted our cat, Cora. Living in Salt Lake City taught us a lot about working together as a teamby leaning on on another for support. After 5 years together in Salt Lake, we returned to the St. Louis area. This is where we met, and we are elated to be surrounded by friends and family that inspire and motivate us everyday.

Our marriage is strong, built on  a foundation of trust, communication, and teamwork. These are the core values we will use to guide us as we transition into parenthood. We have known about our fertility struggles long before we were married, so adpotion has been on our hearts for a large portion of our relationship.

Hi, we are Austin and Hannah and we met the summer of 2019 in the college group at our church. I (Hannah) still remember walking to the patio of the building where Austin was grilling tacos (the location of our proposal a few years later). We both thought the other was cute but neither of us said anything at the time. We became friends and hung out in group settings throughout the summer. Following graduation from college I returned home to WA to stay and at the end of the summer he asked me out and we enjoyed our first date getting some tacos and going to a Mariner’s game! We introduced the topic of adoption early on since we both had a desire to grow our family through adoption. Austin's mom was adopted from Korea and Hannah saw adoption firsthand when her youth pastor adopted when she was younger. We both knew that we desired a partner who had the same passion for adoption.

I would like to introduce you to our family. My name is Julie, and my wonderful husband's name is Will. I am 30 years old, and Will is 31 years old. We have been married for a little over eight years. Will and I met at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. We had both grown up very involved in our churches, so it seems appropriate that we met at the Baptist Collegiate Ministry. We were friends for two years before we started dating. Will's kindness drew me to him. We dated and were engaged for a year and a half before getting married in 2015. Will and I love to travel, and some of our favorite places that we have visited are Spain and Portugal, the Grand Canyon, cruises to the Caribbean, and camping at State Parks, beaches, and other beautiful campgrounds around the Southeastern United States. We can't wait to share our love of travel and the world with a child. We spend a lot of our weekends going to football games, camping in our camper, hiking in the Great Smoky Mountains, and spending time with family either in East Tennessee or Middle Tennessee. I love to capture family adventures and memories with my camera. Since I am a professional photographer, I love to take pictures while we travel and around the local area. I look forward to capturing precious memories of our adopted child as they grow up.

Together Andrew and Hailey are known as the fun couple – always making each other laugh, willing to take a spontaneous trip, or go to a hockey game with friends. We love hanging out with our friends and family – but also value our time at home together. That is a core value in our family – spending time together. We want to show up for the school play, or the sporting event – as a family. We both feel very blessed to have been raised by incredible parents who were there for us and we want to be able to give that to our kids as well.

We couldn’t believe we sat near each other in nursing school for 2 years and never shared more than a few words with each other. After going on our first date, almost a year after graduation, we realized how much we had in common and we were instantly attached to each other. We realized we grew up with similar beliefs and enjoyed the same hobbies. We love sports and going to events together, cheering on our favorite team. We both love trying new restaurants and exploring new cities. We love to ride around looking at mountain views and just enjoy each others company. We love to plan vacations with the kids and surprise them with new adventures. We truly are best friends. We love each other so deeply. We respect each other and stand behind each others dreams. We make sure to put each other first and continue learning ways to grow our relationship with each other and the Lord. Having children was always a dream of ours, even before we were married. We love parenting together and we are so grateful for these special blessings that God has given us.

A little about us: we met near the foothills of the beautiful Rocky Mountains at a discipleship school. When we first started our relationship, Brandon (who had never dated before) thought it'd be quite sweet to get Jess a flower. But when he took the carnation out of the car to hand it to her, the heavy flower head fell off! Not quite the impression he was hoping for, but despite the "flower that flopped", the relationship did not, and we joyfully were married less than a year later. 

After 8 years of marriage, we still enjoy laughing together at life's quirky happenings and dreaming big about the future. We love and follow Jesus Christ. Because of that reality, our home is filled with peace, joy (and so much of it!), love, laughter, giggles, excitement, hope ... the list could go on and on! 

To sum it up, our home and our family is a place where Light and Life are found.

We are a family focused and church orientated couple. We are mostly home-bodies, but don't let that mistake you for our sense of adventure too! 

We have two cats, Bailey and Lilly and a brood of silly chickens. We love camping, playing music and debating on if we love sunsets or sunrises more. 

We met in 2007 in Alaska when Kelly was a brand new flight attendant. Robert had already been a flight attendant for 5 years and Kelly did not have it in her adventurous spirit to spend time with Robert but he was persistent. In 2009 Kelly said yes to dating instead of just being friends. 

Fast forward through many adventures (Alaska, Canada, France, Germany, Mexico, Hawaii) and on September 6th, 2014 we got married in Washington state at our local beach park. We have made this sleepy little marina town our home ever since. 

We met in October 2019 at a trivia night in small town in central Texas. Zoë’s best friend from college happened to invite Ben out to trivia that evening, and Zoë and Ben instantly hit it off. We grew closer in our friendship over the Fall months and in January of 2020 we went on our first date. From that January date to go rock climbing we have basically been inseparable. We have now been married for 3.5 years and love each other more each day.

Right after we started dating, the Covid-19 pandemic shut down the world. We both experienced interruptions to our jobs, social lives, and families. Although the world was forced into isolation, God knew that we were destined to be together and used that time to show us all the different kinds of challenges we can overcome together. We believe that these difficulties early on drew us closer to each other and to the Lord and helped us build a firm foundation for our relationship. We can do anything with the Lord.

Ben is currently working as a software developer and Zoë is a music teacher in several local school districts. We both enjoy playing music together in our free time and spending time with our wonderful church family. We also LOVE to travel all over the place! We are both very active and enjoy hiking, biking, rock climbing, dancing, gardening, disc golf, you name it! Our relationship is full of the joy of the Lord, and we can't wait to share that joy with a child someday.

We both went to college at Texas A&M University. Claire majored in mathematics and Jeffrey in Industrial Engineering. We both joined the Baptist Student Ministry our freshman year. In 2015 we were both Bible study leaders of different groups and slowly got to know each other over the year. We began dating and most of our dates consisted of studying, getting coffee and snacks, and taking breaks by driving around exploring our town. We got engaged October of our senior year (2017) while finishing school, applying to jobs, and student teaching. It was a wild year but God was oh so faithful in each moment. We graduated from college and three weeks later got married! We moved to McKinney on a whim – about 30 minutes from each set of parents – and fell in love with the city. We absolutely LOVE doing life together and getting to explore the DFW area!

A primary factor of who we are as a couple is quality time spent together! We find lots of joy in time spent together, or with community even in the mundane things. We are avid board game players, coffee shop visitors, and amateur food enthusiasts. Some of our favorite moments with friends and family have happened just on a couch in deep conversation or over a cup of coffee!

We have been so blessed to have friends who live close by and that we get to see often! They are our chosen family and who we get to do life with. Our community has comforted us and rejoiced with us and we hope to continue walking with them as we get older! We have found a lot of joy in prioritizing our community and growing it! They love Jesus and us so well!.

In 2023 we adopted our son, Eliezer, and are absolutely obsessed with parenthood. He is in full toddler mode which has been the sweetest season of our lives (even with the hard tantrum moments). We are so incredibly thankful for the way God has blessed us in our marriage and are very excited for the years to come. Parenting has definitely been our favorite adventure yet!!