Anthony & Rebecca In OhioIn

We met while working in a retail store. We have been together for 10 years and married for 8 years. Anthony is an accountant for a local university. He loves to golf with his father and grandfather, tear apart computers and do other things with technology. He enjoys playing with remote control cars and boats with our son, Alexander. He likes spending time outside mowing and having bon fires. Rebecca is a medical social worker at a local hospital. She loves to read, play board games and go hiking. She also loves to spend time playing blocks and toys with Alexander. She enjoys taking our dogs and son on walks. She especially loves to do yoga and meditate.

As a family, we enjoy traveling around the country going to museums, zoos, aquariums and other local travel locations. We are very lucky to have some wonderful local farms that we can go to and enjoy being around farm animals and learn about them. We also have wonderful metro parks that we live close to and can spend time exploring, hiking and playing. The metro parks also provide a great place to have ice cream picnics. One of our goals is to try and go to a zoo, aquarium or museum in every state! We as a couple did a lot of traveling outside of the country and can't wait to take our children to different countries to learn and explore different ethnicities and cultures. We also enjoy spending time at home just relaxing and watching movies as a family.

We recently built a new home in a quiet community. Our backyard opens to a large grass field that will not be built on for 20 years. We have a large fishing pond that is across the street from our home. The pond has a walking trail around it and we enjoy spending time walking, feeding the fish and ducks. Our home sits on a dead end and the closest home is 2 houses down. The neighborhood has a number of children who live close enough to allow our children to play with them. We live less than 10 minutes away from the elementary school that the children will be going to. This is also the same elementary school Rebecca went to.

We have a unique family situation that has allowed us as a family to thrive. Rebecca’s sister and niece, mother, grandmother and Anthony’s father watch Alexander and will continue to watch any new babies we will add to our family. We all live very close. Rebecca’s sister and brother live two blocks over and her grandmother lives two houses down from the family. Rebecca’s mother and father live 10 minutes away from our home. Her family has a family operated business that allows the family to support each other and have flexible schedules as needed. Anthony’s parents live 20 minutes away and also assist with caring for Alexander. Anthony’s grandparents also live close and we spend as much time with them as possible over the weekends.

As a family, we have some amazing traditions around Christmas. We love to go to the local zoo that decorates with lights and other Christmas decorations. We usually start our Christmas celebrations right after Thanksgiving. We normally go and cut down a live tree for our house and our major family tree. Rebecca normally puts up 3-4 trees, a Christmas Village and other decorations. We love to decorate our house with lights and put up Christmas trees. We always go to Anthony’s grandparents' house on Christmas Eve and have dinner and then go to church afterwards. On Christmas day, we get up and open presents as a family and then go to Rebecca’s parents' house for a big breakfast and more opening of presents. After that we go over to Anthony’s parents’ house and end our night with dinner and more present opening.

Some of our other fun traditions in the family include our summers. We love to go over to Anthony’s parents' house to swim and try to go a few times a month over the summer. We enjoy going to parks and taking part in Metro Park events and classes. We also have a big family cookout on July 4th with Rebecca's family and then light off fireworks.

We also like to spend time with all of our family and often spend weekends traveling around to see our grandparents. Alexander loves to spend time with his great-grandparents and we will continue to travel and spend time with them as the children grow.

We knew that adoption was the only way we were going to grow our family. It just made sense to us to grow through love and open hearts. Adoption always made sense to us and our view of having a village to help children grow.