Mark and Lucy met each other in Boston before their first day of graduate school. We were friends for a year before Mark asked Lucy to go on a date to a museum after church. She didn’t realize it was a date and started to ask another friend at church if she wanted to join them, at which point Mark communicated that no, this was a date! Very shortly after, Lucy fell madly in love with Mark, who had fallen madly in love with Lucy, and we were married in Alabama less than two years later. We spent the first ten years of our married life in New York City, which is our favorite city, but we moved nearby to New Jersey in 2021 when our son, John, was three. Since then, we’ve added the kindest, most precious two-year-old golden retriever to the mix—Archie, who thinks he is human. When we first hoped to become parents after getting married, we ran into delays with infertility for a number of years, and then we unexpectedly learned we would have a biological son, John. Around this time, we also learned we would gain a new nephew, Michael, through adoption. John and Michael have both made our family so much more beautiful, and we would consider it an incredible privilege to grow our family further by becoming adoptive parents.
About Mark
Job: Founder & CEO of a financial firm
Hobbies: Coaching little league, serving on our city’s Board of Education, investing, quoting funny movies, hiking, walking the dog, doing anything active outdoors, going to the Jersey Shore, having long dinners with friends and family, being part of church/Bible study activities, and traveling
Fun Fact: Mark loves traveling to Spanish-speaking countries and got to live in Nicaragua and Spain for short stints before meeting Lucy. His Spanish is a little rusty, but he’s always looking for opportunities to practice, including with Lucy, who herself lived in Ecuador and Peru.
About Lucy
Job: Stay-at-home mom and founder of a nonprofit
Hobbies: Reading children’s books out loud with John, making our home cozy and beautiful, hosting dinners and holidays for friends and family, walking the dog and enjoying the outdoors, having family movie nights, being part of church/Bible study activities and the school Parents Association, and traveling
Fun Fact: As part of her college program, Lucy went on a 23-day kayaking and hiking trip in Canada with only a compass and a map to guide her small group for three entire weeks. After enduring that trip’s million bug bites, freezing swims, and pelting rainstorms, she “retired” from such intense camping but has always been grateful for that challenging experience.
About John
Job: Second grader
Hobbies: Reading and being read to, building Legos, riding his bike, using his imagination, drawing, playing flag football and little league baseball, swimming, playing with friends, neighbors, and cousins
Fun Fact: John has never passed a stuffed animal that he did not love, and he is a LEGO master! His largest LEGO creation is an amazing pirate ship with 1,200 pieces.
Our Lives
Our house is on a cul-de-sac, a short walk from a charming downtown with restaurants and shops. Because our street gets hardly any traffic, the neighborhood kids run from yard to yard and share each other’s swing sets and trampolines. We adore our neighbors and look forward to a block party with them every summer, as well as dinners and spontaneous afternoons in our front yards throughout the year.
John attends a wonderful school up the street from our house, and we walk him to and from school with our dog. Weekday afternoons consist of a few sports and activities, but also a lot of outdoor play, riding bikes, Legos, and Lucy and John reading books aloud together. We have family dinner in our dining room or at our kitchen island in front of our kitchen fireplace in the winter.
Weekends at home consist of church, time with family and friends and grandparents, and various birthday parties and sports. We also love frequent day trips to NYC (especially the Natural History Museum and Central Park) or to the Jersey Shore or nearby ski slopes. We’re Minnesota Twins baseball fans, but still love Yankees and Mets games, and Mark recently took John to his first Giants game. We also travel further whenever we get the chance, most recently to Hawaii, Colorado, Florida, and Alabama.
Our Family
Lucy grew up with her mom, dad, and older sister in Alabama. Her parents still live in the house where she was born, and her sister lives near them with her husband and their four children. Lucy’s sister and brother-in-law adopted our youngest nephew when he was three, and we’ve gotten to learn from them about becoming adoptive parents. We visit Alabama for holidays and have made some of our very best memories during vacations spent with Lucy’s family and John’s cousins at the beach, or at her parents’ lake house and farm.
Mark grew up in New Jersey with his mom, dad, and younger sister and brother. His parents still live in the house where he spent most of his childhood, and being closer to them was part of our reasoning for moving from NYC to New Jersey. We now go to the church that Mark grew up going to, and his parents are such an important part of John’s faith upbringing. They are the world’s greatest babysitters and gift givers and would be so thrilled to pour more time and more toys onto another little baby! Mark’s sister and brother are now in Los Angeles and New Jersey and are a wonderful aunt and uncle.
Beyond immediate family, we treasure relationships with many friends who are like family. We are godparents of four children who live in Florida, Virginia, Colorado, and Washington, and we have deep friendships with families in our town and former places we’ve lived, especially through churches, schools, and neighborhoods we’ve been part of.
Final Thoughts
We are so eager to grow our family through adoption and will do so with open arms and overflowing hearts. If you choose to place your child with us, we promise that your child will know, through all of life, that he or she is deeply and unconditionally loved—not based on achievement or behavior, but on being God’s work of art. We promise to protect your child with all of our being. We promise to encourage your child to dream big and to embrace his or her unique gifts and talents. We will be there for every milestone, every triumph, and every challenge. Through it all, we promise to honor and respect the beautiful bond that exists between you and your child. We pray for you and the miracle growing inside you as you navigate the road ahead. Should our roads cross, please know that the story that unfolds will be full of gratitude, kindness, and love.
-Mark & Lucy
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