Steamboat Springs, Colorado has a very special place in our hearts. It is where we celebrate birthdays, anniversaries, weddings and also where we go for a nice getaway from the hussle and bussle of city life. Steamboat Springs has it all with mountains, lakes, rivers, old town mainstreet and two ski areas.

Michael enjoys fishing in the nearby rivers and lakes in the summer and autumn and skiing in the winter.

Kelli enjoys the quiet solitude of the aspen groves while hiking in the summer and autumn. During the winter, she enjoys visiting the local shops on mainstreet or reading a book while cuddled up in a warm blanket next to a fireplace in the winter.

We have had the opportunity to experience many different cultures including their cuisines and religious practices during our travels to Central America, Europe, Asia and Africa. This has taught us to be open-minded and accepting of all cultures and we want to share this with a child.

More importantly we want to make sure that we meet the child's cultural needs at home and though community-based programs that will help us to provide cultural inclusivity. At home, we plan to integrate religious practices, introduce traditional foods, and celebrate holidays that are meaningful to the child's cultural heritage. Our neighborhood is culturally diverse, but we plan on integrating our child into relevant community programs to ensure that the child feels inclusive.

We both enjoy camping in the Rocky Mountains, hiking with our dogs, attending sporting events and traveling domestically and internationally. We generally travel domestically at least twice a year and internationally once a year. Traveling has been a large part of our lives and we want to be able to travel with our child so that they can also experience the different cultures that we have had the opportunity to experience. Our first stop when the child is old enough will be to Germany, so that Michael's extended family will have the opportunity to meet our child.

We also do a lot of charity work in which we give back to the community through volunteering at clothing donation centers, helping during school supply drives, fundraising for children's walks where proceeds go to clinical research and donating to a local domestic violence center.

When Michael needs to unwind, he enjoys fishing and photography whereas Kelli likes to cook and read. We hope to share our interests with a child and teach them the importance of volunteering.

Kelli's older brother, younger brother and his girlfriend, and mother all live nearby as well as Michael's aunt and uncle. Family is very important to us so we try to get together as often as possible. Barbeques on our back deck or camping together during the summer and cooking and baking together in our kitchen during the winter are common.

Birthdays and major holidays are usually celebrated at our house and include Michael's childhood friend who is more like his brother. We usually start with appetizers while catching up and then everyone pitches in to make the meal.

We often will end the celebration with card games over coffee and cake. Attending sporting events (i.e. football and hockey) with our family and friends is also commonplace.

Michael also has aunts, uncles and cousins in Germany. We travel there often to see them and when we cannot we catch up over video chats. They are all excited to have a baby enter our family and cannot wait to have a child to share our family moments with.

Our neighborhood is a great place to live and raise children. We live in a five bedroom house on a quiet cul-de-sac in a family oriented suburb of Colorado. Our neighbors all have children who like to play and ride their bicycles in the cul-de-sac and use the green belt across from our house for sledding in the winter. Our neighborhood has a local park, a community swimming pool and tennis courts and our school district is rated one of the best in Colorado. We have community events all year round which include trunk-or-treating for Halloween, home decoration competitions for Halloween and Christmas, an Independence Day parade and a community BBQ at the swimming pool on Labor Day.

We are only an hour from Denver and less than two hours from the Rocky Mountains which allows us to easily go to the zoo, museums, sporting events, plays, or concerts downtown and ski, camp, fish or hike in the mountains. This diverse environment is a perfect place to allow children to grow and explore.

Thank you does not seem sufficient to describe how much we appreciate you even considering us as part of your journey and allowing us to share more about ourselves. We hope that knowing your child will be loved, nurtured, protected and supported throughout their lives will make your decision a little less difficult.

Having a child in our lives is something we have wanted for a very long time. We first met through a mutual friend when Michael was moving back to Colorado. Michael made dinner that night as a thank you for helping him move. The meal was not edible, but his thoughtful gesture was appreciated by Kelli. We started dating shortly after Michael's culinary disaster and were married almost 2 years later. We always knew that we wanted children and had already picked out names, but we wanted to be occupationally and financially stable before we started having them. We started trying about 10 years ago, but were unable to conceive after several years. Shortly after realizing that we would not have a biological child of our own, we started looking into adopting a child. It never mattered to us if our child was biologically ours or not, as we knew that we would love any child brought into our lives. Then COVID hit and we decided that the timing was not right to adopt. We have now been married for almost 20 years and with Michael's cooking now improved, we feel that this is the best time in our lives to bring a child into our family.

We are very excited for the future. We want to share our lives and teach a child about the importance of love, compassion, acceptance and diversity through example and traveling. We feel the best way to learn is to experience and we want to do that with a child. We also want to encourage things that interest the child. That may be sports, reading, music, photography, or crafts, anything that will make them happy and productive in life is important for their development. We also feel that family connections are important. As we are very close with our families, they will be an integral part of the child's life through birthday celebrations, holidays, vacations, sporting events, etc.. Our families are very excited about us adopting and cannot wait to have a new member in the family.

We want you to know that we are here for you and want you to be a part of your child's life by sharing photos, letters, emails, phone calls and visits throughout their life, if you desire. We will be honest with your child concerning the adoption and will support them by answering all of their questions. We will make sure that your child knows how much you love them and that your incredibly difficult decision was made courageously and selflessly. Thank you for considering us and we hope that you find comfort in whatever decision you make.

Sincerely,

Michael & Kelli