Whenever we talk about children, we always include both our son, Jacob Jack ("JJ") and our dog, Charlie. We really treat Charlie as a member of the family and is probably our most spoiled child.

Our son, JJ, is 4 years old and in pre-kindergarten. He is a super silly, fun loving ball of energy that loves basketball, music and playing outside. He is very active in sports, swim lessons and tumbling. He likes to play the drums with Josh and help Amanda make homemade pizza in the kitchen. He is very interested in science and learning how things work. He is always asking to watch You Tube videos for kids about electricity. We have started sharing this journey with him with age appropriate books and talking about how all families are different. He is very curious and exited to welcome this child into our home and our family.

Charlie is our 5 year old black Labrador Retriever - our gentle giant. He is JJ's "brother" and biggest protector. Charlie LOVES to chase the ball at the dog park - ball is life! He is also an avid swimmer. There is a dog beach at a local county park near our house so that is one of our favorite family outings in the summer. Charlie normally travels back to Iowa with us to visit family and enjoys his trips to the farm as much as the rest of the family.

We are truly the definition of "opposites attract." Josh is the laid back, creative one that goes with the flow and doesn't plan anything until 5 minutes before it happens. Amanda is the analytical, organized planner who has family vacations mapped out for the next 2 years. We complement each other in so many ways to make our family work - and bring out the best qualities in each other. Above all, we love our family and being parents.

One important thing that makes our family unique is that we are a dual religion family. Josh is Jewish and has strong ties to his family heritage, while Amanda is Methodist and grew up with traditional Christian values. We are sharing both of these religions with our son - sharing stories, beliefs and celebrating both Jewish and Christian holidays to expose him to both religions and what makes our combined family special. We would plan the same for this child to let them ultimately decide when they are older if they feel strongly one way or the other.

Education is very important to our family. It is one of the promises we can make to you to ensure the best educational opportunities for this child. This child will attend a small, private school that offers an early education program starting for toddlers. It is a classroom setting, but in a very small, interactive environment that includes specials like music, Spanish and PE. This school setting helps to develop social skills with other children, but also makes them comfortable in a classroom environment when they start kindergarten.

In addition to school, we also believe in helping expose the child to a variety of activities to help them discover their likes and talents - whether that be sports, music or art. Amanda is also a huge advocate of exposing our children to the diverse world - in the form of people, food and travel. Amanda never left the country until she was 24, but has since developed a passion for international travel having visited over 35 countries. She hopes to share this passion with her children and expose them to the global world at a much younger age.

We live in a small town in Missouri. Our home is located in a small neighborhood with lots of families with children ranging in age from newborns to high schoolers. We enjoy spending time with our neighbors while the kids play outside together, ride bikes or go swimming. Our favorite neighborhood event is the annual Halloween party and trick or treating. All of the families with young kids get together for pizza and spooky treats before setting off for trick or treating in the neighborhood - which includes grandparents, parents, kids and pets.

Our home is the first house as you enter the neighborhood so we like to wave to the neighbors coming and going from the entrance. Our home is 3 stories - with the kitchen and family room on the main floor being the heart of our home. We have a large basement - mostly for family fun with shuffleboard and pinball machines for some friendly competition. We enjoy spending time outside so we have a large fenced in yard for throwing the ball with our dog and patio for entertaining friends.

Outside of our neighborhood, we also love to take part in events at our son's school and in our community. We have a built a wonderful network of "friend families" from our son's school that we enjoy BBQs, trips to the swimming pool, and holiday events. Some of our favorite events are the summer holiday celebrations that include great food, music, face painting for the kids and fireworks.

Our extended family is small, but mighty! Amanda's extended family is in Iowa so just based on proximity, we see them more often. We make several road trips a year to visit Amanda's parents and brother's family in the town where she grew up, in addition to them traveling to see us. Even though Amanda is a global traveler and accomplished professional, she is a small town country girl at heart. Her brother, his wife and their two sons built a home on the family farm so we enjoy visiting the farm, driving the John Deere gator and feeding the animals when we visit.

Josh's brothers and their families live in California near where he grew up. We enjoy trips California to visit them with mountain and ocean views and great food in San Francisco. It has also been a tradition for Josh's family to join us for Thanksgiving and enjoy some of their family favorite foods - apple cider, cheesy corn and the famous family cheeseball. Unfortunately, we lost both Josh's mom and dad over the past few years, but we are very intentional about continuing the family gatherings. We are also close with Josh's step mom (Nana) that lives in Indiana and visits at least one a year.

Hello! We are Josh and Amanda. Thank you so much for taking the time to learn more about us and considering adoption as an option for you and this child. We admire your courage and want to share some more with you about us and our family.

We met about 10 years ago the old fashioned way - online. We met in California where we were both living and working at the time. We both loved living in the Bay area of California and exploring the area together was a big part of our dating history. We loved trying new ethnic foods in San Francisco, attending outdoor concerts in Mountain View and weekend trips along the ocean in Monterey. We got married in wine country in 2018 and decided to move to Missouri in 2019 to settle down, buy a home and start our family.

Amanda grew up in Iowa and always knew the Midwest was where she wanted to put down roots - a place that was family centric and aligned with her small town values. Currently, Amanda is an operations manager for a tech company. She is very supportive of her alma mater and has served on numerous advisory boards and volunteer organizations that supports young alumni and students. She also has traveled extensively internationally - both for work and for fun. She loves exploring new cultures - trying the food, exploring the sights and learning the customs. Thailand is one of the favorite destinations with friendly people, amazing food and diverse places to visit.

Currently, Josh is a custom jeweler and owns his own business. Josh's business helps people design and build their own custom jewelry creations from a computer design to a 3D wax model and ultimately the finished piece. He works with a lot of couples on engagement rings and wedding bands, but working with customers on fashion pieces with colored stones are some of his favorite projects. He also helps customers who want unique or personal touches in their jewelry, such as moonstone or deer antler. He made a ring for a airplane mechanic who wanted part of an airplane engine incorporated into his wedding band. Outside of work, Josh enjoys bowling, pinball, smoking BBQ meats and working on cars.

Since we found each other later in life, we knew we would probably need help to create our family. We pursued IVF and were lucky to welcome our son to our family in 2020. As a family, we love spending time together with our dog, Charlie, and participating in our community. We are season and holiday lovers meaning that we enjoy participating in the events for that time of the year. We love apple orchards and pumpkin patches in the fall, holiday events in the winter and swimming at the community pool in the summer. We are very involved in activities for our son and enjoy spending time with our neighbors and friends.

For the past several years, we have been on a long and difficult journey to grow our family. We have experienced multiple failures and losses along the way and have spent quite a bit of time talking and learning from each other about our priorities. Ultimately, we decided that being parents again was our most important goal and adoption was an amazing gift that could help achieve that.

We look forward to honoring your place in this child's life and including you in whatever capacity you choose that to be. We will share regular updates and pictures with you of the child's growth and experiences. We are also open to annual visits if desired. We want to keep you as a constant in the child's life and help them understand where they came from and that they have many people who love them.

Thank you again for considering us as adoptive parents. We, as well as our friends and family, are beyond excited to have another child join our family and JJ is ready to be a big brother.

Josh & Amanda