Yes, we have one child, our son Dalinar. We adopted Dalinar in 2023, and would like to give him a sibling through adopting another child. We got Dalinar's name from one of our favorite book series: The Stormlight Archive. Dalinar is very active. He likes to play with his balls and climb on the play equipment at the park or daycare. His first word was, “up” and the first 2 words he put together were “up please”. Dalinar also loves music. He requests his favorite songs, dances enthusiastically, and loves to play music such as on his drum set, mini ukulele, or the guitar we got for when he is older.

Dalinar is a very happy and chill child. Kirk loves that when Dalinar enters a new unfamiliar space, Dalinar will put his hands behind his back and stand where he can observe the room until he knows it's safe and who/what is there. Dalinar is also a social child. Kristin likes how Dalinar always wants to know where “his people” are. Throughout the day, Dalinar will ask, “where is grandma / grandpa?”, or ask for Owen or Lele or Lyssa (some of his cousins). And Dalinar is always happy to see and play with his people.

We have many family traditions. Most of their traditions involve holidays and being with family. We BBQ with Kirk's family for holidays such as Labor Day, Memorial Day and 4th of July (the 4th also often includes a bounce house and setting off fireworks). For Halloween, we like to participate in a Trunk or Treat with our church. During the fall, we get together with some of Kirk’s family and friends one evening a week to watch an NFL football game—with much heckling and talking over the announcers. As a family, we celebrate Thanksgiving with Kirk's family on Thanksgiving Day. Then we drive to Kristin's parents’ or brother’s place to celebrate the holiday with her family. We travel from California to the east coast to celebrate Christmas with Kristin's grandparents almost every year. And we always spend New Years with Kirk's family playing board games and watching movies.

Now that we have a child, we are looking forward to building new traditions. Such as Easter egg hunts, or Trick or Treating with Dalinar's many cousins.

We met as many do in the modern age, through online dating. We both signed up to eHarmony. Kirk had used the web site off and on for around a decade with no success. Through the years, he went on a few dates, but there were long periods of canceling his subscription and restarting. Kirk had started a new job and felt he was in a good place in his life to start a relationship, so he decided to reactivate his account. Kirk had been on the website for 6 months, and again having little success, decided to cancel his subscription. A few weeks later, when looking at his monthly bank statement, Kirk realized he apparently didn't finalize the cancellation of his subscription and was charged for another 6 months. Deciding, “might as well give it another shot,” he sent out of few more requests for guided communication. One of which was to Kristin.

Kristin, as it turns out, having had no luck with other dating sites, had signed for eHarmony just three days before receiving a message from Kirk. We hit it off over our shared love for fantasy novels, board games, and faith. The rest is history. We believe that we were meant for each other and God was looking out for us. The timing was perfect.

Kirk is the youngest of 8, and Kristin is the oldest of 2. We are both really close with our families.

Most of Kirk's family lives in the area, including a small horde of nieces and nephews! His family loves to talk and are a lot of fun. We see at least some of Kirk's family every week, whether for a BBQ, to play Dungeons and Dragons, to watch NFL football, or for a birthday party. We have each of our nieces and nephews over for birthday sleepovers as a special treat. The nieces and nephews absolutely adore Dalinar and love babies!

Kristin's parents recently bought a house just a 10-minute walk from us which is awesome! Dalinar loves getting to spend time with “Grandma-Grandpa” as he calls them. He already knows which way to go to get to their house. We also visit with Kristin’s brother and his wife several times a year to play strategy games, play D&D, or to go on vacation together, such as to Hawaii. We visit Pittsburgh, PA at Christmas time to see Kristin's grandparents and extended family which is wonderful.

Everyone is very excited to have a new member of the family. Your child will be surrounded by loving people.

We love our home. We picked it with raising kids in mind. It has 4 bedrooms, spacious living areas, and we have a playroom with lots of toys, a slide, and Kirk’s grandmother’s rocking chair that we got re-upholstered. We have enjoyed making our home our own: putting in deep green carpets, a big table for family meals and games, and colorful fantasy- and animal-themed decorations. We want our children to also make it their own: enjoying their own rooms (both Dalinar’s room and the room for our next child have window seats!), giving them a swing set in the backyard, and filling our walls with their artwork.

Our neighborhood is great for walking, with many scenic bike paths and a park within walking distance where Dalinar has often played with other kids. We can walk to Dalinar’s daycare and multiple schools, many restaurants, a grocery store, the hospital and the local college which has a pool and swimming lessons for kids. Dalinar loves the community Kids’ Discovery center which has both indoor and outdoor activities. There is an annual summer fair with rides and games that we would love to take our future children to.

California is great--we are within a day-trip of both the beach and several national parks. It is so fun to go hiking in the redwoods, but still be back home by dinnertime.

We are honored that you would take the time to consider us. We hope that learning more about us will help bring you peace of mind as you decide how to best love your child.

We met online through eHarmony. We are both nerds; we first connected over fantasy books as we'd both written "anything by Brandon Sanderson" in the free-response section of our dating profiles. For our first date, we walked along the beach, never running out of things to talk about as Kirk is a great talker! We had so many random things in common, it was like we'd been living parallel lives: both being home schooled, growing up going to church and to summer church camp, and both having started game nights at our churches. Our personalities are so different yet complimentary. Kirk is enthusiastic, ready to jump into the next fun thing or next project. Kristin is caring and organized, often re-centering us on what is important, keeping us from doing way too much. We were married on May the 4th, 2019 (“May the fourth be with you!”?"and yes, we wore light sabers), and we have been happily married ever since.

Kristin has dreamed of building a family through adoption for years, and Kirk was happy to make that dream a reality since he's always wanted to be a father. Kirk has a quote from one of his favorite fantasy books “It is the raising of a child that makes them yours… not blood.” Your child will certainly be loved as our own.

We adopted our son Dalinar when he was just a couple days old. We had been waiting for the call for nearly 2 years?"and when we got it, we needed to drive 6+ hours to the hospital the very next day as he had already been born! The birth mother didn’t want any contact which we’ve been told is very unusual, as we were/are fully willing to stay in contact. We are the first in our extended families to adopt, but they have all been very supportive and love Dalinar.

Kristin has been a tutor for many years, but is currently only working a few hours a week as an online tutor in computer programming?"so that she can be a stay-at-home mom like she's always dreamed of. She cooks, keeps the house clean, takes care of our pets (2 parakeets and a ball python), and encourages Dalinar to be a helper too. Kirk is a hard-worker (both at home with home projects and professionally) and has worked in several different fields: handyman, gymnastics coach, manufacturing, school custodian. He is now happily working to design boats, able to use his mechanical drafting degree as part of the company’s R&D department. Kirk starts work at 5 in the morning which allows him to get home in the early afternoon, which means he has plenty of time for our family/children. We eat dinner together in the middle of the afternoon, then have a snack/dessert in the evening before bed. Kirk likes to stay in shape by going to the gym several times a week, and we want to start Dalinar in gymnastics as he is so active.

We are so excited for a second child, and we are happy to stay in touch with you. Whether you'd like it to be through text, email or regular mail, we will send you pictures and stories so you can watch your child grow up. Kristin made sure to take lots of pictures of Dalinar and send them to extended family, so we are ready to send pictures to you of your child. We know you may need more or less contact at times, so we will strive to be sensitive and supportive of you wherever you are. In addition to exchanging email addresses and phone numbers, we are open to an occasional visit with you if you decide that is something you would like.

Thank you again for considering us as potential parents for your child. We realize this is a monumental decision. You will be in our prayers.

Kirk & Kristin