Meet TJ & Katie
A video message from TJ & Katie
A Letter from TJ & Katie
Thank you for taking the time to learn about us! We are a loving, active family that offers a nurturing home and positive environment, and we are excited to grow our family through adoption. As an adoptee herself, Katie looks forward to sharing this unique bond with our next child. Together with our son, we are excited to offer your child a lifetime of love, adventure, and opportunity!
About Us
We have been happily married for five years and live in Michigan with our son, Ryan, where we are surrounded by family and life-long friends. After the birth of our son, we learned that Katie could not carry another pregnancy. We believe we are called to adoption and trust God has a plan for our family!
The Christian values we were raised with have shaped who we are as people, as partners, and as parents, and our priority is to raise compassionate children who are equipped to do God’s work in the world. We believe strongly in the importance of education and ensuring our children have every opportunity to learn and grow. In addition to this, our families instilled in us a strong work ethic and integrity, which we hope to pass on as values to our children, along with our sense of adventure and love for life.
We are a very active family and love to spend our family time outside, playing at local parks or taking walks or bike rides. We love sports in our family too and never miss a good football game! We enjoy traveling and take an annual family trip to northern Michigan and the Carolinas, along with visits to new places each year. We look forward to sharing our active lifestyle and love for learning with our children.
About TJ
“Hard-working, motivated, generous, and loyal” are the words that best describe TJ. In addition to having a leadership role at his company, TJ is a very involved dad. He and our son, Ryan, are always “wrestling”, throwing the football around, or playing trucks.
TJ is an avid reader, and reads every morning with his cup of coffee. He loves learning about history, whether it’s in a book or at a museum. He is also the “green thumb” of our family and enjoys working on the yard. He’s very active and gets a run or gym time in almost every day. TJ was a star wrestler and football player, and looks forward to coaching our kids in any athletic activities they may pursue.
About Katie
Katie is a loving wife and mom who makes taking care of “her boys” and making our home happy and healthy her priority. She is genuine, funny, adventurous, and inquisitive. She works part-time as an education consultant and has a strong passion for early childhood education and ensuring all children have the opportunity to learn.
Katie loves art – whether it’s visiting art galleries, painting, or taking art classes. She also loves to cook, has a minor obsession with the Food Network, and looks forward to making a healthy family dinner nearly every night. She looks forward to making sure our children know how to cook healthy meals!
Our Son and Family
Our son, Ryan, is very loving and kind-hearted, and we know he will be an amazing big brother! Ryan attends a Christian preschool, plays in a toddler soccer league, and loves his weekly swim classes. He also loves reading books and playing with trucks.
We are blessed with a large, very close extended family, including a dozen nieces and nephews. We enjoy spending time together whenever we can — there are always a lot of laughs involved! We see our parents and siblings regularly and they are all looking forward to loving another child.
Our Home in Michigan
We live in a large, five-bedroom home, filled with light and love. We especially love our newly finished basement and our backyard which both offer space to run and play. Our town is located just outside of a large city, offering us the best of both worlds: having a small, tight-knit community and having access to large city amenities. Our community has multiple large parks, an ice rink, trails, and community events like a halloween parade and winter festival. We have the top-ranked schools in our state. It is the perfect place to raise a family!
Our Promise
We promise to give your child every opportunity to develop into the special individual they are meant to be – by loving them, giving them opportunities to explore their interests, challenging them to be their best, and instilling in them a strong set of values. We promise your child will always know his or her birth and adoption story, and that he or she is loved beyond measure.
To learn more about us, please call or text Lifetime at 1.800.923.6784.
Learn More About TJ & Katie
| TJ | Katie | |
|---|---|---|
| Our Education | Masters in Business Administration | Masters in Business Administration |
| Our Professions | Executive Management | Education Consultant |
| Stay-At-Home | No | Part-time and works at home |
| Our Racial Background | Caucasian | Caucasian |
| Some of TJ & Katie's Favorites | ||
| Holiday | Thanksgiving - we spend it with TJ's family in a new location every year | Christmas - Katie loves the holiday spirit and puts the Christmas tree up as early as TJ will let her! |
| Vacation | Hawaii | London or Paris |
| Ice Cream Flavor | Butter Pecan | Mint Chocolate Chip |
| Favorite thing about each other | Katie's constant support for me and Ryan | TJ's motivation - once he sets his mind to something, he makes it happen! |
| Christmas Movie | It's a Wonderful Life | Elf |
| Childhood Memory | Family trip to Disney World | Summers spent "up north" in Michigan |
| Family Activity | Friday night cookies and movies | Books and prayers before bedtime |
| More About Our Family | ||
| Our Special Interests | We share many interests as a family. We love to travel - in our state, across the country (especially to visit family in Ohio, the Carolinas, and Florida), and overseas. We really enjoy learning about history, art, and different cultures through travel, as well as just connecting and having fun as a family. We both love to read -- TJ mostly reads nonfiction and Katie enjoys fiction. Audio books are new family favorite, and we listen to them on drives and as we fall asleep at night. We read with Ryan regularly and he has grown to love books too. We love any good sports game in our house. We are huge fans of our college teams, and football season is our favorite time of year. We are very active both individually and as a family. TJ hits the gym or runs nearly every day and Katie goes to a local barre/pilates/yoga studio. We do 5K races together and include Ryan by pushing him in his running stroller. We've encouraged Ryan to be active through involvement in toddler activities like his soccer league and swimming classes. | |
| Our Faith | Our Catholic faith and community is important to our family and our extended families. Our Christian values - especially faith, love, and compassion - really define our approach to daily life. Instilling strong Christian values in our children and ensuring they live them out on a daily basis is our priority. We look forward to continuing our faith journey with our children. | |
| Our Traditions | While we consider ourselves to be adventurous people, we absolutely love the familiarity and consistency that our family traditions give us. In particular, we do an annual family vacation to northern Michigan (which is among the most beautiful places on earth!) with Katie's family. This offers us a chance to unwind, relax, and reconnect with nature and with each other. We always order the same pizza from the same pizzeria on Friday night, make s'mores over a campfire, watch the same old movies, and float on tubes in the lake. It's definitely gotten "busier" as more kids have come into our family, but we wouldn't have it any other way! | |
| Our Volunteer Work | Being involved in our community is really important to us. In particular, we enjoy supporting national and local organizations promoting kidney health and organ donation - both of which have touched our family. We support fundraising initiatives through an annual drive we organize at TJ's work, as well as by participating in events such as charity runs and walks. Our extended families participate with us, which makes these events so rewarding and fun for our entire family. Katie has also been on the board of various nonprofit organizations, particularly for schools and education. | |
| Our Careers | We both are blessed to have careers that we love that also allow us to prioritize our family. TJ is a Vice President at a large manufacturing company. He is consistently viewed as a smart, caring leader. He is on the cutting edge of innovation in his industry and gets to do some really interesting things and go to very cool places. When possible, Katie and Ryan tag along on work trips. Katie works as an education consultant. She works with school systems (like school districts or state education agencies) on strategic issues such as how to implement new programs or how to shape new policies. She finds her work very rewarding because of the impact it has on so many children and families. She is able to do her work from home and works part-time, which helps keep our family in a good rhythm. | |
| We live in the state of... | Michigan. There's so much to explore in our state, including beautiful lakes, forests, and beaches. The fall is especially beautiful here! There is no better place than a cider mill on a fall day in Michigan, complete with freshly-picked apples and homemade doughnuts! The summer offers every outdoor activity you can imagine, from boating to hiking to golfing. And if you can handle the cold and snow, Michigan winters are a great time to get outside and go skiing or ice skating or just build a snowman in the backyard. We live in a metropolitan area full of kid-friendly museums and a zoo. There's so much to explore here! | |
| We Prefer a Child Who Is... | ||
| Age of Child | Newborn - 2 years | |
| Twins | Yes! Katie is an adopted twin, and we would love to adopt twins! | |
| Gender | We would love either a boy or girl. | |
| Sibling Group | Yes with the oldest up to 2 years old. | |
| Ethnicity of Child | Caucasian, Caucasian/Asian, Caucasian/Hispanic | |
| Future Contact with Birth Family | We are open to creating a plan with birth parents including photos, letters, and visits | |
| In Closing | ||
We look forward to welcoming your child into our home and hearts! We promise to surround them with love, guidance, and support on life's journey. Thank you for considering our sincere desire to love your child. |
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