Dear Birthparent(s):

As you sit-down to read our profile, we are thinking of and praying for you, as we have been for months. We imagine that the decision you are making is one of the most difficult of your life, but it is also the most courageous, loving, and selfless that anyone can make. We have great admiration for your strength and character. You have chosen to give life to your baby and we want to provide a wonderful, supportive and loving life for a baby. We are grateful that you are reading our profile and hope that it helps you get a glimpse of who we are.

Our Story
We met in June of 1992, two weeks after junior high graduation in Michigan, where both of our parents had summer homes. Jay knew from the moment he laid eyes on Carey that she was something special. We began our relationship as friends, but it soon turned into dating. It was not much later that we realized we were soul mates. We dated straight through high school, going to dances from freshman homecoming to senior prom. We have a unique and close relationship with our in-laws because they got to experience our growth into adulthood and shared many milestones in our lives.

After high school graduation, we both went to college out-of-state, but that did not last long as we both came back within one semester to be near each other and our families. Carey majored in early childhood education at National-Louis University, with a minor in psychology, and graduated after doing her student teaching. Jay went to Loyola University Chicago and got his degree in political science with a minor in philosophy.

We got engaged during our junior year of college on April Fool’s Day. Jay popped the question while we were on a moonlit walk on a beach in Aruba. For a second, Carey did not know if the proposal was serious or just another April Fool’s Day joke. The planning of our wedding took place over the next year and a half. We got married on July 8th of 2000. Our wedding was everything we had dreamed and more. A few months after our wedding, we moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan, where Jay attended law school. Ann Arbor was a great experience for us, as we enjoyed everything the town and the University of Michigan had to offer and grew closer as a couple. After law school, we moved back to the western suburbs of Chicago.

We have been in each other’s life during some important times and have allowed each other to grow as individuals and as a couple. This has made us stronger as a couple and gives us a great appreciation for each other. It is really neat to have known each other since before high school and to have witnessed our growth into the people we are today.

Our Background

Carey…
I grew up in Oak Brook, Illinois. My place in the family is the youngest of eight children. I have five sisters (Cathy, Chris, Cherie, Caron, and Casey) and two brothers (Sam and Stuart). I was fortunate to have my mother (Doris) stay at home during my childhood. Throughout my life my mom has been my best friend and I truly enjoy spending time with her. My parents provided a very secure, consistent, and loving home. My parents still live in the home that my father (Sam) built before I was born. To this day, I am very close with my siblings, seven of whom live in the Chicagoland area. Family get-togethers are a frequent (and with twenty nieces and nephews, noisy) event. Besides Jay, my best friends are my mother and my sisters.

One of my great loves as a child was playing sports. I was always busy with soccer, basketball, volleyball, swimming, tennis, or cheerleading. Some of the fondest memories from my childhood are the family trips we took to Florida for spring break and the weekends we spent at my parents’ summer home in Michigan. We still take those yearly trips to Florida and make many weekend trips to Michigan as a family. There are twenty nieces and nephews in my family (Matt, Emma, Ben, Jessica, Jenna, Jordan, Melissa, Lindsay, P.J., April, John, Justin, Sammy, Marina, Tommy, Matthew, Drew, Lizzy, Lexie and Christian), making our next addition number twenty-one, but there is never any shortage of love and affection. The cousins have all developed very close friendships and bonds with each other.

Jay…
I am the second oldest of five children and have four sisters, Lea, twins Gia and Joy, and Jil. I had a happy and worry-free childhood, with great memories of playing games with my sisters. Every year, we would take great vacations to places like Hilton Head Island, Vail, Florida, Germany, or London. The reason I enjoy traveling so much today probably has a lot to do with the vacations I took during my childhood. I enjoyed playing sports, especially soccer and tennis, and watching college sports (the University of Michigan) and Chicago sports teams (Cubs, Bears, and Bulls). I am a huge University of Michigan fan (Go Blue!!!) and closely follow the Cubs and Bears. I also enjoyed going to school and spending time with my close friends. My dad (Lee) had his own business and was always hard at work, while my mom (Salley) stayed at home and did everything she could for my sisters and me. My dad instilled his hard-working nature in me and my mom her commitment to family.

Our Life Today
In August of 2005, we adopted our son, Christian Jay William (C.J.), through Sunny Ridge. The experience we shared with each other, Christian’s birthparents and our Sunny Ridge case-workers on that beautifully sunny August day was profound and life changing. Christian has brought so much love and joy to our home. We would describe Christian as extremely happy, high-spirited, silly, tender-hearted and loving. Christian loves life and everything it has to offer him. Another important member of our family is our ten-year-old American Cocker Spaniel, Nala. Nala is a sweet dog, who loves children (in fact, she thinks she is a kid). Nala has a very special relationship with Christian and often sleeps outside of his room during his naps. All three of us, and Nala, are looking forward to a new addition to the family.

We live in a western suburb of Chicago in a new two story home, directly across the street from the local grammar school. Our neighborhood offers a great environment for children. There are lots of children of all ages on our street. Our neighbors know each other and truly care about what is going on in each others’ lives. There is a strong sense of community in our town and it is very family-oriented. Our home is a ten minute walk from the village library and down-town area, where there are lots of stores, restaurants, parks and town festivals. We take advantage of all that the town has to offer quite often. The three of us love being outside and try to spend most nice days doing outdoor activities.

Since Christian’s arrival, our favorite activities have revolved around spending quality time together, whether that is just being silly or dancing and singing at home or talking long walks outside. We try to go out for dinner at least once a week and also enjoy going to museums and having play dates with friends. We also enjoy watching movies, skiing, playing tennis and exercising. Just as much as we love to be active and travel, we also love to spend time in our home relaxing and doing things around the house. One of our favorite fall weekend activities is watching the University of Michigan football team. We also spend time gardening and barbequing on our back patio and exploring our yard with Christian.

Vacations and traveling have always been something we have loved to do and we have continued this with Christian. Before C.J., we took vacations to Germany, Aruba, Hawaii, Arizona, Cape Cod, Caribbean cruises, Vail and Steamboat Colorado. We always look forward to our yearly trip to Florida with Carey’s family where most (if not all) of Carey’s brothers and sisters, and her parents stay in the same hotel. Our newest travel tradition is once a year during Chicago’s long winters we escape to an indoor water-park with C.J. and some good friends. This is time full of splish-splash fun. We took our first trip to Walt Disney World in May of 2008 to celebrate Jay turning 30. It was an unforgettable experience; we cannot wait to go back to "Mickey's House" as Christian calls it.
         
Carey stopped working and became a full-time stay-at-home mom when we adopted Christian. It was always one of Carey’s greatest aspirations in life to be a full-time mother; even Carey’s college education was focused on child development. Before Christian, Carey worked at her family’s construction company, which her father has owned for over thirty years. Carey has no plans to work outside of the home in the future. While Carey and Christian are enjoying their weekdays together, Jay is busy at work as an attorney at a large international law-firm based in Chicago.  Jay’s practice focuses on mergers and acquisitions between large companies. Each day, Jay takes the train to and from work. The train station is only a ten minute walk from our home. Jay is lucky to enjoy the people he works with and the type of work he does. We have become close friends with many of Jay’s co-workers and enjoy spending time with them and their families.

Carey Says…
Jay is the most amazing person that I have met in my life. He has the ability to love Christian and me with his entire heart and shows his love no matter what life throws at us. I had expected Jay to be a wonderful dad and he has even surpassed my expectations. I get lots of joy watching Christian and Jay play and do boy things together. Some qualities that describe Jay are respectful, genuine, loyal, intelligent and kind. When Jay makes a decision to do something, he fully dedicates himself to reaching his goal and he almost always accomplishes it. An example of this was his high school dream of becoming a lawyer, which he fulfilled by going to one of the best law schools in the country and getting a job at one of the most prestigious law firms. Jay works very hard at his job, but he never makes me feel like work is more important than Christian or me. We also have great communication with each other. Throughout each day, no matter how busy, we look forward to the times when we can talk and share what is going on with each other.

Jay Says…
I feel like the luckiest guy on earth to have married Carey; she truly rounds me out. The things that attracted me most to Carey were her loving and caring ways, compassion for people, want of the same things in life that I do, and her ability to light up a room and my day. One of the first characteristics I noticed about Carey was that she is a nurturer. Carey has done an amazing job being Christian’s mom. She has already instilled in him a loving, playful and caring heart. I think one of the reasons Christian is such an awesome kid is because of Carey’s ability to strike the right balance between love, play and discipline. Other qualities that describe Carey are honest, passionate, fun-loving, and genuine.

Our Faith
One aspect of our life that affects everything we do is our faith. We both were raised Roman Catholic, but have found a spiritual home in a non-denominational Christian Bible Church. As we became more involved in our church, our lives were transformed as our relationship with God became much more personal and important. Carey takes part in a bi-weekly bible-study group. Jay is part of a men’s group that meets Friday mornings before work. Raising our children as followers of Christ is vitally important for us. Our church has a wonderful Sunday school for children ages one through high school, in which we actively volunteer. Our lives as Christians does not just take part at church as we try to live each day in the example of Christ.  

Our faith and love for each other helped us get through the disappointment of not being able to conceive. After researching alternatives, we decided as a couple that we did not want to pursue medical infertility treatments. Through the hard trials that we faced, our relationship as a couple, our individual relationships with Christ, and our relationship with Christ as a couple all became stronger. Our experience with infertility made us realize that we have to follow God’s plan for our lives and we now know that adoption is part of God’s will for us. Even before we adopted Christian, Carey felt a calling and desire to adopt and after discussing adoption for years, we knew it would be part of ours lives. Both of our families have had direct experience with adoption, including one sister having adopted two children and two cousins and a brother-in-law having been adopted.

We are committed to sharing our child’s birth story with him or her from day one so that he or she will always know the wonderful and unique way we became a family. Openness is something that we feel should be decided together with you so that the decision we reach serves the best interests of everyone involved.

Well, it is very difficult to put the essence of us onto a few pages of paper, but we hope that this letter gives you an idea of who we are. Above all, we have an overwhelming desire to share our great love through parenting. If you decide that we are the right family for you, we will do everything we can to provide a loving and supportive home. We cannot express in words what a wonderful gift it is that you are giving through adoption. If you would like to get to know us better, we would love to have the opportunity to meet with you. Our prayers are with you and we wish you the best in making this decision for you and your baby.

For more information please contact Sunny Ridge Family Center.

With love,

Jay, Carey, and Christian

Back to Waiting Families