Hello!  We are Mike and Melissa from San Francisco, California. We are so thankful that you’ve taken the time to learn more about us. We deeply respect the courage and strength you have to explore adoption for your baby. We hope this gives you an opportunity to learn a little about us.  We are a very active and happy couple, and are excited about becoming first time parents!

Our Life Together

We met at a running event 15 years ago and realized we had a tremendous amount in common. We started dating despite the fact that Mike was about to leave for a yearlong trip around the world. Our connection was so strong that two days before Mike left, he decided to cut his trip in half with the plan for us to continue the adventure together in the future. Through daily emails and regular phone calls, we formed a strong friendship which serves as the foundation of our relationship. Three years later, we continued the trip, backpacking around Europe for four months. Mike proposed at the end of the trip and we’ve been happily married for the past 11 years.

Our love of travel is one of the things that immediately connected us. We are curious about the world and excited to explore new cultures and places. We also love everything outdoors from camping and hiking to kayaking and surfing. Melissa is an avid cyclist and enjoys participating in running, cycling and triathlon events. Mike is an avid surfer and loves to be in the water, but also enjoys cycling and rides his bike to work most days. Everyday he sees parents riding their children to school on their bicycles, which is an experience that we both dream of sharing with our child.

Since we both work in education, we’re fortunate that we’ll have summers off to play, explore, and travel together with our child. Mike is a high school physics teacher and Melissa is an elementary school social worker. Curiosity, exploring, and learning are important to us. With summers off, we are excited to continue to explore the world through the eyes of a child and spend lots of fun time together as a family. In addition, we plan to have one of us stay home as a full-time parent, for the first 3 years, until the start of pre-school. We live a very healthy, happy, and active life and we can’t wait to share it with a child!

Our Home and Community

We live in a quiet and safe neighborhood of San Francisco close to the beach and Golden Gate Park where we spend a lot of time with our dog Ashby. We have the best of both worlds - we are in an amazingly diverse city with so much to offer yet we live in an area that has a small community feel. There are markets and shops within a short walk and we know many of our neighbors and shopkeepers, thanks to our cute dog! Also just a few blocks away is the beautiful hiking trails of Lands End, where we enjoy walking Ashby every weekend.

We live in a single family home with two bedrooms and a small fenced in backyard. We love having family and friends over for holiday gatherings, barbeques, and backyard movie nights. We recently watched Riding Giants, one of Mike’s favorite surf movies, snuggled up in front of the fire pit sipping hot cocoa, which helped take the chill off the foggy night!

Meet Mike through Melissa’s eyes

Mike is a very supportive, nurturing and adventurous person who I’m lucky to call my husband. He has always been encouraging and supportive of me reaching my goals, from pursuing my master’s degree to completing my many athletic endeavors. One of the things I love most about Mike is that he is compassionate and nurturing. His strong nurturing instinct was especially clear when we completed a half-ironman triathlon together. After 5 hours into the race I was sick, cramping, and crying. I didn’t think I could go on. Mike walked with me for 13 miles with a gentle and loving presence to the finish line. From that I knew he would always be by my side with love even in my most difficult moments. 

Mike makes life fun and adventurous! He inspired many of our trips to experience different countries and cultures, and at the same time he is very thoughtful about how we impact those around us.  I love that about him. Our child will be fortunate to have a father that loves to play, explore, and learn. Mike is going to be a very active dad, and he might just be the last one to leave the playground! When we get together with our friends and their children, Mike becomes a human jungle gym. He loves being tackled, racing big wheels, and playing tag. 

As the cook of the house, he’s super excited to have a little chef-in-training help him in the kitchen. And he can’t wait to teach our child to surf! Mike is always learning and growing, and willing to share his gifts with others.  He recently started a new career as a high school physics teacher. He really wanted to make a difference in the lives of young people and to help them gain a passion for learning too.

Meet Melissa through Mike’s eyes

Melissa is a caring and loving partner and the most beautiful person I have ever known. Both in her personal life and professionally, as a school social worker, Melissa cares deeply for every person in her life. She is warm and cheerful, and often a bit silly. She loves telling kids jokes and is always on the hunt for a new joke to share with students at her elementary school. Melissa glows when she is around our friends’ and families’ children and immediately knows how to make them feel special and safe. Her silly faces make them laugh and her bright smile is mirrored back by every child she encounters.

Melissa is deeply connected to her family and friends. Melissa has always dreamed of having a home where she could host holiday gatherings and other events. Since moving back to San Francisco after attending college in San Diego, she has been able to fulfill those dreams. Melissa makes our house so warm and welcoming whether it’s a large family gathering or a work party.

Melissa is adventurous and loves to experience and explore the world. During our first trip abroad together, she was a little nervous about backpacking around Europe for 4 months. The first night, in our hostel room full of bunk beds, she turned to me and said “I don’t know if I can do this for 4 months.” The next morning, upon seeing our first monument in Athens, Greece, Melissa turned to me and said, “I don’t think 4 months if going to be enough!” She has never stopped exploring.

Melissa is so excited to apply everything she has learned about children from her work as a school social worker and from her time with her friends kids. She is going to be an AWESOME mommy!

Growing Up with Us

*We value an open and honest relationship, and as parents we will make sure our child knows we will always support them no matter what. We will introduce our child to different people and beliefs, and encourage an attitude of openness toward different cultures and lifestyles.

*Some things we are really excited to do with our child: reading bedtime stories every night; teaching our child to ride a bike; going camping and hiking in our favorite Nationals Parks like Yosemite and Lassen Volcanic

*Our family has a vacation home on a lake in the mountains in Northern California where we spend a lot of our free time. Melissa grew up swimming, skiing, and fishing at the lake every summer, and we are really excited to do these things with our child. Melissa has continued her grandmother’s tradition of making plum jelly from the trees on our property. We hope that this family tradition, and the legacy of the lake house is something we will pass down to our child.

*We are very fortunate to have a loving network of family and friends that are ready to welcome our son or daughter. Melissa’s side of the family lives in the Bay Area. Her mom lives 15 minutes away and is excited for special Grandma-time!

*We travel to Boston twice a year to spend time with Mike’s side of the family and explore the East Coast. We love to take walks in the snow during winter, and play at the beach and go paddle boarding in the summer.

Our Path to Adoption and Possibly to You

We have experienced a great deal of love, adventure, and good fortune in our lives, but nothing so meaningful as becoming parents.

Raising a child together is a very important chapter in our lives that we’re excited about and ready for. We have a number of friends who adopted their children and several friends who have been adopted themselves. And Melissa helped one of her closest friends through the process of placing her baby with adoptive parents when they were 21. Having experience with all sides of adoption has made us feel that open adoption is the best path to fulfilling our dreams of becoming parents.

Our path to adoption has led us here, to meeting you.  Our path to adoption has led us here, to meeting you.  We hope you can envision your child growing up in our family, and we hope we can provide your child with the life you are dreaming of for him or her.

Thank you for reading!

Warmly, Melissa & Mike