Dear Birth Mother,
Hi, we are Erin and Ray and we hope to be able to get to know you a little better. We can only try to understand the difficulty of your decision. It truly must be life changing. We want you to know that, if we are given the opportunity, we will provide your child with a warm, safe and loving home, in an environment that will have all the advantages a parent wants for their child. We want to help reduce your anxiety about your decision by assuring you that, from the moment your child is born, he or she will grow up in a way that will make you proud and ease your concerns about what lies ahead for your baby. You also deserve to be proud of your choice to pursue adoption for your baby. Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your baby during your pregnancy. Thank you so much for considering us.

Our reasons for adopting
We have very full lives that we want to share as a family. We discussed our interest in adoption before we realized that conceiving naturally is very difficult for us. With all of the difficulties people in our country endure, we have chosen to adopt domestically. We have spare rooms (with lots of windows and closet space!) in a beautiful home in New Jersey. Erin has worked very hard to make ours a family home that we can’t wait to fill with children! We can’t wait to witness their development, school days and all of the adventures of childhood.

Our Story
We met in New York City on a blind date, arranged by a mutual friend. We married a year later on Chelsea Pier, overlooking the Hudson River. It was one of the rainiest days of the year, but we know that will bring us the good luck the old cliché promises! We love each other immensely and have a strong relationship with good communication. We love spending time together. We look forward to the evenings after work as well as weekends when we can be together. We laugh, have stimulating conversation, and enjoy our mutual interests which include walking, playing tennis, grilling outside, watching movies and playing with our cats.

About Erin

After graduating with a degree in Psychology, Erin worked her way up in the hotel business starting as a General Manager’s Assistant and finishing as a Vice President of Sales and Marketing for two Boutique Hotels in NYC. Ray used to get jealous because she met a lot of celebrities through her job! Erin left work shortly before we got married, to plan our beautiful wedding, start building our current home, and prepare to grow our family. Erin will be a homemaker and, as Ray says, will have the toughest, but most rewarding of all jobs - being a full time mom. She has been waiting for the moment when this dream can come true.

Erin’s family moved a great deal while she and her sister were growing up. This has given Erin confidence and the ability to meet people and make friends easily. Although she scooped ice cream, waited tables, and also worked at a grocery store while in high school, she was always happiest working her summer jobs with kids. She babysat, was a camp counselor for 4 summers, and gave piano lessons to children. She ran track and played field hockey and tennis, and was the Photography Editor of her Yearbook in College. Erin has done volunteer work for the Humane Society, Elementary Schools and had an Adopted Grandparent for 6 years at a nursing home. She has lived in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Arizona, Florida and England (where she studied abroad) and has traveled all over the U.S. and Europe for pleasure and for her work. She cannot wait to explore the world with a child.

About Ray
Ray works in Finance in NYC. He has spent almost 20 years in this industry and is at the stage of his career where he has a lot of flexibility with his work schedule. His schedule will be great for family time. He will be home often and will be able to be a very hands-on father. He will also have the freedom to take fun, family vacations! Ray was a wrestler in school, and also played football, and will make sure that we stay active as a family! He is a huge help around the house and no task is too big for him to pitch in! He has a strong work ethic and is an honest person. He is great with kids and will be a dad who loves his children unconditionally.

He may retire in a few years to be home with family.

Ray loves to work out at the gym. He loves go biking and hiking on trails. He enjoys playing tennis with me and a group of friends on Friday nights. He also loves to ski. In the house, he loves to play pool and read.

Our Interests

We do everything together from tennis to skiing to biking. We love to be social and take in the culture of NYC. We really love to see plays and musicals. We loved Madame Butterfly, and of course, Jersey Boys! We also enjoy shooting pool at home! Erin’s dad is very happy we just got a pool table. Erin is a very good athlete and Ray is no longer embarrassed to say that she creams him at both tennis and golf. (But he can still lift a lot more weight at the gym and runs much faster than she can!) She kicks his butt in yoga, though!

We enjoy all kinds of music and films, and love to travel. Erin is also a great cook. We have been grilling on our new patio and love it. One clear and easy way to explain our interests and how they differ would be to look at our book and magazine collection. Erin’s magazines of choice include interior design, health and fitness, and cooking (and of course those fashion and gossip magazines are thrown in there)! She also likes English Literature and any book from Oprah’s Book Club! Ray, on the other hand, LOVES Politics, Economics and History, and reads all kinds of war books as well as Barron’s, Newsweek, and the Wall Street Journal. We take turns choosing movies to rent since Erin loves Romantic Comedies and Ray loves all of the history and educational stuff! One thing we are very excited about will be traveling with our new and growing family. Highlights of our travels include: riding ATV’s in the dunes of Los Cabos, Mexico, eating the day’s catch with locals on the Amalfi Coast in Italy, hiking in the Teton Mountains in Yellowstone National Park and riding bikes in Napa Valley. We tried to go skiing in Vermont recently but there was little snow. We still had fun, though! Erin loves to take photos so we have tons of pictures from these trips to share with family and friends. Erin is already planning a photo gallery in the house that will star the child we are blessed with.

Our home and community in NJ
Our community is small, tightly knit, and values participation in sports. The town’s public High School and overall education system is among the best in NJ. We belong to the YMCA and the Mountain Lakes Club, which has a pool, tennis courts, bowling alley and many kids programs and camps. We are just four houses down from the Lake where kids swim in the summer and ice skate in the winter. The Fourth of July is always special! People go out in their canoes or kayaks, and hang out on the beach and watch the fireworks display. We attend mass at the local Catholic Church and can actually walk there from our home! We already know many couples in our town and everyone has kids! We also have a great apartment on a quiet block in the West Village of Manhattan, and will always have a place to stay when we go to the city to do fun things. We love to go out to breakfast and take walks down by the river. We also love to shop and visit galleries and museums. NY is still our favorite place to take in a show or a movie. We can’t wait to push a stroller in Central Park!

Family Life and Friends
We have many friends and family all over the country. We are both proud of our numerous friends from high school, college, and work. We get together with our friends and their children frequently. Ray lost his mother a few months ago after she had a stroke, leaving him with no living parents. We were so thankful she was there to dance with Ray at our wedding to “You are the Sunshine of My Life”. However, Ray considers Erin’s Dad, Bill, to be one of his best friends in the world. Ray is planning their second “boy’s boxing night” -to watch a professional fight in NYC. We enjoy fishing on Erin’s parent’s boat in Cape Cod. Erin’s mom, Mary, and Ray are also very close. They live in Massachusetts but just sold their home and will be moving closer to us! They will be incredible Grandparents. Ray’s mom, Teresa, loved Erin very much and was proud to have her as her daughter-in-law. Erin visited her in the hospital regularly, making the journey in from NYC as often as possible to see her. Ray’s mother would announce, “Here is my little Irish face” when first seeing Erin each visit. She was very proud of her son. She admired his character, generosity and his educational and career accomplishments.

Ray has a sister Marie who has three grown children who each have children of their own. We attend all of their birthday parties, Baptisms, etc. Ray’s nephew Jason was the best man at our wedding. Erin has a younger sister, Shannon, with whom we are very close. Shannon is a fifth grade teacher in the Philadelphia area. She is a doll and will be an amazing “Auntie”. Erin also has a large extended family in NJ and all over the country who get together very frequently. They even went to Ireland together when Erin was in high school. Erin is very close to both her mom and dad and speaks to her mom almost every day. Her mom is one of seven, so there are lots of kids in the family! Ray and Erin are both Godparents to three kids in total and they are a lot of fun!

Ray about his “Sweetie”

Erin is pretty and stylish with a great personality and good sense of humor. Erin is feisty and never passive. She is willing to stand up for what she believes in and go after what she wants. Erin is very independent. For example,she lived away from home and out of the country when she was only twenty years old. Erin is smart, well educated and well traveled. But she is also very warm and loving. She has friends from all phases in her life and works very hard at maintaining relationshipsand loyalty to her friends. She is also very close with her family. Erin is both sweet with me, and with her two cats of ten years - Mocha and Espresso. She cannot wait to be a mother, and I cannot wait to see her in that role.

Erin about her “Love”

Everyone who meets Ray adores him. He is so personable and cares about the person he is speaking to, or is with, very much. I admire his zest for each day and his passion toward his work, but more importantly for his dedication toward his marriage commitment. He is an upbeat, positive person with lots of energy. Ray has made a huge success of himself in his business, but he is so down to earth and always remembers what he has earned by hard work and will never take it for granted. Instead, he wants to share it all as a family. He is very handsome and keeps himself in great shape. Ray is sensitive, loving and fun. He is also very intelligent with lots of creative ideas. Being a Dad will make him the “complete Ray”.

We are not perfect. I’m sure we will make some of the same mistakes many parents make, no matter how hard they try. However, when it comes down to it, providing a loving and rich environment, a home where our baby will be comforted, looked after, and raised well are our ultimate goals. That is our promise to you. This is what we can do for you, to make your very difficult decision a little easier.

If you have any questions for us or would like to speak with us, please contact your adoption advisor at AdoptHelp by calling 1-800-637-7999.

Thank you again and please take care.

With Love and Admiration,
Ray and Erin