ONTARIO ADOPTION PROFILE - BETTY AND MARK

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CONTACTS:

We would love to connect with you. Please contact us directly at:
Email:  mbdadopt@gmail.com

If you prefer, you can also contact our amazing Adoption Practitioner, Donna Durant:
phone: 905-627-9883
email: donna@familyfocusadoption.com

HI THERE!

We are Betty and Mark, an energetic and fun loving couple, hoping to expand our family through adoption. We hope that the fun trivial pursuit facts, pictures and descriptions give you a glimpse into who we are. Join us by meeting our amazing fury family member Dexter, our live together and our thoughts on adoption.

Our life is filled with fun, energy, hard work, balance, bloopers, challenge, bundled together with some quirkiness-Betty collects rocks from vacation spots and Mark once shaved off his eye brow by mistake~it took a while for it to grow back~Mark tried to color it in with brown eyeliner but it looked even worse!

Thank you for considering us in your search. As you make one of the most important decisions regarding your life and that of your Child, our hope is that you gain important insight into what makes us tick.

We can assure you that if you choose us to raise your Child, he or she will be brought up in a loving home and be part of an extended family and friends network; many who have already offered free baby-sitting services! As you move along your personal journey, we wish you all the best!

We met in a pub March 16, 2000-when Mark started speaking, I thought he was faking his British accent and told him to "drop" it. He insisted he was from the United Kingdom ~ he truly was! The ironic part of our meeting was we both worked for the same company and I had consulted on his transfer to Canada for a two year period.

We were instantly attracted to each other! For our first date, we went to a really bad play and enjoyed drinks afterward. We dated for another year, going to the movies, trying new recipes, road trips and hanging out.

After a year, when Mark's transfer ended, he returned to the Channel Islands. We had a 2.5 year long-distance relationship; talking at least five times a day and visiting every three months. We could write the book on surviving long distance relationships! After immigration paperwork, Mark arrived in Canada as a permanent resident on August 7, 2003-the tears of joy flowed at the airport!

To "Canadianize" Mark, I proposed the following April Fools day - he said yes and I said "April Fool's Day!" Mark then proposed on my birthday and we married on June 10, 2006 in Guernsey. We had a fun reception on a gorgeous island a boat ride away--we all joked about me being careful not to go "scuba diving" in my dress as we descended steep stairs to embark the boat--thankfully I stayed dry!

We always dreamed about raising children. We initially tried to conceive, however after two miscarriages, we have embraced adoption as a way to build our family.

Adoption is very much a part of our history and our current day-to-day lives. Mark's father was adopted and we also have a close network of friends who extended their families through adoption. We truly feel that our support system has given us a true window on adoption~the beautiful moments, the challenges, but most of all, the great gift of coming together as a family.

PS: Dexter, our blue eyed furry family member, is also looking forward to a playmate to get dirty in the lake mud, giving paw for treats and cuddling at bedtime~Dexter even snores!

We are blessed to consider two places our home. The first is our comfortable 4 bedroom home, located in a quiet family oriented neighborhood in a large town. We have a comfy backyard which we hang out in and Mark has an environmentally friendly vegetable garden which he grows from seed. Our neighborhood is the ideal place for kids~located two minutes from the shore of Lake Ontario, schools, splash and dog park and soccer field. We love decorating our home for special times of the year: Valentine's, Easter, Spring, Halloween and Christmas. At Valentines, our home is full of red hearts!

We also visit Mark's family in Guernsey, an island, off the coast of France, enjoying the snow white beaches, amazing hiking trails and eating fresh strawberries bought from roadside stalls-- island life at its finest!

Our second home is the family cottage, located three hours north. Most weekends we pack up for the sanctity of our slice of heaven--Our cottage has been christened: OUR NEST. We enjoy tubing, boating, water-skiing, boarding, swimming, sailing, fishing and spending fun times on the dock, holding watermelon seed spitting contests.

Mark was baptized in the Anglican Church and Betty in the Catholic Church. Our faith is expressed in a multitude of ways: admiration of the cross that sits on our mantle, participating in church services, and giving through volunteer work.

Our faith is a regular part of our lives in that we participate in religious high holidays and also as Betty is from Polish decent, the rituals and practices at Christmas and Easter time. Our faiths have kept us strong and focused: we want that for our child. Between us, we have three great god-children and are the legal guardian for the daughter of close friends.

Whether it be meeting Buddhist monks in Michigan, Italian nuns in a Monastery in France, attending a fund raiser to help families who have lost a loved one, searching for a boat lost in Lake Ontario or simply washing dishes at Food Bank Breakfast, we both try to uphold our religious upbringing through volunteer work.

If asked what makes us "tick" as a couple, we would say that we both compliment and challenge each other. Our marriage is based on love, respect, commitment and communication, peppered with lots of fun, challenges, encouragement and memorable bloopers.

We were raised in very loving homes. We have first hand experience in what a great marriage looks and feels like, trying to mirror our own, adding our own twist!

Very importantly, humour is a constant, leading us through the great and challenging times. Like the time that I programmed the car GPS system in Orlando to take us to a Disney hotel's head office instead of the actual hotel! Or the time that Mark stopped traffic in the middle of the road to allow a turtle to cross the road without getting run over~it put a whole new twist on the joke about “why did the chicken cross the road.”

Based on our strong bond as a couple, we feel that our life experiences, lessons learned and interests are a solid foundation for parenthood.

1. Personality: Friendly, sense of fun, adventurous
2. Eye color: Green
3. Height: 5 feet, 10 inches
4. Ethnicity: British
5. Education: College diploma, specializing in business; post secondary certifications
6. Wonderful parents: Janine and Alan, married for over 45 years
7. Siblings: One younger brother ~ Grant
8. Career: Manager, Risk Management at a major Financial Institution
9. Extended Family: Quite large: Mom came from 6 siblings; Dad from 3
10. Vacations: Any new place
11. Quirky habit: Buying T-shirts for any reason: Charity, vacation memory, fashion
12. Favorite colors: Green & blue
13. Favorite movie: Star Wars
14. Favorite insect: Dragon Fly
15. Favorite food: French fries
16. Favorite Wii: Winter Sports (snow boarding) and Rock Band (I love playing the drums)
17. Planned childcare: Betty will stay at home until at least kindergarten
18. Favorite childhood memories: Endless summers at the beach in my inflatable boat
19. Famous person I admire: The late Jacques Cousteau, undersea explorer
20. Hobbies: Anything having to do with water: scuba diving, boating, swimming
21. Favorite place: Guernsey, Channel Islands, UK
22. Favorite hat: My beanie that I bought in a small village in France
23. What is on my bucket list: Sky diving, dive the Great Barrier Reef
24. Favorite adult memory: Seeing Betty on our wedding day and saying "I do"
25. Most loved non-productive past time: Watching ocean waves

1. Personality: Friendly, bubbly, positive
2. Eye color: Hazel with black flecks
3. Height: 5 feet, 6-1/2 inches
4. Ethnicity: Canadian-Polish (I am also 100% fluent in Polish)
5. Education: Honours Bachelor Degree, Sociology & Anthropology; Human Resource Certification
6. Amazing parents: Barbara and Stanley, married for over 45 years
7. Siblings: None, however all my girlfriends are my "chosen" sisters
8. Career: Manager, Human Resources at a major Financial Institution
9. Extended Family: Close & large: Mom came from 10 siblings; Dad from 8
10. Vacations: Anywhere by plane, train, motorcycle, automobile, bus or boat
11. Quirky habit: Collect unique rocks during vacation and bring them home
12. Favorite colors: A tie between blue and red
13. Favorite movie: SHREK
14. Favorite insect: Lady bug
15. Favorite food: Potato pancakes with sour cream and sugar
16. Favorite Wii: Deal or No Deal, Price is Right and all Sport games
17. Planned childcare: At home into until at least kindergarten
18. Favorite childhood memories: Endless summers at the cottage fishing, swimming and laughing
19. Most famous people I have met: Pope John Paul II and Queen Elizabeth's mother
20. Hobbies: Endless: Abstract painting, playing with my dog, cooking, boardgames, gardening, Facebook
21. Favorite place: Laying in the hammock at the cottage
22. Favorite hat: My skunk hat~makes me smile and people laugh, especially kids!
23. What is on my bucket list: Sky diving, learning to drive standard and visiting Australia
24. Favorite adult memory: Hanging out at Disney for a week with Mark/Mickey/Minnie Mouse
25. Most non productive past times: Watching falling stars on the cottage dock and blowing bubbles

For the past four years, we have planned our lives with the expectation that we would have a new family addition. Betty does not plan to return to work.

Your child will know of his or her adoption right from the beginning. We hope that by working together, an open adoption will help provide answers to questions that your Child may have as they grow up. One thing we promise is to make sure he or she knows that the decision you made was purely out of love. However, we will respect the arrangement most comfortable for you.

We have the greatest respect for your courage and strength at this time. We hope that you can see the kind of parents we'll try to be and the life that your Child would have with us. We hope that you now have a quick glimpse into who we are.

Should you consider us as possible adoptive parents, we look forward to building a new chapter in our lives and sharing the story of how we all came together to create a plan to give your Child the best life possible.

With best wishes,
Betty & Mark
PS: Dexter says woof!