| Mom to be | Dad to be | |
| First Names | Raquel | David |
| Religion | Christian | Christian |
| Ethnic Background | Hispanic | Hispanic |
| Education/Degree | Master of Arts in Applied Linguistics | B.S. in Electrical Engineering |
| Profession | Linguist/Christian Minister | Electrical Engineer |
Family Video
Our Story
Hi, we are David and Raquel. Thank you for checking out our profile! We hope you enjoy getting to know us a bit.
We met at church while we were living in North Carolina. This was the church that David and his family attended. One day, Raquel showed up wearing a tote bag with the name of her hometown in Venezuela which happens to be the same hometown as David’s. This connection allowed us to become good friends fairly quickly as our families began to get together for holidays, special occasions or to simply enjoy Venezuelan food together. As we spent more time together, it became evident that we were attracted to one another, so we began to get to know each other more intentionally. Raquel loved how David made everyone feel comfortable and how genuine he is, and David loved Raquel’s way of caring for people. Her joy and stories captivated him more and more every day. We spent a lot of time together with a large group of mutual friends there. We fell in love pretty quickly.
We began dating officially in June of 2014 and, after dating for 10 months, we got engaged and then got married 14 months after that.
Two weeks after getting married, we moved to Dallas, TX since David had gotten a job there and for Raquel to finish her MA in Applied Linguistics. We lived there for 3 years. Moving away from our family and friends just two weeks after our wedding was hard, but it provided such a great setting for us to transition into life together. We learned to lean on one another and our bond grew even stronger.
Family Life
As Christians, our greatest value is in following Jesus which leads us to live a life of love and service towards God and toward others. We hope to teach our children these values as well.
We believe that God created people to live in a loving relationship with Him and each other. We believe that the family nucleus is where we can begin to display that love. We value spending time as a couple, and with our families. We value communication and openness. In a world that is becoming increasingly disconnected, we believe that the best way we can love people is by building genuine friendships. We believe that love is a commitment that requires a daily decision to put others’ needs above our own.
We value hospitality and finding ways to serve those around us. We were both born and raised in Venezuela until our teenage years. And this country has given us many opportunities that we are grateful for. However, we do not believe that we are here only to pursue success, but to serve those around us. We value giving of our time to help new comers to the US adapt to life here.
We value being life long learners. More specifically, we enjoy learning about people and cultures. We live in a very diverse area of New Jersey and enjoy having friendships from many different backgrounds.
We both grew up with pets, mostly dogs (but David also had bunnies and turtles) but now we have beautiful indoor cat.
Lifestyle
We live in a single-family home in an urban neighborhood. We have a large backyard and live in a street where everyone knows each other. We count it a blessing to have good relationships with our neighbors.
We live in a very diverse town of New Jersey. In our street alone, we have people from Venezuela, Dominican Republic, Colombia, and Argentina as well as local New Jerseyans from several ethnic backgrounds. Additionally, about a mile from our house is a large Middle Eastern community. We love to take advantage of this diversity and enjoy spending time in coffee shops, restaurants, and dessert shops from different countries. We also spend a lot of time (especially in the summer) at local parks. We enjoy having picnics there or going for a walk. We like to hike, and go to the beach, and are people oriented. We enjoy opportunities to spend with friends whether by hosting them in our home or going out.
Raquel loves to cook and share Venezuelan cuisine with others. David loves to play video games and is learning to play the guitar. In the last couple of years, Raquel has discovered that she enjoys painting. We also love playing board games; we think they are a fun way of getting to know people.
Adoption
We understand that you are and will forever be part of your child’s story. Because of that, we desire to open our hearts to you as the first parent(s) of your child. We would like to have open channels of communications and flexibility in our relationship with you. We are comfortable providing letters, pictures, phone calls, and text messages, and at annual visits, but we believe that the best way to make this decision is to have a conversation in order to hear your expectations and wishes so that together we can figure out what our level of communication and relating will look like.
Moving to the US as teenagers provided us many opportunities to be exposed to people from different ethnic and racial backgrounds. From our first ESL class to working in jobs that attract many internationals, our lives in the US have always been in diverse settings. We believe that having access to people from virtually every country in the world in the US is a huge blessing and what makes the US an amazing country. This is not the reality in all countries in the world, but we love this and do not take it for granted.
Additionally, Raquel’s family is very diverse. Raquel’s sister-in-law is a white lady from West Virginia, and her brother is a black man from the Dominican Republic. Our family is mixed racially and culturally. Although David’s family is all Venezuelan, they also love and embrace diversity.
We live in a multi-cultural setting. Among our closest friends are people from various Latin American countries, Americans of several ethnicities, and from China, Korea, Turkey, India and Palestine. Also, we both love learning languages. David speaks Spanish and English fluently; he also speaks some French and a bit of Turkish. Raquel is fluent in Spanish, English, Portuguese and is conversational in Turkish; she hopes to learn Arabic in the future.
We hope to share our love for languages and cultures with our children. We want them to value diversity as much as we do. And because of our love for diversity, it will be a joy to embrace your child’s ethnicity and expand our circles to make sure we have friends locally from our child’s ethnicity as well.
Favorites
| Dad to be | Mom to be | |
| Genre of Music | Instrumental | Latin music, worship music |
| Childhood memory | Playing monopoly with my dad and sister | Beach trips with my family & playing hide and seek with my neighborhood friends weekly. |
| Subject in school | Physics | Language arts, theater |
| TV show | The Office | Parks & Rec, The Office, The Good Doctor |
| Holiday | Christmas | Christmas |
| Dessert | Dulce de lechosa con pina (Pineapple and Papaya preserve) | Any dessert with Oreos or plain Oreos |
| Video Game | Stardew Valley, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate | |
| Sport to watch or play | Soccer | Soccer & baseball |
| Mac or PC? | PC | PC |
| Coffee or Tea? | Coffee | Both |
| Eat in or Dine out? | Dine out | Dine out |
| Early Riser or Night Owl? | Early Riser | Both with a nap |
Best Wishes
We are eagerly and joyfully awaiting the day that we get to become parents. We realize that parenting is a big responsibility, and we want you to know that your child will be loved deeply.
We will not take this responsibility lightly and will strive to provide the best environment that we can for your child to flourish. We have a lot of love to give and can’t wait to shower your child with all the love we are capable of giving.
We acknowledge that this is such a hard decision, and we commit to pray that the God of all comfort would lead you, comfort you, and be near you throughout this process and throughout your life.
Thank you so much for considering us as parents for your child!
Ready to Contact Raquel & David
Drop us a line today!
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