Family Life

Family is the center of everything for us. We value honesty, kindness, and showing up for the people we love, and we believe a home should be a soft place to land and a safe space for everyone in it – especially our future child.

Matt’s family is large and lives nearby in New Jersey — we can’t go to a family party with fewer than fifty people. Ciara’s parents and younger brother are in Ireland, so we travel to see them once or twice a year, and they come to us just as often. Between the two sides, our traditions are a happy mix: holidays split between both families, summers at the Jersey Shore, big birthday cookouts on the patio, sporting events, theme park trips, and pumpkin picking every fall. We have two nephews and one baby niece who cannot wait to be cousins.

We were both raised Catholic and plan to raise our child in the faith, including baptism and an active community, while also making sure they grow up understanding and respecting other beliefs. Adoption is already part of our extended family, and it’s spoken about with a lot of love and openness — which is part of why this path has always felt so natural to us.

We also have one very good dog: Dolly, a five-year-old labradoodle who is gentle, affectionate, and endlessly patient. She already thinks of herself as a big sister-in-waiting.

Lifestyle

We take road trips with the music up and no fixed plan, stopping at farm stands along the way. We go to concerts often, big shows and small outdoor festivals alike. We’re unapologetic foodies who will drive a long way for good pizza. We travel every chance we get, both within the States and internationally — Ireland to see Ciara’s family, along with Cape Town, Lima, and the Amalfi Coast, where we brought Matt’s parents along for their dream trip.

At home, Matt is the unofficial pitmaster of the family, smoking ribs on the patio on lazy weekends, and he’s a lifelong sports fan who also loves golf. Ciara is rarely without her Kindle, loves walking local trails, hosting, and baking, and grew up between the U.S. and Ireland, so she speaks Irish and can teach our child a few words of Gaeilge (the Irish language).

Our home is a four-bedroom, three-level house in the farmlands of New Jersey, with a cozy living room, a basement full of fun (including a pool table), and a deck and patio for entertaining. The yard is fenced in and just the right size for backyard games and for our child to run around. Our area is quiet and family-friendly, with highly-ranked schools, parks, farms, and green space — and we’re still only about an hour from New York City for a show or a concert. We don’t have the nursery decorated yet, and that’s on purpose: we’d love to know your favorite colors and animals so we can include them.

Adoption

We believe in open adoption, and we would love an ongoing relationship with you in whatever form feels right and comfortable.

We’re open to letters, photos and updates, emails and texts, phone or FaceTime calls, and in-person visits. We’re flexible on how often, and we’d rather build something that works for you than hand you a rigid schedule. You can tell us what you need, and we’ll follow your lead — including if that changes over time. Our commitment is that we’ll keep showing up consistently and honestly, and we’ll never treat contact as something to be earned or withdrawn.

We’ll talk about adoption with your child openly from the very start, as a normal and positive part of our family’s story. Ciara hopes to make a special handmade illustrated book telling your child’s story, including you, so they know their story from the earliest age. Your child will always know your story, and how loved they are by all of us.

We are open to adopting a child of any ethnic background, and we’ve thought carefully about what that responsibility means.

Ciara grew up between Ireland and the United States, so she knows first-hand what it is to carry more than one culture and to want both parts of yourself seen and celebrated. That experience shapes how we’d approach this. We wouldn’t treat our child’s heritage as something to mention occasionally — it would be woven into our everyday life: the food on our table, the holidays we mark, the books on our shelves, the music we listen to, and the art on our walls.

We would also make sure our child has people around them who share their background, not just us. That means choosing a diverse parish and schools, seeking out mentors and community groups, building friendships with families who look like our child, and learning the practical things well — including hair and skin care — rather than guessing. We’d take our lead from you as well, about what traditions, language, or family history you’d like us to pass on. Our child will grow up proud of where they come from, with the language for it and the confidence to talk to us about anything, including race and identity.