Dear Expectant Mama,

My husband and I want you to know a little about who we are, and how we would treat your precious child. One thing we know, is we cannot imagine being in your shoes. While you are contemplating such heavy decisions with unimaginable emotion…we sit on the ‘outside' of that experience. We have been waiting and praying for a God to bring us the child or children meant for us for many years. We know you may have many decisions coming in the next few months, we want you to know we are praying for you and your family that whatever decision you make will be made with complete peace in your heart. We cannot imagine all that weighs on your mind, but we want you to know that if you do choose us, we would be beyond thrilled to give your child all the love we have! We have been praying for and about this moment for more than 14 years, so we are ready if you are!

About Us

My name is Deanna, and I am 45 years old and currently a “stay at home” foster mama. My husband’s name is Antonio. He works for a major technology company and is 40 years old. We are currently foster parents and have been fostering for the last 5 plus years.

We had hoped to one day adopt through foster care, but all of the children placed with us (7 total) have been reunified with their birth families. Which is the happy ending that foster care aims for! We are an interracial couple, myself being Caucasian and my husband being Afro-Cuban. We met online in 2007 and my husband immigrated here from Cuba in 2011 which is when we got married. We just celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary this past January.

While we don’t have any children with us permanently at this time, we frequently have a former placement with us for several months at a time. We had her from birth to 17 months and ever since she reunified, she has returned to us every couple of weeks due to the good relationship we have with her birth family. She is now almost 5 years old and has always considered us her mama and daddy so she now has 2 families that love on her. And even though she is not with us permanently, she is super excited to be a “big sister” when the time arrives.

We live about 45 minutes north of Los Angeles in a beautiful suburb that offers lots of family friendly activities, recreational parks and beaches not more than 20 minutes from us. We have 3 little rescue dogs of mixed heritage that love on all the babies that have come through our doors. I am originally from Ohio and moved to California permanently in 2004. Since my husband and I are neither from the area, we don’t really have family around us, but we have an incredible group of friends that we call our “Village”. Our friends are from different races, religions and backgrounds, but the common thing we have is a love, friendship and respect for one another. I think it’s a gift to be able to provide our future children with such a variety of loving relationships!

In our household, we speak predominantly English, but my husband is also fluent in Spanish and Portuguese. His family is mainly back in Havana, Cuba, so we would love our children to grow up bilingual so that they can communicate with ALL of their family, both stateside and abroad. We are Christian and attend an incredible non-denominational church about 10 minutes from our house. They have been such an incredible support for us through our foster care journey and just a loving ‘family’ for us no matter what! We believe that God has the children that are meant to be ours out there somewhere, and at just the right time, He will lead them home to us!

To us, love is what makes a family! We very much look forward to meeting you and if you choose, making you a part of our family as well! We want to follow your lead on how you would choose to have an ongoing relationship. We hope you know that no matter what, you are in our prayers and we hope for all good things for you and your loved ones!

Many Blessings,

Deanna and Antonio