Basic Info
Joey
Age: 30
Ethnicity: White
Religion: Agnostic
Raul
Age: 31
Ethnicity: Hispanic/Latino
Religion: Agnostic
Joey & Raul
Texas
Intro
About
Work & Education
Joey
Education: Bachelor of Science, Communication
Profession: Character Design / Illustrator
Raul
Education: Master of Science, Computer Science
Profession: Software Engineer
Post-Adoption Relationship
Open (Open to contact, phone calls, in person visits before adoption. Sharing photos and letters after placement. Visits at neutral location after adoption, etc.). If you want a more closed adoption, we would honor that request as well.
Semi Open (open to an in-person visit before adoption placement, phone, email, sharing pic/letters after placement
Environment
Country: USA
State: Texas
Parent Relationship: Married
Parent Neighborhood: Suburban
Parent Years Together: 1 to 5 years
Parent Residency: House
Parent Pets: 2 dogs, Franklin and Phoebe
Children At Home: No children
Sexual Orientation: Same-sex parents
Preferences for a child
Age: Newborn to 1 year of age
Gender: Either
Multiple Children: All
Race/Ethnicity: All
Special Needs: Open to discussion
Certification 
Gladney Center for Adoption verified this family completed an adoption homestudy including: background checks, character references, official interviews, required training, home inspection, financial review, etc. and are approved for adoption.
Our Family
Joey and Raul
Hello and Hola!
Our promise to you is that if you choose to place your child in our care, our love and support for them will know no bounds.
We feel so fortunate that you’ve taken a moment to learn a bit more about our growing family. However, before we get into ourselves, we want to acknowledge the journey you’ve taken to get to this booklet. We know that journey has likely been, at times, overwhelming and emotional, with complicated questions and daunting answers. We can’t even begin to imagine the whirlwind of emotions you must be feeling, but we have great empathy and are in awe of the strength it’s taken for you to walk this path thus far.
Our promise to you is that if you choose to place your child in our care, our love and support for them will know no bounds. They will be a part of a family that crosses two continents, will cheer them on during the good and the bad, and is unwaveringly devoted to love for each other...
We feel so fortunate that you’ve taken a moment to learn a bit more about our growing family. However, before we get into ourselves, we want to acknowledge the journey you’ve taken to get to this booklet. We know that journey has likely been, at times, overwhelming and emotional, with complicated questions and daunting answers. We can’t even begin to imagine the whirlwind of emotions you must be feeling, but we have great empathy and are in awe of the strength it’s taken for you to walk this path thus far.
Our promise to you is that if you choose to place your child in our care, our love and support for them will know no bounds. They will be a part of a family that crosses two continents, will cheer them on during the good and the bad, and is unwaveringly devoted to love for each other. But, most of all, they’ll be part of a family that was built on warmth, empathy, support, and camaraderie. They will know of the great path that led them to us and the incredible people who made that possible.
Our Why
We feel that family does not stop at blood and is made up of the community and people around us.
Our Family!
We’ve been so excited to embark on this adoption journey! Ever since we began talking about expanding our family, adoption has been the primary topic of conversation. We feel so grateful for the opportunities we’ve been granted in life and we want to be able to share those opportunities with others.
We feel that family does not stop at blood and is made up of the community and people around us. Adoption, for us, is an extension of that belief and a meaningful way to grow our family.
We can’t wait to get started!
We feel that family does not stop at blood and is made up of the community and people around us. Adoption, for us, is an extension of that belief and a meaningful way to grow our family.
We can’t wait to get started!
Our Story
When we first met, we were assigned the same work team.
We love to travel
No one would’ve expected us to find each other in 2020, during COVID lockdown, living in two different cities. Yet, destiny prevailed and, through a chance placement at work, we both discovered our soulmates.
When we first met, we were assigned the same work team. We kept the conversation light and casual but got to know each other all the same. Raul liked superheroes and GIFS, Joey did too. After a few months of get-to-know-you chats, Joey left the team and an opportunity opened for a first date.
A first date (in which Raul commuted 2 hours!) turned into a second, into a third, and eventually into a serious relationship. We made each other laugh, there was an immediate sense of trust, conversation flowed easily and intensely, and it was so clear we were both bursting with happiness. The common relationship tests of vacations, extended family meetups, and moments of insecurities where one of us needed to lean on the other, all passed exceedingly well.
We lived together for 6 months before Raul had to move to Canada for work. Long distance, while challenging, proved to only strengthen our relationship - creating opportunities for travel, long phone calls before bed, and a chance to define our relationship by our feelings instead of proximity.
When he moved back to the US, we cemented our relationship with an engagement in 2023 and a wedding in 2024. Throughout all that time, we talked about how we wanted our future to look - two kids, two dogs, with a big house and a garden. What defined our relationship in the beginning still defines our relationship now - we both hold great respect for the other, have similar views of the world, and our interests, anxieties, hobbies, and hopes are complimentarily aligned. The spark that convinced Raul to commute 2 hours for a first date, that kept our relationship strong when it was separated by a country border, and that led us to marriage and a family, is still bright today. Our story is just beginning and adoption is the next chapter for us...
When we first met, we were assigned the same work team. We kept the conversation light and casual but got to know each other all the same. Raul liked superheroes and GIFS, Joey did too. After a few months of get-to-know-you chats, Joey left the team and an opportunity opened for a first date.
A first date (in which Raul commuted 2 hours!) turned into a second, into a third, and eventually into a serious relationship. We made each other laugh, there was an immediate sense of trust, conversation flowed easily and intensely, and it was so clear we were both bursting with happiness. The common relationship tests of vacations, extended family meetups, and moments of insecurities where one of us needed to lean on the other, all passed exceedingly well.
We lived together for 6 months before Raul had to move to Canada for work. Long distance, while challenging, proved to only strengthen our relationship - creating opportunities for travel, long phone calls before bed, and a chance to define our relationship by our feelings instead of proximity.
When he moved back to the US, we cemented our relationship with an engagement in 2023 and a wedding in 2024. Throughout all that time, we talked about how we wanted our future to look - two kids, two dogs, with a big house and a garden. What defined our relationship in the beginning still defines our relationship now - we both hold great respect for the other, have similar views of the world, and our interests, anxieties, hobbies, and hopes are complimentarily aligned. The spark that convinced Raul to commute 2 hours for a first date, that kept our relationship strong when it was separated by a country border, and that led us to marriage and a family, is still bright today. Our story is just beginning and adoption is the next chapter for us...
Our Promise
Our home will be goofy, educational, affectionate, and inviting. But most of all, our home will be a safe space for our children to grow up and explore the world.
With Love, Joey & Raul
We hope this book offers a glimpse into our family, but we know that reading a few paragraphs from a book only scratches the surface of getting to know who we are as people and parents. There is not enough room to fully express how much love we have for a child placed into our care, but we’re not sure there will ever be enough pages to satisfy that.
Our promise to you and to our future family is that we will always act out of love, respect, support, and the best interest of our children. There will be moments of mistakes and frustration, but mostly warmth, understanding, and learning. Our family will travel the world, be immersed in Spanish and American culture, and stand hand-in-hand during the good times and the bad.
We promise to celebrate adoption in our home and the people who placed children in our care. We’d love to keep you up-to-date on all the milestones along the way and are open to exploring that relationship further.
Our home will be goofy, educational, affectionate, and inviting. But most of all, our home will be a safe space for our children to grow up and explore the world.
Our promise to you and to our future family is that we will always act out of love, respect, support, and the best interest of our children. There will be moments of mistakes and frustration, but mostly warmth, understanding, and learning. Our family will travel the world, be immersed in Spanish and American culture, and stand hand-in-hand during the good times and the bad.
We promise to celebrate adoption in our home and the people who placed children in our care. We’d love to keep you up-to-date on all the milestones along the way and are open to exploring that relationship further.
Our home will be goofy, educational, affectionate, and inviting. But most of all, our home will be a safe space for our children to grow up and explore the world.
Post-Adoption Relationship
Open (Open to contact, phone calls, in person visits before adoption. Sharing photos and letters after placement. Visits at neutral location after adoption, etc.). If you want a more closed adoption, we would honor that request as well.
Semi Open (open to an in-person visit before adoption placement, phone, email, sharing pic/letters after placement
Certification
Gladney Center for Adoption verified this family completed an adoption home study including: background checks, character references, official interviews, required training, home inspection, financial review, etc. and are approved for adoption.
Posts
Our Adventures
We love to travel and our goal is to take our kids to as many places as we’ve been - all the Disneys, Europe, Asia, beaches, lakes, and ski resorts. If there’s a post card, we want to go, bring the family, and have an adventure. Outside the house, we’re big fans of discovering interesting food (our most recent find is shabu-shabu), walking around downtown settings, and finding spots/activities where we can embrace our inner child. Inside the house, we love playing games, cooking, baking, and reading. Our house not only includes multiple Nintendo game consoles, Xboxes, and Playstations, but also an entire closet filled with board and card games. Playing together is a key tenet in our family and we’ve set up our house to foster this type of activity. As we mentioned, we’ve built a library in our house, and the shelves include books for all ages. We have a hefty Dr. Seuss collection, over a hundred comic books, novels ranging from classic mythology to soapy mystery, and everything in-between. We like to consider ourselves well-rounded and, through our adventures outside and inside the house, we intend to share multiple cultures, experiences, and memories with our children. Our growing family will continue to reach past the borders of our home to see places and meet people from all walks of life.
Our Traditions
The fall and winter are our favorite times of year because for four months, our favorite holidays are back-to-back. We go all-out for Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Día de Los Reyes. From elaborate costumes, to family vacations, to specially baked cookies and cakes - we make it a point to celebrate these holidays as a family every year. Joey bakes apple and pumpkin pies and Raul has made it his goal to grow the fruit that we use for them. In addition to the holidays, we have introduced more low-key traditions like daily neighborhood walks, weekly game nights, and monthly family cookouts. When we have kids, we plan to build more traditions around whichever hobbies they are most passionate about - whether that be sports, arts, or something entirely new.
La Familia De Raul
Raul’s family lives in a small city in Spain, but we’re no less close to them. We’ve bridged the gap with video chats, messages, and yearly trips to Europe. We intend to raise our children bilingual so they can have close relationships with both sides of their family. Raul’s parents are divorced but live close to each other to be near their extended families. Their family line extends back generations in the same city. His dad owns an entire apartment building and a beach house, which he always opens up to us when we visit. Likewise, his mom always welcomes us to her apartment, located down the street from the city’s famous town center park. Along with his parents, their city is home to Raul’s sister, brother, cousins, grandparents, aunts, and uncles. It’s a slice of familial paradise, nestled in the mountains of Northern Spain.
Joey’s family
We live within 30 minutes from every single member of Joey’s immediate and (mostly) extended family. This makes family get-togethers easy and often. Joey’s parents own three homes - one nearby, one on a nearby lake, and a condo in a Colorado ski resort. From boating to skiing, they love to have the entire family over for fun adventures, all-you-can-eat dinner parties, and extended family reunions. Joey’s sister and brother-in-law currently have two kids and are embarking on their own adventure of adopting more. Between grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins, and second cousins, this tight-knit group has already shown that they’re ready to shower any new member with love and support.
Frank & Phoebe
Frank is an almost-senior Chihuahua-mix, rescued by Joey back in 2017 from a shelter in New York City. His favorite pastime is sleeping and his special talent is being able to wrap himself in a blanket all by himself. Phoebe is a Retriever-mix who just left her puppy stage. She was rescued by both of us from a shelter in Texas in 2023. She is never without a ball in her mouth and is always down to cuddle, snuggle, and play. They’re nearly inseparable and we could not be happier that they’ve become a bonded pair. They’re very rarely never by our side, going on adventures with us to the city, and our parents’ lake house, and Frank has even flown with us. We’re excited for them to become fur-siblings to our growing family.
Welcome Home
We’ve recently moved into a newly built two-floor home. The house has 4 bedrooms, an office/art studio, a library, a large kitchen space meant for entertaining, a game room upstairs, and a family room downstairs. We are absolutely obsessed with both our library and our huge backyard. When we moved into our home, we decided that instead of a formal dining room, we’d convert the space into a dedicated reading area. We’ve built out the room to have floor-to-ceiling bookcases, really comfortable chairs to curl up in, and a spot for us to kick up our feet and dive into a really good book. We believe reading is essential to keeping our brains sharp and our library provides the perfect alcove for such an activity. Our backyard was another feature that sold us on the house. As we mentioned, Raul is an avid gardener so we created a space where he is able to grow a variety of fruits, flowers, and vegetables. We’ve grown watermelon, plums, cucumbers, and a ton of potatoes. If we had another four pages of this booklet we could list everything we’ve grown. Even with all the gardening beds, we’ve found more than enough room to run around with the dogs, set up a small fire-pit, and enjoy the freedom of an open yard. Our neighborhood is founded on former farmland in a quiet, young community. We live down the street from a brand-new elementary school, two parks with sports courts and playgrounds, and a large pool. A 2.5-mile walking path (Frank and Phoebe’s favorite walk) winds its way around the neighborhood. We’ve noticed a ton of kids in the neighborhood and, with all the activities we see going on on the weekends, we are confident our children will be able to make friends quickly. A little further up the road (not even 20 minutes away!), we live near a new kid-friendly theme park which we’re excited to bring our new family to regularly. Coming from Spain, Raul always says that this neighborhood is exactly like he imagined American suburbia - comfortable, friendly, and a great space to raise a family.
Fun Facts about Raul
- Raul has lived in three different countries -Spain, Canada, and the United States - As a prize for graduating top of his University, he met and shook hands with the King and Queen of Spain - He finished first in his work group’s 5k run, ran a Tough Mudder, and got his green belt in karate - He built a video game from scratch
Meet Raul by Joey
He’s goofy, he’s incredibly caring, and (for some reason) he loves blue cheese on pizza. Those are three things you should know about Raul right up front. Other things you should know about Raul are that he’s originally from Spain, he came to the US to get his Masters Degree in Computer Engineering, and he stayed because he got hired at one of the top tech companies in the country. It’s at that company that I met Raul and we began our relationship back In 2020. I was immediately drawn in by his quick wit, his emotional openness, and the love he had for really “dorky” hobbies. He’s a big comic-book reader and a green-thumb (we currently have 8 fruit/vegetable gardens in our backyard). Over the past number of years, I’ve learned so much more about Raul and my growing love for him seems near-infinite. When you first meet him, he’s reserved and may stand to the side to let the louder people talk, but, once he gets to know you, he opens up as the jokey, sarcastic, playful one of the group. He loves to quote his favorite show Friends and is constantly slipping in references to memes and Internet humor. He has a special super power for making me and those around him laugh until our sides hurt. Even though Raul is now based in the US, his family still lives in Spain. Every year we go to Europe to see them and immerse ourselves completely in his culture for a week. In the meantime, we are constantly connecting with them through WhatsApp, video chats, and social media. While in the States, Raul has taken on the role of “the fun uncle” and can often be found playing games, running around, and goofing off with our niece and nephew. He loves being with family. I believe Raul is going to make a wonderful father because he has all the right ingredients: compassion, intelligence, empathy, endless energy, humor, and blue cheese.
Fun Facts About Joey
- Joey was a child actor on a popular TV show for three seasons - In the past, he’s worked for The Jonas Brothers, Demi Lovato, and Bravo TV. Now he’s a freelance character designer / illustrator - He lived in Prague for six months - He’s written two books (currently unpublished!) and multiple articles for gaming sites
Meet Joey by Raul
The first thing you might notice when you meet Joey is how easygoing and welcoming he is. Even though he defines himself as an “extroverted introvert,” he’s really skilled at striking up a conversation with new people and putting everyone at ease. He’s truly the most caring and thoughtful person I’ve ever met. For example, when we first started to get to know each other, I mentioned that Toy Story 3 was my favorite movie. That Christmas, he secretly tracked down, purchased, and gifted me a book about the art and making of Toy Story 3, which was out of print and not for sale anymore. It showed me just how far he’d go to make someone else happy. He has great emotional intelligence, always able to tell how other people feel and having thoughtful conversations about it. However, he’s also a kid at heart. From his deep passion about all things animation, knowing all the behind-the-scenes details of any Disney movie and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle (his fav is Donatello, of course!), to a really big collection of games, he shares his passions with others. This makes him one of the most fun people ever (especially to his niece and nephew)! Joey will be an amazing father. In addition to everything already mentioned, he makes THE BEST homemade pizza. Seriously. Secondly, he makes any place feel like home - nice, cozy, and celebratory. As I’m writing this, he’s already getting out all of the Halloween decorations to put us in the spooky, cozy fall mood. And wait until Christmas comes around! Not only is he great around kids, he’s also really into the science and facts about everything: from when and how to train our dogs, learning the right moment to start tummy time for a new baby, to the best toys for each stage of developmental growth. He’s incredibly invested in the people around him, endlessly caring, and the most loving person I could ask for!