Welcome! Meet:

Greg + Asha

Director at an Academy/Writer / Community Development/Home Educator

Colorado

Caucasian

Christian

All About Greg & Asha
Video
Why Adoption?
Gallery
Family and Home
How We Met
Advice to Future Child
Perspectives on Open Adoption
Favorites

All About Greg & Asha

Hi! Our names are Greg and Asha and we want to say how courageous you are for considering adoption for your child. Your child is precious, and we can’t think of a greater blessing than to be entrusted with raising and loving this child.

We are a family that loves to have fun and laugh. We love to do most things together, from reading great stories aloud to going on family hikes to finding new adventures in old places! We love to explore the many mountains near our house, go camping, share meals with friends, play soccer, play games, run and travel. We have two boys, ages 7 and 5. The boys play on soccer teams, which Greg coaches. One of the joys Greg has had as he has coached several successive seasons is seeing how young kids develop, grow, and deepen friendships over the seasons. Asha plays the flute and our children have started learning the violin and ukulele, so we’re working on starting a family band. Asha loves to cook and bake, and our children enjoy helping out, particularly licking spoons and sprinkling sugar. Greg teaches at a university and directs a center, and Asha now works from home primarily schooling our sons. In this season we love the flexibility that homeschooling provides, especially giving us the option to travel and see in person what we are learning. We love international travel, and our most recent trip to Scotland and England has provided much fodder for imagining ourselves as knights facing dragons in deep lochs. Oh, and we have a little squire, our golden retriever puppy named “Charlie”. We believe traveling abroad is a great experience for our children and we delight in seeing new places through young eyes. Our hearts long for our family to grow, to welcome another little knight or princess to share in the adventure of love and life.

We have had three miscarriages in the past three years, and though this has been very difficult it has given us great assurance that this is the time that is right for adoption. Adoption has been a shared vision of ours since we married, and now we are firmly and deeply rooted in our city and surrounded by an amazing community of friends, many of whom have also adopted, so the time feels right. We don’t yet know your story, but we would love the opportunity to build a relationship with you and to share hospitality together. That being said, we will respect your preferences in communication and visits. We pray that God will give you wisdom and comfort, speak to your heart, and grant you peace as you consider this decision.

Why Adoption?

Adoption has been a shared family dream of ours since we married in 2014. We both believe, as laid out in Psalm 127, that children are a blessing from the Lord and “blessed is the person whose quiver is full of them.” We desire a family of adopted and biological children who live, laugh, and love together. Our two sons are eager to be big brothers. We know they will be fiercely loyal and protective and that this little child will grow up with two brothers who will always be in his or her corner.

Our own stories have pointed us to see the beauty of adoption. Asha grew up not knowing her biological father and was adopted by her dad when she was 18. That process, both the ten years of knowing her adoptive dad that led up to adoption, and the more than two decades since, has shaped her life greatly. Greg grew up in a single parent household and has known both the brokenness of family and the deep joy of redemption.

We love our family, but our family doesn’t yet feel complete. We are a puzzle missing a piece. We long to welcome another little soul into our family.

Family & Home

Our home is much more than the walls around it. It is a place of welcome, of homemade chicken soup and hot cocoa on a snowy day, of kisses for skinned knees, of morning snuggles, of jokes and squeals and lots of stories. Sometimes our sweet dog barks to sound an alarm that a deer or wild turkey is outside. Sometimes we’re cheering loudly for a sporting event. We’re always singing and praying and thanking God for another day of life that He has given us.

We live in a 5 bedroom, 4 bath, 3-floor single family home near the mountains. We know several of our neighbors and have neighborhood gatherings for the holidays. Our community stretches across our city and the country. In our city, we walk closely with several families in a life group at our church. We are also part of an arts guild with monthly events, a wonderful homeschool coop, and a forest school enrichment program. We also have a very close group of friends that is scattered across the country but with whom we have shared life for over a decade. Their children are like cousins to ours.

Greg’s mom and step dad are bee keepers in upstate New York. Greg’s dad and step mom live in Nebraska. Asha’s parents and four adult siblings live with their families in Florida. We love to get the whole family, both sides, together as often as we can, most recently we gathered at the South Carolina coast for Christmas. Our children love when their aunts and uncles visit, which they do quite often. Even more often is “Grandma camp”, when Greg’s mom and Asha’s mom fly in at the same time to enjoy activities with the boys. We are blessed with a rich community, precious family and friends who are like family.

How others describe me

Asha describing Greg:

From the first moments of my very first conversation with Greg, I knew that he was mature, intentional, compassionate, and had an incredible way of making the persona he was talking with feel known, understood, heard and valued. Now, after 9 years of marriage and observing Greg in countless social situations, and especially with our sons, I know this to be truer than I thought.

Greg is a wise and faithful shepherd, and his emotional intelligence and thoughtful love for his neighbor has blessed our family. We are rich in friends and have a deep community across the country and world, and I attribute this in great part to Greg’s character and personality. Above all, Greg is a humble man who passionately fears and adores the Lord. He rises early to meet with God in prayer, and one of Greg’s greatest desires is to hear the voice of God and to walk with him as a son and friend.

Greg loves reading Bible stories with our children and teaching them the way that leads to life. His words hold great weight, at home and in the community, and when he speaks people listen. Greg is deeply devoted as a husband and father. He studies us and things about each of our needs continually and does everything he can to meet them. Greg has an incredible focus and discipline in his work, he is renowned as an expert in his field, and he is diligent and creative.

Even when Greg feels work pressures, he’s always ready to play with our boys and to hug this mama - he brings so much joy, fun and laughter to our days. Greg spends hours sharing his love of stories with our children, reading living books and telling fabulous bedtime stories. I love the vision Greg pursues for our family and his desire to shepherd and care for more children. Oh, and his smile melts my heart!

Greg describing Asha:

I am amazed and astonished by Asha on a daily basis. She has a radiant smile, exhibits grace and charm under pressure, and loves all her children deeply and truly. Asha has a joyful heart and is constantly making new friends, which has enriched our family tremendously.

I’ve heard the story that when Asha was in first grade one of her teachers asked the class to write down something they were good at. Asha wrote: “I am good at holding babies.” That is true, and not just holding the baby, but loving the child in her arms.

When I first met Asha I was attracted to her smile, her laugh, and her looks. But over the next few weeks and months I quickly came to realize that her personality and her character were even more beautiful than the package in which they came. I have seen her care for sick children, cuddle kids with hurst and scrapes, teach our children to laugh and play. Asha constantly gives of herself, pouring out into the life of our children, shaping them and growing them and teaching them. She is a wonderful wife and an incredible mother. I see it now, and I know one day our children will realize how fortunate and blessed they are to have experienced their mother’s love.

How We Met

“We met halfway up the steps of Grand Central Station in New York City.” Well, we had been at an event together a few weeks prior but didn’t actually meet then (though we have a picture to prove it!). Sometimes timing is everything. After the event, both of us decided to join an online dating site, and then Asha saw a picture of her boss on Greg’s profile! She was so curious, so she initiated communication. After a few weeks of emailing, we wanted to meet. Greg, living in Brooklyn at the time, decided that halfway up the steps at the train station would make it easier for Asha to find him. He continues to be thoughtful like that. Our first date lasted 11 hours. Three days later we had our second date. We lived about 4 hours apart at the time, and after a few months it became increasingly clear to both of us that we were made to partner together in this life.

From the outside, this is always obvious. Asha is an exuberant extrovert, who likes nothing better than meeting and making new friends. Greg is as introverted as Asha is extroverted, and loves long lingering mornings reading in bed with coffee. What we realized, fairly quickly, is that below these surface differences, we are actually very similar. The same foundation exists within us both. We love and prioritize our family and our faith, we are loyal, both to one another and to Christ and, we have a shared vision of the path that we want to walk in this world. Five days after our wedding in 2014, that path took us to Istanbul, Turkey, where we lived for our first year of marriage before returning to Princeton, where Greg finished his PhD. One of the things that we have seen in our nine years of marriage is that by knowing one another we are able to see the world as the other sees and understands it. Greg can be in a situation and know what Asha would say or how she would react, and vice versa. This experience of seeing the world through the others’ eyes has been an unexpected and rich blessing in our marriage.

Advice to Future Child

You are dearly loved, more than you’ll ever fathom.

Perspectives on Open Adoption

We honor this child’s first family and the connection they will forever have with each other. That is a very important bond, and one we celebrate. In our experience, children thrive when they are in a supportive environment where they can know and be known. We very much desire to do all that we can to foster the relationship between our families, and especially to share stories and milestones and hopefully laughter. But we also want to respect the needs and wishes of the birth family in all seasons, and we will be sensitive to their preferences in our communication.

Favorites

Greg

Favorite Movie: Casablanca
Favorite Holiday/Tradition: celebrating the 12 Days of Christmas by feasting with friends and family
Hobbies/Interests: running, reading and time with my family
Dream Vacation: Santorini, Greece with my wife and a few good books
If I Could Choose a Superpower: ability to freeze time

Asha

Favorite Movie: Meet Me in St. Louis
Favorite Holiday/Tradition: So many fun ones for Christmastime! Going to the North Pole (a sweet Christmas themed amusement park) with our children. Gathering with both sides of our family in a big beach house on the Carolina coast. The Icelandic Christmas tradition of Jolabokaflod- a Yuletide “book flood” where we make a big pot of hot chocolate, sit by the fire and the sparkling lights of the tree, and read together. We get the kids special books each year that they can enjoy reading.
Hobbies/Interests: time with friends, playing my flute, cooking, art and design
Dream Vacation: gourmet cooking and adventuring in Italy
If I Could Choose a Superpower: teleporting to see friends