Our Families.

James comes from a blended family, a Brady Bunch type situation.  He grew up on Long Island near the beach.  Swimming and the ocean was always a big part of his life - he spent the summers working as a lifeguard at the beach and was on the swim team through college.   His mom Rita and Stepdad Frank have 7 kids together - Frank’s kids are Lara, Jen, Frankie, Sharon, and Rita’s other kids are Doug and Alexis. 
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They grew up together in the same house and are lucky, because they loved each other, and grew very close after all moving into the same house, even if Sharon’s bedroom was a hallway.  Rita worked at a doctor’s office, and Frank worked as a construction engineer.  

 

We came together every night for dinner, learned what it meant to work hard and provide for your family from watching our parents, and the house was always full of laughter.  We hope to create the same vibes in our home as parents.

 

  James’s parents and siblings are all still very close with each other today. He’d never even distinguish who is a step vs blood sibling because to him, they’re one family.  

 

Lara, Jen, Sharon and Doug are married with kids ranging from the ages of infancy to 14, so if you were to help us become parents, your child would have a lot of cousins ready to play with. 

 

All of James’s family, except for Doug (his job has him living overseas), still live out in Long Island a short drive away, and they spend lots of time together - nieces and nephews birthday parties at each others’ houses, holidays together, beach days in the summer. 

 

James’s family is a huge, loving support system that is already raising our nieces and nephews together as one, and they’d be there for James + Keith too.  Sharon likes to say “you guys are meant to be parents.”