Brianna & Clark

It’s our honor to invite you into our story and to be invited into yours. We recognize you’ve walked a difficult road to get to where you are, and we thank you for taking this journey. We believe you are precious. We believe you are priceless. We believe you are made in the image of God, and you are loved. We believe the same about your child. We believe everything happens for a reason, and it is not a coincidence our paths have crossed in this way. We’ve walked our own road of hardship, probably very different from yours. Ours includes heartache from infertility, miscarriage, and the loss of family members dear to us. We’ve felt the lowest of lows in our own way, but we also recognize that the greatest joys in life cannot be experienced unless one also knows the feeling of deep tragedy. As we look toward bringing a child into our home (hopefully your child), we know our hearts are able to experience the strongest degrees of joy because of the road we’ve walked. We also know you have the capacity to feel that joy too. Maybe not now, maybe not tomorrow, but we pray you will experience it in the not-too-distant future.

It was a dark and stormy night…just kidding! It was a perfectly normal Sunday afternoon about nine years ago. Brianna was working at our church as a preschool teacher, and Clark was visiting a worship service with his brother and sister-in-law. Clark had just moved to our city a few months before and was trying out new churches. Brianna was attending the evening service of the church since she had worked in the preschool that morning. Clark and Brianna started talking and hit it off! Clark talked about his college summers as a youth ministry intern, and Brianna’s heart was doing jumping jacks on the inside. (A guy with a ministry heart is hard to find!) Our first date was at a Red Robin on a Sunday after church several weeks later. We had both been in relationships before and were intentional about discussing important issues early on in our relationship. After four months of dating, Clark proposed two days before Brianna’s birthday on a paddle boat in her favorite park. Brianna was so surprised that she hesitated in responding…so much that the paddle boat floated towards the geyser in the middle of the pond and we both got wet! The first person we shared the good news with was the paddle boat attendant on the dock! Eight months later, we were married on a beautiful October day with friends and family surrounding. Since that day, our relationship has been characterized by fun, spontaneity, adventure, and love. We enjoy just spending time on the couch together as well as taking impromptu road trips across the United States. We talk about everything, enjoy being silly together, and are truly each other’s best friend.