Happy Matchiversary

Exactly one year ago today, we received a call from Holt, our adoption agency. They told us that we had officially been matched with this little guy.

This picture just makes me chuckle now, because the little guy in this picture really looks nothing like the Jin-yeong we met just over 4 months later. We thought he was so cute, though, and loved the impish little smile on his face. We also found his fruity outfit quite endearing!!

We first saw this picture on Tuesday evening, June 22nd. I was lying in our bed, working on my laptop. At that time, we were in the Waiting Child Program and were actively scouring the photolisting on nearly an hourly basis. Even though it was 5pm in Oregon, where the main Holt office is located, I just happened to check the photolisting. Given the hour, I didn't really expect any new photos, but checked anyways. And saw this face. I remember quickly reading the little summary of his social and medical situation. I called Sheref in to look, and we immediately decided to call and request his file. I emailed, then also called, Oregon. I've forgotten whether the following happened that night or early the next morning, but suffice it to say we got his file, reviewed it, and called to tell Holt we wanted to proceed nearly immediately.

As part of his file, we also received these two photos:

And these...

About a month earlier, we had "gone to committee" for another little baby, and (obviously) not been chosen. Generally, even if only one family is interested in a particular child, that family still has to "go to committee." Going to committee is a cumbersome process and somewhat stressful, so we were not looking forward to doing it again. We were also nervous because we had no idea how many other families would be interested in Jin-yeong.

On Wednesday night, I emailed one of the Holt staffers about setting up a committee phone interview. I was hesitant to ask, but did anyways, how many families were also going to committee with us. Within about 10 minutes, she wrote back something to the effect of "You'll be happy to hear you are the only family going to committee." I remember yelling to Sheref, who was in the kitchen cooking dinner, that we were the only family. Although we certainly didn't want to get our hopes up, we knew that this almost for sure meant we'd be matched with him, but we still thought we'd have to do an official committee interview and wait for a committee meeting. The committee meetings occur only on Thursdays, so we assumed we would have to wait another week to find out if we were officially Jin-yeong's family.

On Friday morning the 25th of June, one of the Holt staffers called Sheref's cell phone and asked a few simple questions. She then said, "Well, that's all I need to know for the interview. You are Jin-yeong's family!" I was at work, staffing Labor & Delivery. I was sitting at the nurses' station. I checked my email and found an email from Sheref with the title "We have a son."

And that is our matchiversary story. Happy Matchiversary!