Happy Belated Referral Day!

On June 24, 2005, Dave received a very important call from Children's Hope International (CHI), our adoption agency. We had been matched with an 11-month old girl named Qi Jia Yan! She was waiting for us in Qichun, China and was described as a "bright and lovely girl." CHI said that we could come to their Overland Park office to pick up a faxed copy of a photo of Jia Yan.

Dave and I dropped whatever we were doing at work and went to the agency. When they handed us the grainy faxed copy of the photo, we got the first glimpse of our beautiful girl. It was at that moment we knew that this little stranger was absolutely, 100% our daughter.

This special day is known as our "Referral Day." Each year we talk about the events of that day and then take a picture of Qi Jia Yan, now known as Lydia Ellise Jiayan, with the photo we received on her referral day - though we use the color copy we received by FedEx the next day! We were a little late in celebrating this year, but now the 2009 photos have been taken.

Here are Referral Day photos of our bright and lovely girl each of the three prior years.

2008

2007

2006

We marvel over how much Lydia - and our lives - have changed over the past four years. We never would have guessed that we'd be back in Asia living with our daughter. That June 24 phone call put us on a new and more interesting path. We wouldn't change a thing.