We make a pretty good team
Battling infertility has shown us just how committed we are to each other and our shared goals. We met in Toronto in 2010 at a French class near the home where we now live. When we started dating, we discovered that we had both lived in East Asia and Germany and we tended to get pretty absorbed in debates about how to make our communities happier and healthier. We still debate this same topic a lot today! We got married in 2013 and started trying to have kids right away. While fertility work has taken up a lot of our time, we have still managed to each go back to school, take on challenging and fulfilling jobs, and go on some great camping trips. In a regular week, what we enjoy most is cooking and eating together, playing board games, walking our dog Kimchi, and having friends over. After the Raptors won last year, we’ve been watching a lot more basketball, too! You can learn more about each of us in the Bios section.
Although we have lots of fun together, it’s our values that make the foundation of our relationship. We value participating generously in our communities, we value environmental sustainability and we value treating everyone we live with, work with or meet with compassion. We don’t always live out our values perfectly, but we keep trying. We have a family motto: “Compassion, Service, Delight”. Compassion refers to how we want to treat ourselves and others, Service expresses our motivation to contribute positively to our communities, and Delight reminds us to take pleasure in the small miracles around us every day.
We are part of a big family and community
As much as having children is a big dream for the two of us, we also have a big supportive, loving family who have been along for the roller-coaster ride. We are both very close with our loving, supportive families. A big part of our dream is to be able to raise our kids surrounded by the love and support we've enjoyed from a large extended family and community of friends. We're also pretty sure that Kimchi pup would love siblings. There is no doubt about it: these kids would be loved!!
We have close relationships with Eric's siblings and their families and cherish our relationship with Eric's parents.
A bit about Jia
Jia was born in China and she and her parents moved to Germany when she was six. She has many fond childhood memories of eating German treats and running around with her friends in the forest behind their home. When she was thirteen, Jia and her parents arrived in Canada and she set about learning how to swim in another new culture, which included learning English from watching Full House and the Golden Girls! These cultural experiences shaped Jia’s natural instincts to appreciate and get along with all kinds of different people. They also informed her choice to work in the social development sector for almost a decade in communities all over the world before she focused on similar work in Toronto. Jia holds a Masters of Landscape Architecture, her favourite ice cream flavour is caramelized banana, and at least once a day she tells our dog Kimchi that she loves her “soooo much!”
A bit about Eric
Eric grew up in Waterloo, Ontario with his parents and brother and sister. He has many fond childhood memories of climbing around his treehouse (in a real tree!) and mountain biking around the local landfill and ski hill. At a young age, Eric took up his father’s bad habit of reading and complaining about the news, and the internet has only made his habit worse. It also feeds his useless ability to remember stats like the number of people who fall off ladders or the number of words in the English language. Eric spent a lot of his summers at summer camp, or camping with his family, and these experiences fostered in him a strong interest in environmental sustainability, which has influenced his career choices. Eric holds a Masters of Public Policy, his favourite ice cream flavour is Earl Grey and one of his favourite albums is U2’s Joshua Tree.
Kimchi the dog
By all accounts, Kimchi leads a double life. She'd like you to believe that she's a timid, mild-mannered old soul who is scared of corners, always says please by sitting patiently, falls asleep on your lap and dozes away the day nestled deep in the couch. But when the chance to party comes knocking, Kimchi jumps at it. Literally. She jumps up to greet guests, she jumps straight up and down in the backyard to convince the neighbour to visit with treats, and when she's hanging out with pals at the dog park, she'll jump a five-foot fence to see what's happening on the other side.
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She's a totally lovely goof who loves people, kids, other dogs, and hiking. Kimchi holds a certificate in Foundational Obedience Skills, her favourite ice cream flavour is fish, and for some weird reason she loves putting her face in your feet while you're putting your socks on in the morning.
