After a missed connection when meeting in high school, fate brought our paths back together again in California years later, where we became a couple. We celebrated our 5-year wedding anniversary in May 2024, and have been together since 2014.
Early in our relationship, we both expressed how important it was for us to, one day, parent a child. This shared calling made our love stronger, and together we mapped out our path to fatherhood through adoption.
It’s always been important for us to be near our families, so we moved back to NJ in 2019 buying our first home together in 2021. We quickly added Remy and Phoenix, our fur babies, to the mix and have been remodeling our home in hopes to continue to grow our family here.
As young gay men, we were both drawn to adoption as our first choice. We never considered other paths knowing there are birth parents looking for someone to love their child as much as they do.
About Matt
Job Description
Associate Marketing Director
Hobbies
Matt loves going to concerts and seeing Broadway shows. Working for a cleaning company, he does enjoy cleaning and organizing. He also enjoys lots of outdoor activities: travel, camping, hiking, snowboarding and gardening. As an active DIYer, Matt enjoys learning about ways to remodel our home. He always plays the cello and cherishes time with family and friends.
Fun Fact
Matt has a tattoo that says “Family first” and lives his life by that sentiment. He has 9 aunts, 10 uncles and 25 cousins (including many with kids). We see them all regularly and vacation with them often. As a family of DIYers, Matt and his brother spent hours and hours learning to remodel and landscape his new home!
Matt also loves a good road trip and has driven to all four corners of the continental U.S. – Maine, Key West, San Diego & Washington state. Matt has been to 42 states and drove cross-country twice.
About Steve
Job Description
Legal Aid Attorney
Hobbies
Being a fur baby Dad to our pup and kitty. Outdoor adventures including hiking, fishing, skiing. Being raised all over the world, Steve loves to explore new places with family, reading, art museums, learning new languages, cooking and entertaining.
Fun Fact
Steve grew up with a single mother in a trailer park, always with his nose in a book, studying all the way to Harvard. At 12 years old, his stepfather entered the family and Steve became an adoptee himself. After the positive impact of his stepfather, Steve sought to be adopted by him as an adult.
Steve is active and energetic about his education. He loves languages and grew up speaking Indonesian with his family. He speaks perfect Spanish, which he learned in school but also taught himself French, Turkish, and Hindi, spending summers in Turkey teaching kids English. After Harvard, Steve went to law school and uses his skills to help make people’s lives better.
Our Lives
Our typical days are filled with hard work, lots of laughter, love, and a hint of adventure. We have a large, two-story suburban home, a strong tribe of friends, and a big, loving family. We are both active and energetic, we love exploring Philadelphia and New York or taking the occasional road trip – heading to camp under the stars, or venturing off to see natural wonders, like Niagara falls, or Lady Gaga.
We share our home with Remy, our playful four-year-old dog, and Phoenix, our sweet orange cat. We cherish our quality time together. Matt, who works from home, enjoys gardening, DIY projects and decorating for the holidays. Steve, the resident chef, cooks up delicious dinners most nights. To relax, both of us love spending time in our beautiful backyard, which has fruit trees, a garden, and is very open and spacious – perfect for a treehouse!
Our Family
We have a big immediate and extended family. Between us, we have 8 siblings, 5 nephews, 1 niece and over 40 cousins. Family is everything to us. We were both raised by not only our parents, but also our loving aunts and uncles. We are extremely close with many of our cousins and often vacation with our parents and siblings. We live less than 30 mins from our parents, so we see them often and most of our siblings live less than an hour away.
Final Thoughts
There’s nothing we can say that would capture our gratitude and express how deeply appreciative we are to be on this journey. It would truly be a dream come true to be given the opportunity to become parents.
-Matt & Steve
English 
Spanish 
Chinese 
