We met through mutual friends months before we started talking romantically. He moved away to Chicago and I stayed in Denton. We started messaging each other regularly and after a few months, we both knew we were in love (which was complicated for MANY reasons, but we don't have to get into all that on the damn wedding website).

I bought a ticket to Chicago that I couldn't afford, and we had the best meet cute kiss in an airport anyone could ever ask for. He asked me immediately to be his girlfriend and I gladly accepted. We proceeded to have the best five days, filled with Trader Joe's (my first time in a Trader Joe's), museums, city transportation and obnoxiously staring into each others eyes lovingly.

Leaving Chicago after meeting the love of your life in the flesh was difficult, but what followed was a dedicated long distance relationship. Many dropped phone calls (Chicago is so cold that Bens phone would actually freeze to death), coordinated movie dates ("ok press play.... NOW. Shit. Ok now! I don't think we're synced up... what's your time stamp????) and video calls with terrible internet connection (my fault) later, I asked him to move in with me. He agreed happily, and after 8 months of long distance relationship, we finally were together.

The next six years of our lives was filled with trips to the State Fair of Texas, Covid, roommates, shitty rentals and a lot of love.

During Covid, I lost my job and got to play housewife for a few months. We celebrated his birthday that year with a State Fair themed party that to this day has topped anything I've ever planned... ever.

We both had some major life events, with Ben supporting me through terrible workplaces, my mental health journey and my mothers tragic passing, and with me supporting him through surgeries, illness, and one really dumb lay off. All the while, we managed to listen, to provide for and to love each other.

When my mother died, Ben lifted me up and carried me through life until I found my feet again. I had known that I wanted to marry him for awhile, but after that, I was truly certain. My parents never really commented on my love life, but I remember telling my dad (who lives overseas) about how Ben was caring for me, and he said something along the lines of "We approve." Having my dad agree that Ben was right for me was monumental. I knew and he knew that we should lock it in.

October 2023, we went to our yearly State Fair trip. This year was going to be full of great fair food and..... Why was Ben carrying around a backpack? He didn't give me a chance to look inside and was being so gentle with it I truly thought there might be a puppy inside. After walking and eating.... and eating... and walking some more, we settled at Fernie's Funnel Cakes. He pulls his backpack onto the table, gently pulls out a miniature model of a State Fair food stand that has a ring box in it. I open the box to a gorgeous ring, and he popped the question. I, of course, said yes!

We mentioned the story on our Save the Dates, but I just want to emphasize that he did this completely without my knowledge by bringing the model to work with him, and every day on his lunch break, he would work on it until it was absolutely perfect. If that's not love and dedication, then I don't know what love is.

As a little treat to ourselves, we went on an absolutely wonderful eight day cruise to the Bahamas. We saw things we had never seen before (one being an interesting looking lady [read: whiskey tango] with a Carnival Cruise logo on her calf), did thing we never dreamed of doing (one of which being the only adults without children at a Build-a-Bear-on-a-cruise event. Ask us about our cruise bats!), and ate things we never thought we would eat (literally the best BBQ we've ever had. Forget the age old Texas vs Carolina vs St. Louis BBQ battle... the entire world has been sleeping on Caribbean BBQ). Experiencing the world newly engaged to the love of my life was an incredible event. We will keep those memories with us forever.

And now, we're here. We're getting married and our most favorite people will be surrounding us to celebrate our love... who could ask for more?