Christine and I actually met through work back in 2017. Apparently I was one of the first people who interviewed her - I don't remember but she has the emails to prove it. When she came on, she was joining the team that I was leaving; we probably had a month of overlap during which we didn't work closely together, and then I switched teams. On top of this, Christine lived in New Jersey (working out of our NYC office) and I lived in North Carolina (working out of our Raleigh office) - we were totally not on each other's radars. Fast forward to late 2018 where a group of friends who met through work organized a cruise together. Somehow, Christine and I both ended up with this group of 9, taking a cruise down to Mexico for a week. Over this week, Christine and I had several conversations and got to know each other a bit more. By the end of the cruise, I definitely had a crush (Christine did too I think). That said, we were still in totally separate states and this cruise was our first real interaction. We continued on with our lives. Over the next year, we both ended up travelling quite a bit for work. She would have trips down to Raleigh and I would take trips up to NJ or NY. Every trip we would see each other and hang out and get to know each other some more. I know my feelings were growing, but we were still just friends. By August 2019, I was working up the courage to send Christine a text message to let her know I had feelings for her. She happened to be in Raleigh for a workshop, and I was able to let her know in person. She felt the same, and we were officially together pretty shortly after that!

Moving to Colorado Christine was already thinking of doing some living outside of NJ, and Raleigh was first on her list! She moved down to Raleigh and lived with a couple of friends during our first sixish months of dating. Then COVID happened - a transformative time for us all, and a time where Christine and I decided to make a change. Christine's dad is from Denver and there is a big Kaufman presence in the city, so we decided to move out west. One of my sisters ended up moving out to Denver the next year, we got a pandemic puppy (named Eleanor), we rented a house near City Park, and what was initially supposed to be one year in Colorado stretched into three. We both work from home so there was a learning curve to figuring out how to live and work together, but our time in Denver was filled with challenges, learning, growth and love. We have since moved back to NC to be closer to our parents, but we will always cherish our time spent in CO.

Christine and I discussed getting married frequently, and I knew I had to deliver the goods before the end of 2021. I was fine with the timeline, but I wanted to do something unique and memorable for the proposal. After some research, I learned that you could rent out the Daniels and Fisher Tower in downtown Denver for just this occasion. After a lot of emails and calls with no responses (I was panicking a little bit), I was able to get the tower reserved for 12/15/21. We were planning to pack up the car and drive out on a 2.5 week trip to New Jersey and North Carolina for the Christmas holidays on 12/17, so I pitched it to Christine as "one last date night before we hit the road". I had the uber driver take us to the restaurant, but they actually dropped us off on the side of the road in front of the clock tower. I grabbed Christine's hand and led her inside - she had no idea what was going on (at least that's what I told myself). We were whisked up an elevator to the 17th floor where someone waited to take our coats, a song that I selected (24.19 by Childish Gambino) was playing, and there were rose petals on the staircase leading to the 18th floor - right behind the clock face. That's where I popped the question and Christine said yes (through many tears)! I had dinner delivered there earlier, so we were able to eat and have some champagne while facetiming our parents. After we left there, we met at a nearby brewery with our local Denver friends and family to end our evening of celebration. We're so excited to celebrate this next chapter in our lives with you. See you in CLT!