During the pandemic, I was told we probably wouldn’t be going back to the office. Tied to big cities because of my job (corporate communications) and a country girl at heart, this was my big break. I made a spreadsheet of all the country towns around DFW. I googled them, looked up their school ratings, and narrowed it down to a handful of cities. One Sunday, I packed Cade in the back of the Accord and from Azle to Anna, we drove 350 miles around the circumference of DFW to find the town that felt right. I liked Weatherford or Royse City the best. Then, I found a brand new apartment complex opened in Van Alstyne for a good price. It seemed like fate. Two weeks after I moved to Van Alstyne, I unpacked my last box. Cade was visiting with his dad in Michigan and it was a Saturday night alone. I had NEVER been out alone in my life, but not knowing a soul in town, I knew I needed to try and make some friends. It was that night I ventured out to our local bar, The Cowboy Club. I didn’t meet Daniel that night, but I did upon my second visit a couple weeks later. He struck me as a very nice guy. So much so that I actually asked him to buy another girl who was on a date-gone-wrong a drink! The next part is remembered differently depending on who you ask, but I recall Daniel adding me on Instagram first. On October 10, 2021, I messaged him good morning and he responded approximately 0.8 seconds later. He asked me to be his girlfriend on Veteran’s Day that year, and the rest is history.

We knew we met our matches far before we got engaged but it took some time to get everything right. In January 2026, I took a work trip to Serbia, and Daniel and I made a European vacation out of it. Prague, Germany, Dublin (and a slight detour to Switzerland for Daniel--he'll have to tell you about it). I figured this was it but all the great moments kept going by without a big proposal. Until I was standing on the curb the last night in Dublin looking for the Uber... talk about waiting until the last minute! We celebrated with a drink at the hotel bar and got straight to planning!