We owe a special thanks of gratitude to Cherokee & Shanae (daughters of the Groom) and Rohit (friend and boss of the Bride) for encouraging us to try something new in our search for love and companionship. On a whim we both decided to create a profile on the dating site Bumble. Now on Bumble the woman gets an opportunity to make the first move. After reading his profile and looking at the pictures Thomas submitted I was like he seems nice so I sent out a message. We talked on the phone and finally agreed to meet face to face. We met on the beach on 31st. if you know me, I had snacks ( chicken salad, crunchy kale salad, fresh fruit and desert). I offered him some watermelon and unbeknownst to me that's his favorite fruit. We continued to talk on the phone. Thomas birthday and Anola's birthday are two days apart. We went out to dinner for Thomas birthday. Thomas reports he could not remember what I looked like since it was evening when we met. He saw longs legs approach his car. He literally was staring so I gave him a look...you know the one..the what are you looking at face. Now if you hear him tell it I gave him that same look with a added head snap. I didn't know that in his mind he thought I wasn't nice and had decided that once dinner was over he'd never contact me again. He told me he loved seafood so we went to Joe's Seafood and Steak restaurant. I could tell something was amiss because the normally talkative Thomas was not really conversing. He would just respond to my questions. In his mind this was the worst date ever. I was clueless because he kept saying everything was fine. He takes me home and before I got out of the car we started talking. He said that conversation saved me...because he wasn't going to contact me ever again. The rest of our story takes many twists and turns and resulted in many good memories that have lead us on our new journey that begins anew as man and wife. ❤

Thomas isn't meant for any covert missions and sublty isn't his fortee. One summer day we were watching television and a sitcom about wedding was on. Thomas casually says " I bet you don't know what you ring size is. And he was right. But he'd just planted a seed. 🤔🤗 The summer continues and as I mentioned in the story of how we met you know that our birthdays are 2 days apart. We decided to book at hotel stay to celebrate. We celebrate Thomas birthday on July 30, July 31 we celebrate Us and on August 1 we celebrate me. So I figured he might pop the question on the 31st. Shay and Tam, two of Thomas's children wanted to take us to lunch. So I'm like this is it. We had a great lunch. Thank you again Shay and Tam 🥰. After lunch they came to our room with a huge boquet of flowers 💐, balloons 🎈and a birthday cake 🎂..it was chocolate my favorite 😋. Then the icing on the cake was when they started singing Happy Birthday. Thomas and I were sitting on the bed. Though Thomas didn't know it my heart started beating rapidly because I'm thinking THIS IS IT!!! But no sadly I was wrong. The song ended and they left. Now Thomas was in a mood throughout the day. Nothing bad but I could tell something heavy was on his mind. Later that evening we were in our room and Thomas was sitting on the bed really deep in thought. I'm like what's up you are putting a damper on things. He would not snap out of it. Since I tried unsuccessfully to lighten the mood and he would not budge I started to watch television. He sat around for hours until I started getting sleepy. At this point I'm agitated that he's being so extra. I fell asleep and woke up....really early in the morning to Thomas on his knee at the side of the bed. I still had morning brain fog and it didn't register immediately until he pulled out the wedding ring 💍. Now at this point it was my birthday 8/1. I immediately called my mother and sent my girls a text. I talked with my children and they were happy especially Kyle . He says I'm happy as long as I get to walk you down the aisle. We agreed!!! Thomas has more to the story because he reached out to a few people to help with our engagement. Special thanks to Roy, Shay, Tam for keeping things secret and my sister Janiece for figuring out my ring size.