We met each other the first year of dental school. I always claim that I was extremely intimidated by Ben due to his quiet personality. We started to show more interest in each other the summer before the second year of dental school. Ben had come to NELand Days in North Platte and found me to dance with during the entire Tim McGraw concert. I could not stop thinking about him all summer, but I was shy so I never reached out the rest of the summer. Once school started back up, we started texting quite a bit. We started hanging out almost every weekend, but nothing really came of it until October. Ben claims that he was showing more interest that entire time, but I'm pretty sure I was giving the same effort. One game day, Ben convinced me to stop by his family tailgate, and I spent the next two hours talking with Ben's mom, Megan, not sure where Ben was. The week went on and Ben finally asked me on our first date to The Oven, now our favorite restaurant and date night spot. Two weeks later, Ben asked me to be his girlfriend. Later that year we spent our first holidays together and spent tons of time meeting each others family and friends. We went on our first trip together to Vail in December of that year, so it only felt right that we get married there. We spent the next two and a half years of dental school spending all day every day together, and soaking up the memories in Lincoln. On my 25th birthday, Ben had planned to take me out to dinner at Casa Bovina in Lincoln. I was pumped that Ben had planned a date and was completely oblivious to the fact he was about to propose. When leaving for the restaurant, Ben pulled off into a parking lot adjacent to the walking path we walked on almost daily. Ben got out of the car and told me to come with him - still oblivious, but he wouldn't answer my questions. We walked into the grass where he got down on one knee and asked me to marry him and I said yes! Afterwards, I wanted to let everyone know that we were engaged, but there were more surprises in store! Ben told me we were still going to Casa Bovina and that we could call family afterwards. I thought it was such a sweet idea! (Still oblivious) When we arrived at the restaurant, both of our families were there to surprise us, including my sister who lives in NYC! It was the most special surprise to have both of our entire families there to celebrate with us. If you know me, you know I am extremely nosey, and to pull off two large surprises like this without me knowing is quite the task. Ben pulled it off in what I describe as my favorite day yet! We graduated dental school and moved to Gering, NE this summer where we are practicing dentistry, bought a house together, and are raising our two fur babies, Mabel and Booty! I love this life! We can’t wait to celebrate with our friends and family who have been through our story together and have been there to support us!

Morgan and I were dental school classmates, so we were around each other a lot before either of us really showed any interest. That all changed the summer between our first and second year. It has been debated but I think we’ve come to the conclusion that Morgan probably showed interest first. I do think it all really started though the night we danced together at the Tim McGraw Nebraskaland Days concert. After that, I made sure to “casually” ask her which bar she and her friends were going to every weekend. In reality, all I wanted to do was hang out with her. Even when we were out with a group of 15–20 people, by the end of the night she was always the only person I’d talked to. Our first official date was at The Oven in the Lincoln Haymarket, which is still our favorite restaurant to this day. With a bottle of wine and amazing food, we can sit and talk for hours, and that’s exactly how our first date went. A week later, I asked her to be my girlfriend. That December, we took our first trip together to Vail, which quickly became one of our favorite places (hence the wedding location). On that trip, we made one of our earliest “core memories.” We had planned a simple day trip to Vail with dinner and then a drive down to Denver for the night. After another classic three hour dinner, we walked outside to find a couple feet of fresh snow. Our attempt to drive to Denver failed, every hotel was sold out. We almost ended up sleeping in the car but at 2 a.m. we finally found a room. It didn’t take long for us to become inseparable. Morgan became my best friend, and after about a year and a half, I knew I wanted to spend forever with her. The engagement… well, from ring shopping to planning, I was definitely stressed. I kept trying to make everything perfect and eventually realized that wasn’t the right approach. So I picked the date I was going to propose before I even had a plan, just to force myself to make it happen. I ended up keeping it simple. I told her we were going out to dinner for her birthday. On the way, I took a small detour to a walking trail near our house in Lincoln, one we walked together almost every day. Somehow, after a full day of pouring rain, there was a calm break in the storm right when we got there. It ended up being perfect. After I proposed, we headed to dinner where both of our families were waiting to surprise us. We got to have one of our long dinners, this time celebrating with the people who mean the most to us. Thinking back on that night makes us realize how lucky we are to have such incredible families supporting us. Since getting engaged, we’ve officially started “adulting” as we both began our dental careers in Gering, Nebraska. Working with your best friend every day isn’t something everyone gets to say and we don’t take that for granted. Life is busy, but we still find time for our long dinners together, and somehow we never run out of things to talk about. Now we’re counting down to next fall, ready to celebrate with the people who’ve been cheering us on since those long dental school nights. We’ve gone from classmates to best friends to future spouses and we’re pretty excited to see where the next years (and many long dinners) take us.