We met as community organizers in Florida in 2012. We continued to nurture our friendship throughout the years as we made it back to our hometowns of NYC (Juan) and Indianapolis (Cari). As we both decided to go back to school to get our graduate degrees in policy, the National Urban Fellows placed us in Cleveland through The Cleveland Foundation. Being friends just didn't feel like enough anymore and we took a leap of faith to let our hearts do the rest!

Juan proposed in the place we very first met, in St. Petersburg, FL and timed it to get on one knee at sunset. We visited a park we frequented on the weekends. It was perfect!