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For those of you who don't know, Pete and I went to high school together. He was the hot football player with long, Justin Bieber hair who looked like he modeled for Hollister. He was smart (like Valedictorian of his college smart), athletic, and pretty much every high school girl's dream. I, on the other hand, was an emo kid with an aggressive side part who wore Chuck Taylor's, was always in detention, and liked to party... One time (as evidenced by a Facebook post and several diary entries following this encounter in 2010) I left my belt in Pete's car when he took me home from a party at a friend's house... other than that extremely insignificant interaction, we might as well have lived on two totally different planets. Anyway, Pete graduated and went on to college at Del Val and I graduated and went to art school in NYC. After dropping out and having absolutely no clue where to go with my life from there, I toured Del Val and even committed there before changing my mind and going to LVC. Take a guess who my tour guide at Del Val was... I'll wait a second for you to think about it... Ok, I'll tell you.. It was Pete. Fast forward to 2019 when I get this random Facebook message from a "Pete Andrew." The message said "happy birthday Chris!" I remember looking at it and thinking who the heck is this weirdo sending me a private message to say happy birthday on Facebook... I said "thanks" to be nice and went about my day. For some reason, it was bothering me that I couldn't figure out who this person was since it felt kind of personal that they had sent me a private message, so I decided to go back and click on their profile. When I tell you I nearly fell off my couch when I realized who it was, I'm not kidding. I thought "no way Pete Stanakis would be reaching out to tell ME happy birthday..." So, I did what any girl would do, and decided to shoot my shot. I replied to his message again, apologizing for the short response and (respectfully) explaining that I had thought he was some random weirdo messaging me on Facebook. He (luckily) replied and we started talking. We eventually exchanged numbers and Pete asked me if I wanted to "catch up" that Friday and get some dinner at Houlihan's in Hershey, which is where I lived at the time. I remember sending a screenshot of that text to all my friends asking if "catch up" meant this was a date or just a casual dinner to reminisce on all our non-existent interactions in high school... I was NEVER the person to hang out with anyone before my own personal, in-depth vetting process but something just felt right. So, we went and had a great time. I was so nervous the only thing I ate was about 9 lemon slices that I just kept asking the waiter to bring out for me. Why did Pete want to go on a second date with me after that, I'm not sure, but he did. It really sounds so cheesy and I hate to be this person, but I knew in that moment that this was my person. A few years later and here we are, planning a wedding. If you would have told 16 year old me, who was writing in her diary about the far-fetched crush she had on the hot football player who took her home from a party (although I'm sure we exchanged exactly 2 sentences), that I would be marrying him one day, I would have quite literally laughed in your face. It's really kind of funny how things work out, isn't it? If you've made it this far, Pete and I just want to say that we are so excited for this next chapter of our journey and we look forward to you celebrating it with us!