15200 Arnold Palmer Drive Haymarket, VA 20169

Gage is a maintenance technician at our apartment building and one day he came to fix my closet door. My mom was visiting me at the time too. Right when I saw him, I thought he was cute! When he left to get a part for the door, I told my mom I thought he was sooo handsome! Mom played match maker right away lol, and as soon as he got back with the part, she left to walk Ruby, my dog. The conversation went so smoothly - it was like a breath of fresh air! When mom came back, she asked him for his number just in case I needed future repairs, and pretended to not be able to find her phone (ha ha), so she suggested I get his number with my phone. It was adorably obvious what she was doing. When Gage and I were talking, he mentioned that he is world qualified in pool!! So after I got his number, I said to myself “this man is cute AND fun to talk to. I’m going to ask him out!”. I figured the worst he can say is no which is already the answer if I don’t ask and at least he’d feel flattered! Luckily, he said yes! Turns out that Gage wanted to ask me out too but couldn’t because I was a resident at the apartment building he works at, so it’s a good thing I asked. That following weekend, we had our first date - at the pool hall!! We talked and talked and laughed and he taught me how to play pool! We even took our first picture together which is framed and hung on the wall in our bedroom. We both still reminisce about this date, mostly because of the feeling we had when we got home after the date - pure excitement and joy. The rest is history and here we are getting married! Mom played a big role in us getting together so we asked her to marry us! As everyone can probably assume, now I am a big proponent for ignoring your fear of rejection, and if you like someone, ask them out! You never know… you may end up marrying them. ;)

Throughout the whole week leading up to the proposal, Gage was leaving sweet notes around for me to find, even recruiting coworkers at my office to leave notes at my desk- it was the cutest thing! Most of the notes said “say yes!”. That Friday, I get home from work and open the double doors leading to a hallway in our apartment building. Our apartment is at the end of the hallway. As soon as I open the doors, I see our friends and neighbors lining the hallway, each of them holding a red rose! I hear one of our songs playing and see rose petals all along the hallway! It brought tears to my eyes. As I walked the hallway, each person handed me a rose and said “say yes!”. When I reached the end of the hallway, I saw Gage in front our apartment door on one knee! He chose to propose here because our apartment building is where we met! He said with a big smile, “Christine Ember Lienau, will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”. Through lots of happy tears, I said yes! As we were hugging, everyone in the hallway started clapping for us! Out of the corner of my eye, I see someone… it was my mom! Gage surprised me with having her there to see it because he knows how close we are. She then handed me the last rose, and with her happy tears, she said “say yes!”. And then we all laughed and it was just such a beautiful moment. It was the sweetest most romantic and well planned proposal, and I feel so blessed. We both feel blessed. We are thrilled about saying yes to forever in April and we are so happy to have you all there with us!