We're getting married!

Although having mutual friends in college, we weren't actually introduced to each other until we were both invited on a river trip in Hattiesburg, MS. (Can you believe I went to parties at Tyler's house in college and we NEVER met?!) If you know Tyler at all, it shouldn't come as a surprise to find out that he completely ignored me the first night of the trip. (Did I mention that he was the only person there that I didn't already know?) It wasn't until the next morning on the river when Tyler tied his float to mine, introduced himself to me, and proceeded to P O P MY TOES. The audacity! After a full day of bashful conversations here and there, we found ourselves under the stars talking for hours. I'd like to tell you it was at this point that Tyler asked me for my number, but it wasn't. It wasn't until Sunday night when we had both returned to our respectful corners of MS that I saw the one, single, notification in my facebook messenger: "Forgot to ask for your number this morning." from none other than THE Tyler Stone.

Less than a week later, I'm nervously walking into Babalu in Jackson, MS with Tyler. It's our first date. We hype. They greet us as "Mr. and Mrs. Stone", we eat too much guac, and at one point Tyler rapped all of Nicki Minaj's Super Bass.

Tyler asked me to be his girlfriend over crab cakes and pickled green beans at CHAR. I told him no and that it was way too soon. I mean, we had only known each other less than a month! I asked Tyler to be my boyfriend over dessert. ♡

Now, there are a few things you need to know before we dive into this story. If you know Tyler and I, you know that we spend a lot of time at the Memphis Zoo. One of our favorite times to be there is at Christmas for Zoo Lights. We've made a little tradition of going every year that we've been together and our very last stop is always always always the ferris wheel (I love seeing the whole zoo lit up from the top, it's so magical). On this particular night, I had noticed Tyler was a little more quiet than usual, but that was fine because I could. not. stop. talking about getting barbecue when we left. It wasn't until we were walking through the tunnel of lights when Tyler stopped, turned to me, and said "Delai-" and then kind of looked past me..... AT ANOTHER COUPLE GETTING ENGAGED (!!!) that I thought "tonight might be the night". Although I was briefly disappointed as soon as we saw the other couple get engaged, I felt calm because now I knew that it definitely was NOT going to happen that night. We make our way to the ferris wheel, get on, and get situated. Like I said earlier, this is my favorite part so I'm hyped. I'm talking 90 miles per hour about nothing in particular, practically crawling out of the basket to see all the lights when I hear Tyler shakily say "Um, Delaini..". I look over, and this man is pale as a ghost and opens a tiny box with a ring in it. You know the rest. ♡