"We" are saying "YES"!

Greetings Friends & Family, We hope that this message finds all of you safe and well! We want you to know in these challenging times your health and safety are our top priority. Secondly, we want all of you to feel safe, excited, and worry free as you travel and celebrate with us on this special occasion - Our Wedding Day! After much thought and consideration, we have decided to postpone our celebration with friends and family until Saturday, July 24, 2021. Although many venues have opened, our selected venues still remain closed. Also, with the large number of invited guest we could not ensure proper social distancing guidelines at this time. Hopefully, the pandemic will be over by JULY 24, 2021 and there will be more peace, love, and joy in this world! SO PLEASE MARK YOUR CALENDARS FOR THE SAME VENUES NEXT YEAR ON SATURDAY, JULY 24TH, AS WE CELEBRATE "OUR DECLARATION OF MARRIAGE." However,we will have a small private "exchange of vows" ceremony on our scheduled date. SO PLEASE STAY TUNED-IN TO OUR WEBSITE AS WE WILL PROVIDE SOME UPDATES AND POST OF OUR "SMALL" DETOUR! WE LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU ALL AT OUR PLANNED DESTINATION NEXT YEAR! Thank you for your patience ~ Love ~ Darren & Donna ~ Soon to be "The Merrills"

We met 27 years ago; I was the first person that Darren met when visiting his sister at NC A&T. Little did Darren know NC would become home. When I first met Darren, I was mourning the passing of my fiancé. Darren was my friend whom supported me through this difficult time. I had no idea that he "liked" me. He did not want to take advantage of this horrific situation that left me traumatized. Finally, he decided to express his feelings. I was dating someone else. That relationship went on for years, and then another relationship that ended in 2017. During this time Darren's life went on as well. He wed and had three beautiful children. We remained friends over the years, often viewing each other’s life events through social media. A mutual friend that we knew would share a "hello" or " how is he/she doing." Darren asked open-ended questions to get the full story of my life events. It wasn't until August 2018, Darren reached out to me on Messenger stating, "I would like to see you." I inquired, "How are the children? How are you and your wife?" He stated, "The children are great; the wife and I are not." I agreed to meet after several text and persistence. Our first meeting was at 8:00pm in the parking lot of Cookout. Then that led to conversation over cocktails until 3:30am that morning. We drove back to Cookout to pick up Darren’s car. Darren said, “There is something that I need to tell you. I like you a lot, I mean a lot, a lot.” I said, “Okay, I like you too.” The next day, we meet me for coffee and cake at Maxi B’s. He was very persistent! He promised to only keep me for an hour. Thus, I found myself at Maxi B’s with Darren. I reiterated that I was sleepy, and I must go home to rest. He replied, “I will let you rest, and I’ll see you later at 9:00 tonight... You will have to join us as we embark on our new destination July 25, 2020 to hear the rest of our love story! We will see you in July ~ Darren & Donna