Back in October of 2017 when I was a sophomore at OBU and Colten was a senior at OC, my dad became the music pastor at our current church, where Colten already attended. The pastor took me to the young adult Sunday School class where Colten was already sitting. The only open seat was next to him so I, nervously, sat there. After church, my roommates asked me how I liked the new church and the first thing that came out of my mouth was, "Oh my goodness. Let me tell you about the cute boy in my Sunday School class!!" A year and two months later, Colten and I had plans to hangout one Saturday evening- AS FRIENDS. That night as we were sitting on the couch talking and petting his dog, Bella, I realized that we were holding hands, and a week after that we were going on our first date. Colten surprised me with dinner in Oklahoma City at Bricktown Brewery and tickets to see the Nutcracker Ballet. My best friend, Abigail, had been at my house to spend the night with me that day and to repay her for letting me leave her at home with my parents while I went on a date, Colten suggested we pick up me and Abigail's favorite dessert- ICE CREAM- and take it home to her. That's when I knew what a sweet guy he truly was! Four days later, Colten invited me to his house and we had a long talk about our past relationships and what we both were looking for in a relationship. We both came to the conclusion that if we were to be in a relationship, we wanted it to be long term. Colten then asked me to be his girlfriend. The next month, after church on a Sunday evening, was when Colten pulled me aside and said that he knew that it was fast, but that I was the woman that the Lord had for him and he was excited to see what God does in our lives together and individually. Then, for the first time, Colten told me that he loved me. It was awhile later when I finally told him that I loved him :)

I started planning the proposal in February with a Google search. I quickly found a place that caught my interest, Castle Falls. The campus was beautiful and they had proposal packages that allow you to rent an entire floor of the restaurant. I setup a tour for the next day after work. I went and checked it out, and it was exactly what I was looking for. After a couple of days of debating and speaking to Emily's close friends and parents I decided to book Castle Falls for July 20th. I knew in order to make it a surprise I was going to need some help. Josie, Emily's roommate, volunteered to come visit Emily on July 20th and act like they were going to go for a fancy dinner and bring her to me at Castle Falls, where I would be waiting on one knee. During the 5 month wait I needed to get the ring. I went to a couple of places to look at rings and get prices on diamonds. Lewis Jewelers managed to find the exact kind of diamond I was looking, from India, and had it shipped in. However, I couldn't find a ring I liked, so I enlisted my mom to help me design one. The original design we came up with was loosely based on the tattoo on my arm, but was going to be too weak. I decided to simplify the ring to have the diamond resting on crosses, as our relationship is built with Christ as its foundation. They spent the next month making the ring. Once I had it I had nothing to do but wait.... for 3 months... But I couldn't wait all the way to July 20th. On June 10th I officially decided to move the proposal date to June 18th, our 6 month anniversary. I contacted the owner of Castle Falls and she said we could have the restaurant to ourselves that night. With the aid of Chris and Liz, I managed to keep the proposal a complete surprise. She had absolutely no idea it was happening, until it was happening. We got into the proposal room where we sat and I briefly talked about how thankful I am for her. Then I got down on one knee and asked her to marry me.