The Beginning of Forever

We met last summer while we were both working as EFY counselors! We were assigned the same travel session which took us to Buena Vista, VA, where we worked for three weeks. We remained in contact throughout the summer as we worked other sessions together and spent time with mutual friends.

Our first (not) date happened when Lindsey went to Colorado to take care of her siblings for a week. Before she left, Alex texted her saying, "Well, if you ever have the desire/need to talk to someone your own age while you're there, let me know. I'd be down to chat for a while. I would offer to visit... but it's a little far." And then we proceeded to talk for about 4-5 hours every night while she was in Colorado, much to the chagrin of Lindsey's brothers who were forced to help put the little ones to bed.

When Lindsey got back from Colorado, we arranged to go on an actual in-person date. Lindsey's sister was performing in the opera "Rigoletto," so we decided to go see her perform. The date went really well, and three days later we decided to date exclusively.

It all started on Monday when my grandma asked if my sister, Kayla, and I would like to come to her house on Wednesday for dinner. She does this often, so I didn't think anything of it, other than looking forward to an evening of relaxing at Grandma's. Wednesday rolled around and I decided to go out for a jog before we left. I got back, threw on some clean sweats, threw my hair up, and got ready to go. Then Kayla stopped me in the doorway and insisted I put on nicer clothes for Grandma. She had never cared about what I wore to Grandma's before, so I got pretty annoyed with her. She finally convinced me to change, but I was still pretty annoyed until we got to Grandma's. We we walked in, I saw that the table was set with Grandma's nicest dishes, complete with eight settings and sparkling cider. Thank goodness I decided to change, because obviously something important was going on! (I was not suspicious in the slightest!) Then Grandma said that she had something to show my on the back porch. She opened the door and I just saw lights everywhere. The porch and bushes were all decorated in lights, and I turned the corner and saw Alex standing in the yard surrounded by red lights in the shape of a heart. I was in complete shock. When I got to Alex in the yard, he said some sweet things, then knelt down and asked me to marry him, and obviously, I said yes. :)

So up to this point, Lindsey and I had only seen each other on the weekends, so I knew that I wanted to propose on a weekday, that way it would be a surprise. I had originally planned to do it near the beginning of February, but lots of hiccups started happening. I wanted to use some patio lights that I ordered, but then after they came, I felt like I didn't have enough for what I wanted to do. So I ordered more, which pushed the proposal a week back. Then I knew that I could do it at Lindsey's grandparents house in Lehi, but I saw on Facebook that they were on a trip, so I pushed it back another week. Finally everything was ready. I coordinated with her grandparent, an old roommate who was going to take pictures, and her sister for Wednesday, February 27th. I finished my classes for the day, and went straight home, grabbed everything I would need which I had prepared the day before, and left for Lehi. Once I got there I started setting up lights. Her grandparents had some more lights that I borrowed, and her old roommate and her husband got there and helped finish. All the while Lindsey's sister was keeping us up-to-date on their status. Once we were told they were almost there, we waited on the back patio for them to pull into the driveway. Once they were there, I went inside a heart I made with lights. She walked outside, grinning ear to ear, and came over to me. I asked her to marry me and she said yes! Something we realized later is that February 27th was five months exactly before we are getting married. And no that was not on purpose, just a nice little tender mercy.