After a series of tough career breaks for Jessica, she was at a loss for jobs in the city she called home her whole life--Buffalo, NY. The beginning of 2018 found Jessica qualifying for unemployment for the first time in her life. While she started looking for her calling, local liquor store, Butler's, needed to buy a barrel of Jack, and Jessica decided to piggy back on the trip to Nashville. Unemployment required the trip to be a career seeking mission, so she began the dig into Jack Daniels, and their parent company, Brown-Forman, for open positions. While searching for things she was qualified (and interested) in, she found a position in the city of Louisville, KY...which she was completely unfamiliar with. So she applied, and heard nothing. While she waited, she googled the city over and over again and grew increasingly interested as the trip to Nashville neared. On her drive down, she decided to stop for lunch in Louisville on March 2, 2018. On April 20, 2018, she packed as much as she could fit into her Pontiac Vibe, with her 2 year old lab mix, Grux, and 'moved in' to an apartment in St. Matthews, KY. Meanwhile, in "J-town," Kentucky, Michael was going through some personal growth of his own. After going through the worst break up of his life, he began to realize how much he enjoyed his job as an electrician and the heavy weight that was suddenly gone. He shed some pounds and was a happier person overall. Little did he know, a pink haired angel would be on her way to changing his life forever. Contrary to popular belief, Michael and Jessica actually met through a dating app and had their first date on August 18, 2018 at River City Winery in New Albany, IN. Michael wanted to impress Jessica after learning that she enjoyed wine, and coincidentally showed up in a green golf shirt, Jessica's favorite color. On their first date, they talked about kids, how they wanted to elope in Seattle (at the Space Needle), and change their last name to Jetson.

In September 2019, we want on our first 'real' vacation together, to Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. It was so nice to spend the week together with no place to be but the beach :) Little did I know, Michael was scheming with his mom and UPS to get the ring delivered to our house so I wouldn't be the one signing for it when we were back home. Some of our Virginia fam were arranging a group trip to the Bills game to see them play the Redskins, so we decided to join them up in Buffalo at the beginning of November. It worked out that my sister was in town from South Carolina with my almost 2 month old nephew, along with my cousin from VA and a cousin from MN. We were on our way to visit with family at a Buffalo staple--The Brew Pub, when I asked Michael if he wanted to stop at a park that my mother thought would be a 'great place for a wedding.' We got a little caught in traffic and I told Michael to forget it, but he insisted we go. We walked around the park a bit and he suggested we go sit on a bench near the creek. I sat down and looked up and he was down on one knee :) We got to spend the rest of the weekend celebrating with all of our friends and family in Buffalo.

Falling in line with some dreams from our first date, we kept coming back to the thought of an elopement. In the first two months we were engaged, Jessica planned at least 4 entire weddings, in 4 very different locations, of 4 various sizes. Coming from a very large family, Jessica wanted to be able to celebrate with everyone. While that is very much still what we want, we didn't want to spend a year plus saving for a wedding and putting off starting our family. After our Buffalo holiday over Christmas, and feeling like we had all the wrong answers to everyone's wedding questions, we decided to "just get it done" (words Jessica's mother used when she kept flip flopping on plans). Because Seattle required a bit more time and planning than we wanted to allot, we chose a destination that we wanted to travel to early on, Chicago. Michael grew up a Bears fan, and Jessica loves any city on the Great Lakes. We planned our elopement and told no one! We enjoyed a beautiful winter weekend at the Waldorf Astoria, with a couples massage, a trip to a cool brewery, and lots of Weller 12! It was the perfect weekend for us to enjoy our wedding together. We FaceTimed our parents from an Irish Pub and everyone was happily surprised!

Covid-19 was just starting to cause a stir as we were leading up to our trip. Luckily we were able to get married just a week before the Cook County Clerk Office shut down (Three months later and we still haven't received our marriage license)! While we have had some family members affected by this horrible illness, many of our plans have evolved on when to hold a celebration. We have suspended the planning indefinitely for a large scale celebration at this time. We do plan to invite everyone down to Louisville to celebrate once travel is safe again, and we can promise you, the party will be EPIC. We hope you will all happily join us when that day comes, in the meantime, we will use this website to provide the most up to date information. Feel free to email us and make sure we have all your current contact information at jetsonsgarden@gmail.com.