We met at church in early 2019 after Greg moved back to Boston. Tati, originally from Brazil, had lived in Boston for many years already and was a part of the welcome team at the church. She loves organizing social events and would always invite Greg (& EVERYONE else lol) and, sometimes, he would join. At first, neither of them were interested in dating and wanted to focus on themselves... but, many months later in November of 2019, they chatted and danced at one of these events and something "shifted" for Tati—shortly after, she knew she'd marry him one day. Crazy? Maybe; but they say "when you know, you know." Tati knew—Greg needed a little bit more time but he caught on ☺

Throughout the 2020 pandemic, they grew very close by hosting church at Greg’s. Together, they made brunch every Sunday and welcomed about 15 friends to watch the weekly sermon, reflect on the message and hang out. Throughout those months, they saw God move in people’s lives & their own in ways they hadn’t seen before, became best friends and started to recognize some key things in each other. Tati's feelings grew fonder and Greg started to realize he "wished their hugs lasted longer..." ☺ Over a year after that first dance, Greg (finally!) asked Tati out to "dinner" in December 2020. It was definitely a date but he didn't call it that so Tati refused to do so herself... They went out twice and then met for NYE, Tati's favorite day of the *entire* year. Knowing she had many NYE traditions she loves, Greg decided to do them with her and invited a couple of friends over to his house. After the friends left, Greg poured his heart out to Tati and she responded with a mere "it's reciprocal” because she was freaking out on the inside. Once the nerves calmed down, they followed Tati's traditions: stayed up all night, went to the (freezing) beach to jump 7 praying waves during sunrise, and welcomed 2021 together. The next two years were full of fun and challenges, as life is. But, with each season, they continued to grow together and realized the blessing God had provided by bringing them together.

Greg and Tati had talked about marriage a few times but Tati thought Greg wouldn't ask until 2023. But, when he started bringing it up in November of 2022, she knew something was up—if you know her, you know it’s nearly impossible to surprise her. She definitely made it clear she was ready whenever he was ready and her best friends Dea and Jess had a very detailed note about ring shopping to help him out ☺ During one of their talks, Greg accidentally slipped out a comment that gave away that he had the note so she knew it would happen “soon” (but soon can be relative when it comes to Greg lol). In December, Tati was 99.99% sure it’d be before the end of the year but unsure if it’d be in the US or Brazil (fun fact: Greg wanted to do it after she jumped her waves on NYE in Brazil but later realized hundreds of people would be nearby). With the ring in hand and a few days left in Boston, in true Greg fashion, he reached out to their friends Robert and Olivia Brown at 9pm of a Monday asking if they’d be down to help make this happen 48 hours later. Rob is a professional photographer and the 3 of them met that night in Boston’s North End to scope the perfect location and lighting (huge shoutout to the Browns for all the help & the most perfect photos!) Greg then invited Tati to a “surprise” date night on Wednesday and she 100% knew that was it but didn’t tell ~anyone~ just in case lol. On 12/21/2022, Greg brought Tati to a more reserved area of the North End by the water. After parking, he grabbed a grocery store bag with a blanket on top out of the trunk. Puzzled, Tati thought it was kind of weird to have an outdoor picnic at 30-degree weather at 7pm—but she went with it and “hoped there would be snacks” lol. Greg led Tati to “the” location, across the water from the building she used to live when they started dating, and told her they would do things backwards that night and start with "her favorite dessert", which he asked her to guess. After guessing many chocolate-based desserts (IYKYK) incorrectly, Greg brought out a box of Mike’s Pastry Florentine cannolis—Tati’s ABSOLUTE favorite and she was as happy as if he had shown her a ring! “OMG! I LOVE CANNOLIS! I’M SO EXCITED WE’RE EATING CANNOLIS!” she said, without a clue of what would happen next. One split second later, Greg dropped down to one knee and opened up the Mike’s Pastry’s box, revealing 2 cannolis, a stunning ring, and “casa comigo?” (“marry me?” in Portuguese) Tati said “yes!!!!” after taking a brief moment to recompose (lol). The two laughed, cried and, of course, ate the cannolis ☺ After all, Tati was very surprised and the proposal could not have been more like them ♥

We cannot wait to celebrate with you and show you a little bit of Tati's hometown and culture! We hope you can join us for the wedding and the events that lead up to it that weekend.