One day at work, I (Haley) was bored and TLC's "90 Day Fiancé" was on television. I had been on a few dating sites and I was having no luck. So, I thought to myself, "what the heck," and joined the first international dating site that showed up on The Google, International Cupid. After 2 weeks and a few messages, I was done. Now, this was all happening at a fairly low point in my life. I was feeling stuck, so I had a chat with my pastor about my next steps. At the end of the meeting, he prayed that God would make things clear. 2 days later, I meandered back to International Cupid and saw a simple greeting from some random Dutch guy. And I responded. Auke had been on the site for a little while, but was having no luck. He was receiving lots of attention, but as the site is actually pretty sketchy, he had some concerns. Auke said that he has always been drawn to American history and media, so he added the U.S. to his parameters. Auke said that he paused on my profile picture because my positive demeanor drew him in. So, he sent a message... Our first conversation was about the weather. I was impressed that he knew of Minnesota (not common in Europe) and knew enough to ask about our extreme winter that year. I dazzled him when I asked how to pronounce his name because I had no language basis for Dutch or Frisian and wanted to say it correctly. He was impressed I knew enough to include Frisian (his ethnicity and native language- thanks Google!). Conversation flowed from there; paragraphs turned to pages (and pages and pages) and emails and Skype dates and trips across the ocean and "I love you's." A year and a half later, Auke proposed at beautiful Falls Park in Sioux Falls, ND. We were to be married in June of 2020, but then the world died. We had to postpone three times, then indefinitely. We went an entire year separated by the ocean, but we stayed strong. We were legally wed in Europe in August of 2021 and now, we plan to celebrate with everyone in 2022!