Coming out of online college classes that were the result of covid, Blake was eager to get to know some classmates face-to-face after the majority of class interactions so far had taken place on a Discord server for our chemical engineering classes. He messaged a few of the more active members of the server to introduce himself and to try to find some in-person connections - one of those people was Heather. We all met up for a few minutes after class, and that's how it started.

We quickly bonded over a shared love of Star Wars, video games, and dogs. As we got to know each other over the next few months, we found that we had even more in common below the surface - faith, family, life experiences (good and bad) - and by a couple months in it was clear to others around us that we had a mutual attraction. Through the end of the semester and the beginning of summer, we started to spend more time with each other outside of school, but no major outings besides casually hanging out, whether it was with friends or by ourselves. Blake knew of Heather's love of ice skating, and suggested they go to a rink together. A few chilly slips and falls later, Blake and Heather made this whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing official over a chocolate chip pizookie.

It didn't take long for "like" to turn into "love." Okay, so it wasn't a heart-wrenching scene like in "Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back", but it was cute. Heather was afraid that it was too soon to say it (only about 6 weeks of official dating), so she asked Blake first before she said it. He said that he was also afraid that it was too soon, even though he felt the same way about her. Sometimes you just know way earlier than you ever expect to.

After graduating with our bachelors degrees in chemical engineering, Heather went down to Tucson to spend a couple of weeks with her parents. When she got back to Phoenix, Blake had missed Heather so much that he knew he never wanted to be apart from her for that long again, so he said it made him realize he wanted to marry her. Heather was so overjoyed that she cried happy tears.

Even though we knew we were definitely going to marry each other, it was still barely more than a year since we had met. So we enjoyed our time together, and didn't rush anything. After about another year had gone by, we really started to get serious about making some next steps happen. Heather found a ring she liked, and Blake planned a surprise proposal (well, as much of a surprise as you can for knowing that it was coming sooner or later). It was a really sweet moment - Heather came home from work and walked into her kitchen to find Blake down on one knee, with a big bouquet of flowers and two of her favorite foods - Dr. Pepper and a bag of 3 Musketeers candy bars. After some more happy tears, her answer was an obvious yes, or we wouldn't all be here :)

Next stop - Mr. and Mrs. Seay!