We met at our church group’s potato party—Alexandra brought gnocchi and James brought twice baked. Alexandra: I remember feeling excited to meet new people after joining the community group that week. I was nervous about my gnocchi staying hot through the commute across town and not expecting to meet the love of my life! I have one of those picture perfect moments burned in my head when I first saw James and I remember thinking “Who is that? I’ve never seen him before…he’s so cute!!!!!” The first thing I noticed about him was his smile—I know I know, but when he smiles, he’s so giggly and cute and I couldn’t help but smile too! James kept trying to keep the conversation going and I, smooth as I am, thought a great way to show my interest in him was to keep running away from him (nice!). The butterflies were real and I instantly wanted to know everything about him. James hates this, but I thought he was like 29 and married…I’m a self-proclaimed horrible guestimator and the beard really threw me off (and yes before you ask, I did check his wedding ring finger). We ended up sitting next to each other (not so accidentally, @James) in the living room of our friends’ apartment and I was quickly pulled in by his kindness, funny stories, easy laughter, and those blue eyes—I’m a sap and I love him so much, okay! He had, and still does, a way of making me feel so welcome and loved and it makes sense now that that feeling was just my heart finding its home. James: One of my favorite ways of representing where I am from is telling my east coaster friends (who have been to more countries than states) about all the exotic casseroles we have in the Midwest. From hot dish to pretzel salad and oh so much more. We all joked that we should have a party and I would assign everyone a different ‘casserole’ to bring. Eventually we settled on a potato party from a tik tok trend and I knew I had to show out. I brought the best twice baked potatoes (with homemade bacon bits, of course) the world has ever tasted. I was sure to survey the whole room to validate that everyone had thoroughly considered and ranked my potatoes in the top 3 of all the versions of potatoes that were presented. There was one attendee I was particularly interested in garnering her opinion: a girl I had never met before in a girl boss blazer who instantly challenged my belief that I should never date someone in my friend group. Before I could get into my pitch about why I would beat Bobby Flay with my twice baked potatoes, I got caught in those beautiful brown eyes and that is where I would like to stay for the rest of my life. Alexandra was so kind and humble (not to mention gorgeous) and clearly the best person I had ever met. Also, very importantly she laughed at everything I said. Then she stunned me and said, “Well, it was nice talking to you” and proceeded to get more of her own potato gnocchi, leaving me in the dust. Needing more positive affirmation by making her laugh again, suddenly I remembered my survey and followed her to the potato smorgasbord. I remember then getting so nervous and feeling like I was taking up too much of the room. This Alexandra was special, there was no doubt about that and I wanted to ask her to stay by me the rest of the night. Little miss unintentionally hard to get eventually ended up across the room. I had another party to get to and as I was leaving I felt a tug on my heart that I didn’t want to go. But the Uber was called and it was time. As I was leaving I looked back into the living room hoping to catch one last glance and the thought in my head, “I must see her again”. I became very familiar with this thought and feeling when leaving a room that she was in. And this ladies and gentlemen is what you call a meet cute. I met her and she’s very cute and about to be my wife. She is the best thing that has ever happened to me and I’ve never been happier.