Jamie and I have been apart of each others lives, in one way or another, for the past 10 - 11 years. Our first date was in 2009 to see a movie, The Haunting in Conneticut because scary movies are my favorite! Two of my best friends, Larissa and Nichole, went with us and I'm sure we never thought that would be my future husband and I's first date. Fast forward a few years, we just went through high school as friends. Though we were never actually together, we were always there when the other one needed to talk. We both graduated, left our hometowns for college, Jamie joined the Navy and moved to Dallas and I moved to Florida. Life definitely took us in different directions, but even with months to years between us catching up, the one thing that never changed is that something always drew us back to each other. Fast forward again, after almost 5 years in Florida I decided it was time to come back home to Emporia. Jamie also had taken a new job that landed him in the St. Louis area, closer to home. One day, Jamie reached out and we reconnected. We had no idea what would come of it but we had both always wondered what more we could be. The first night Jamie came to visit me, he ran out of gas and ended up being an hour late. I waited up for him and we just sat and talked for hours like we had never been apart. After that night there hasn't been a day we haven't talked to each other. We started going out on dates more and more, then he asked me to be his girlfriend at a Cody Johnson concert. Then, on December 8th, 2019 we were taking Christmas pictures and to my surprise that evening, in one of my favorite places, he got down on one knee and asked me to be his wife. We've both changed and have grown in a lot of ways since that first date, but one thing that has never changed is our want to be there for each other. We can't wait to start the next part of our story and we're so happy to get to share it with all of our friends and family!