While scanning through profiles on-line, one profile stood out. Not only was she beautiful and genuine, but she also loved to fish. "Nice catch! Although the trick is that you have to hold out the fish away from your body when taking the pic to make them seem bigger lol. I like that you enjoy the outdoors. I think we have some things in common. How did you get into fishing? What do you like most about your job? Hope you've been having a good week! " -Jonathan We ended up sending such large messages that we broke the website! The website was cutting off our messages because we had too much to say.

We first met under the Christmas tree at the Galleria Mall and went to a nice Italian restaurant. The menu was fancy, so she decided to go safe and order meatballs and spaghetti. She got wine, but I wondered why the wine never went down even after the occasional sips. Turns out the wine tasted like cough syrup to her and she didn't want to seem picky lol. I learned then that Alicia is not high maintenance, but values the simple and meaningful things in life. Above all, I learned she has a kind heart. We didn't skip a beat. The conversation was amazing and we were all smiles. She hoped that I would like her as much as she liked me. She didn't know that I was already hooked on her. I didn't want the evening to end so we went to Dave and Busters and played games for hours. We both had so much fun that first date.

How do you know when you're ready to marry someone? Well we were completely in love, but there was so much more that went into that question and so much that we learned about each other. We read "Things I wish I'd known before we got married" and "101 questions to ask before you get engaged". We wanted God to be an integral part of our relationship and wanted to be able to pray together about anything. We talked about expectations, roles, how we deal with conflict, communication, our past, healthy independence and interdependence, pet peeves, love languages, what ifs, parenting, finances, protecting our love, and so much more. Above all we just enjoyed each other and our love continued to grow naturally. Without a doubt, we knew that we were ready for that next step. We were ready to get engaged.

On October 14th, 2018, Alicia and I along with our friends Kyle and Jen headed up to Apple Hill. At High Hill Ranch, there's a pond stocked with trout. I had it all planned out. I bought a 9 inch trout lure that looked like a real fish. I wrote "Marry Me?" on both sides. The plan was to have Jen distract Alicia long enough for me to get my pole out of my truck. I got some funny looks casually walking around apple hill with what appeared to be a fish on the line. I threw the lure out into the water. When Alicia saw me, she didn't think anything was off because she knows how much I like fishing. I nervously waited a bit and then acted like a fish was hooked on the line. I gave her the pole to reel in. It was funny when she got it out of the water. At first she was embarrassed because the fish looked smaller than what other people were catching. She wanted to give the pole to me like "this isn't my fish". Then she was confused because she realized that something was off with the fish. She squinted and read the message on the side. She was completely surprised! I grabbed her hands. Told her that I've been hooked on her since we met and that she's become my best friend, fishing partner, and the love of my life. I got down on a knee with the biggest smile on my face and asked her to marry me. She emphatically said yes multiple times. We went wine tasting and then I took her out to dinner at Lazy Dog. There was one more surprised left. Our family and friends were at the restaurant and celebrated one of the happiest days in our lives.