Evan and Justine met for the first time in February 2015, on a trip to the Berkshires with mutual college friends. Evan’s first memory of Justine was seeing her raise an eyebrow suspiciously upon hearing they would be eating lasagna for dinner. Justine’s first memory of Evan was noticing his ugly Timberland boots. The next semester they had two classes together back-to-back, so Justine wore her cute outfits on Tuesdays and Thursdays. They got to know each other over weekly coffee breaks in between classes and many nights of stats homework (neither did very well). That summer, Justine visited Evan when he was in London for a few days, Evan took her to a restaurant he couldn’t really afford, and the rest was history. They spent junior and senior year attached at the hip — dancing at TI and Ivy, eating #6s at Olives, and cutting the line for Nomad pizza. Then came a painful post-grad separation. Evan to Chicago; Justine to London. They spent 3 years living 6 timezones apart, but took every opportunity to cross the Atlantic to see each other. They made many wonderful memories exploring London, Paris, Milan, Portugal, and more…but always followed by another heart-wrenching goodbye. These years weren’t easy, but neither doubted whether it was worthwhile. Justine finally made her glorious return to New York in spring of 2021. Evan picked her up at an empty JFK airport, they shared their final ‘hello’ embrace, and planned to never be apart again.

In December 2022, knowing Justine was on high alert for the moment, Evan decided to sneak attack her at home when she’d least expect it. A December baby, Justine has always loved Christmas season. As they were leaving for dinner, Evan pretended that something was wrong with the Christmas tree. She came over, he got down on one knee in front of the tree, she gasped…and at some point through the happy tears said yes. Check out the video in the gallery!