Ely first caught Lee's eye from afar at Provo's Latin American Festival. Imagine her surprise when she encountered him at a mutual friend's birthday party and he asked her to dance! He was a skilled dancer; her, not so much. But he gave her an open invitation to join him and his friends at the local salsa club if she wanted to improve on her natural skills. Lee took him up on that invitation and soon the two were spending time together as friends outside of the club, going to corn mazes, celebrating Halloween, and even roadtripping home from their respective Thanksgiving celebrations in Nevada. They became such great friends in part because Lee was convinced that romance was not on the table, but Ely was operating under no such assumption! One day while making dinner together at his house, he interrupted their typical conversation to tell her that he loved her, and then continued on with the previous topic as if nothing had happened. With that cat out of the bag, it was only a matter of time. Lee realized how much she liked this bold young man, and accepted when Ely decided to officially shoot his shot a few weeks later. The two started dating officially in January of 2017 and haven't looked back!

Thanks to COVID-19, the 2020 holiday season was a simple and quiet one for Lee and Ely. For New Year's Eve they had planned to eat dinner together at Lee's house and ring in the new year by watching fireworks from the base of the mountains near where Lee grew up. As midnight approached they drove to their firewatching vantage point and settled in, only for Ely to suggest that they get out of the car to watch the fireworks and cheer for the new year. They got out and sat on the hood of the car for a moment before Ely walked away from the car, turned around, and got down on one knee with the fireworks going off behind him. He asked Lee to marry him, and before he could even show her the ring, she was on her knees in front of him, hugging him, crying, and tellling him 'of course!' After the fireworks had ended, they got back into the car and took a look at the ring for the first time, only to hear a knock on the window of the car! A police officer told them that they were not allowed in that area after dark, and Lee was only able to respond with "sorry! I just got engaged." The officer seemed a bit chagrined and said "well, okay, when you're done with that you'll have to leave." Which they did shortly thereafter. But that couldn't put a damper on the enthusaism of two people as excited to get married as Lee and Ely.