It's finally happening!

We have Tinder to thank for matching us together! It was both of our first time using the app, and we got pretty darn lucky right off the bat. As Mo tells it, when they first saw my profile, they thought "oh, she's too hot for me," and almost didn't swipe right for me! Luckily, Gabrielle (Mo's bestfriend) took the phone and swiped for them. So thank you, Gabrielle! For me, I remember seeing Mo's profile and loving it. Not only were they crazy cute, but also a scientist! When we matched, I reached out first, and said something cheesy like, "So you're super cute," and despite my lame pickup line, Mo responded and the rest is history!

We had a trip to Oregon coming up, so I (Mo) thought that it would be a great time to propose. I knew that we would be taking a trip to the coast and found the cutest little painted rock beach in Seaside. So I came up with the most perfect plan: I would paint a rock asking Maddie to marry me, plant it on the beach and when Maddie found it, I would be down on one knee, ring in hand, tears in my eyes and prepared to give a speech that I had been working on for months. It all seemed so perfect. But then, a few days before we left for Portland, Maddie accidentally saw a picture of the rock that I had painted. So then the question was: do I keep the plan, knowing that Maddie already knows, or do I come up with a new plan and surprise her? On our first full day in Portland, we had decided to go pop into the Portland Night Market and I had decided that it would be the place to propose. So I came up with an excuse for a picture that I wanted to take, packed my camera, the rock and the ring and tried my best to not throw up from nerves. We got to the market and Maddie was taking her sweet time checking out all of the booths, trying samples, and having a good time. I probably looked like a crazy person looking like I was going to throw up... and cry. Finally, we got to the spot that I had imagined. And then my brain melted and I have no idea what happened. I put the rock into Maddie’s hand, with no explanation, started to try to give my speech (I think that words came out, they may not have made any sense), started crying almost immediately, pulled the ring out of my pocket and got down on one knee... and Maddie followed me down there. It was truly a blur. She said yes, I put the ring on, we hugged, we cried, it was magical. And then the folks in charge of the market came over to congratulate us with champagne. It was not the engagement that I had planned, but it was perfect. And now here we are. About to get married. I couldn’t be a happier human.