Kristina started attending Malachi's small group at our church in 2018, we had met before through friends and church gatherings, but that is where we got to know each other better and became friends. After a while, Kristina began crushing on Malachi, and eventually, he started crushing on her too! It started out with a couple of lunch 'dates' where Kristina thought they were just hanging out as friends and didn't know that Malachi was wanting to get to know her more one-on-one. After a couple of weeks it turned into 'real' dates and our relationship has been growing and deepening ever since. We'll have been together for two years December 13, 2021 (although the date we became official differs depending on who you ask, but that's another story!)

Malachi had the ring in hand and was trying to plot the perfect plan to propose. After running a couple of ideas by our friends he landed on a plan and waited for the right time to set it up. One of our COVID activities had been building lego sets (we had gotten pretty into the show Lego Masters), and we still had one we needed to do (an AT-AT). So we set a night to complete half of it, then Malachi made an excuse for us to save the second half of it for another night. He planned a date night where we'd complete the lego set and then go to a really nice steakhouse Kristina had been wanting to try. Malachi had hidden the ring in the last bag of legos, so right as we spread out the last bag of legos, the ring poured out with it. He said 'Oh, that's not supposed to be there!' and for about 30 seconds Kristina thought he was serious and was thinking to herself 'Well that's not a good place to hide my ring!' But then he got down on one knee and she understood what was happening. Then he poured out his heart and shared reasons why he loves Kristina, and she said yes!