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Once upon a time there was a boy and a girl who went to a church camp in the summer of 2018. Their lives were spent completely unknowing of the others existence up until now. This is our story...

Hi, my name is Kordelia. Most of you know me, but I am going to tell you about myself and my perspective of how I met the man of my dreams and how we grew to the point of love we share today . I grew up in a house FULL of girls, I have 6 sisters and no brothers. So, drama was a given. I have two very loving and supportive parents and sisters who are my best friends. We were all homeschooled my whole life but coming into junior year my twin sister and I decided we wanted to go to Apollo Career Center to pursue a career. It was because of my teacher there that I even went to this summer camp, Ryan Beeson’s Teen Week. I had been to many different church camps prior to this one, so at the time this was just another church camp to me; little did I know I would find my husband there. We were a couple days into camp, and I was sitting at the lunch table with my friends gawking and obsessing over the cute, popular boy group. They were too cool, cute, and popular for this awkward homeschooler, so I told my friend I was going to set her up with the tall dark and handsome one because he was too cute to let go. As the day went on and another day went by, we joked about them getting together and all the girly things that come with it. We played a few volleyball games together. It came to be Thursday, I think, and two of the boys walked up to me after lunch (including the tall dark and handsome one, who I still didn’t know the name of). Caleb came and introduced himself and Matthew to me. I’m still not 100% sure what he said because I was just in awe they were talking to me. I know he had to have said something about how Matthew and I would get along well or something along those lines because that is the conversation that opened our friendship/relationship. We talked about sports because I thought “He’s popular, that’s probably what he likes, and he looks athletic.”

We talked for a while longer about our home lives and camp and it was a good conversation. He had to leave for some reason, so it cut that conversation short, and left me wanting more. Long story of the week made short the last night before leaving the next morning I went up to him at fire circle and asked if I could pray for him, it was really just to get his number, I thought God would be ok (or at least forgive me) for using prayer as an excuse to get a cute boys' number. So, we prayed for each other and I got the digits! “Thank you, Jesus,” was my next prayer. Once I got home to Lima and him to Ashland (2 hours away from each other) we just started texting and getting to know each other. We talked every day for 8 months before he asked me out, but he did, and I said yes. Our first date was at Olive Garden with my family. They weren’t going to let me date a stranger who lived so far away without meeting him first. After Olive Garden we went to a volleyball game but spent most of the time in the park outside. I would say my family knew he was a keeper when he got back from the bathroom and I asked him, “How was your poop?” without pause he said “I didn’t poop, but I peed and it was a nice even flow.” What man sticks around after you embarrass him like that? Many dates later and every weekend dedicated to spending time with each other, he finally asked me to marry him in October of 2020 at the Mansfield “Blood Prison”. It was actually very romantic if you knew the story. So now we’re here, just about to be married and I couldn’t be more excited to marry the man I love more than life, my best friend. I look forward to spending every morning day and night with him sharing our lives together. As I like to say we were a match made in heaven or at least heaven on earth at a church camp.

Hi, my name is Matthew Trayter. I grew up in a very loving home with two brothers and two parents who would do anything for their children. I went to The Vineyard, some called it the 99. That is how I got introduced to Ryan Beeson Teen Week. I finally gave my life to Christ in the summer of 2014 at a different church camp; but I went to Ryan Beeson's Teen Week in 2016 for the first time. It was awesome! I was at the fire circle playing some worship music for all the campers when we found out that the Cavs won their first championship, I was pumped. Even though my friends from home and my brothers were not going, for some reason I decided to go back to camp in 2018. Call it fate, call it destiny, I call it God knew that’s how I’d meet my wife. I got to camp and met up with my buddy from the years before and told him about this dream I had about my wife being a brunette with blue eyes. I think my buddy made it his goal to find every girl there with brown hair and blue eyes. Then we found Kordelia. She was very different than all the other girls, she didn’t wear make-up, she wore basketball shorts almost all week long, and just didn’t seem to care what others thought. She was herself. She wasn’t what I would normally go for, but she was beautiful, and took my breath away. I was a little nervous to talk to her, I didn’t want to get rejected. That’s why Caleb introduced us, best wing-man a guy could have. We talked for a while and I just couldn’t keep my eyes or thoughts off her all week. She came and prayed for me on the last night at fire circle, and I prayed for her also. I later found out it was just a ploy to get my number, but I was a-okay with that. I wasn’t sure where this relationship was going to go because we lived so far away -so we just texted a lot. Eventually, I decided that it was worth the hardship that comes with long distance, because this was truly a girl I could see myself marrying someday.

I didn’t know if dating would work, at least not how I thought it did prior to her. So, I asked her to be my girlfriend or “Whatever the cool kids are calling it now-a-days”. She must’ve understood what I meant because she said yes. It was about a month before we actually went out on our first date and I was very nervous. I drove all the way to Lima to meet her family, so I dragged my brother, Jacob, along to help the nerves and potential awkwardness. I sat him next to her dad at lunch. I still wonder if he’s forgiven me for that. We kept meeting up after that and eventually our two-hour long trips felt like nothing because we had done it so much. October of 2020 came around and I knew Kordelia was my future. I wanted to ask her to be my wife. The plan was to do it in a hot air balloon ride at sunrise (super romantic, I know). But the weather was not going to permit us to do that. So, it was Friday night, I had just gotten the ring and told Collin “We’re going to do it tonight.” It just so happened that we had already planned to go to Mansfield’s Blood Prison that night. We all went and ran through the whole thing. When we had finally reached the end and were in the gift shop area; we left the crowd of people to a more separated room. I pretended to look on the bottom shelf for something, reached into my pocket, turned around, and asked my best friend to be my wife. I told Kordelia that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her and that in life we were going to face many scary situations, but the way we will make it through, is doing it together. It was very symbolic doing it there. We will take our hot air balloon ride another time. Now we are so close to saying “I do” and I am more in love with her than I have ever been before. I am so thankful that God had our paths cross years ago and for every little piece of help He's given us along the way, because now I get to marry my best friend.