Celebrating At Last

Kelsea & Dusty You could argue that we met back when we were little kids, jumping on a trampoline together. We had crossed paths who knows how many times. But never truly knew who each other was. Let alone that one day we would become husband and wife! I remember it so clear. I was moving in with one of my brothers friends. That’s really the only way I knew of Dusty. A friend of Cody’s that he had previously worked with. After showing up at the wrong residence… and now finding that I cannot get into the correct house because my arms are full and I’m struggling with my one free hand to turn the knob. He suddenly is standing in front of me with the door open, and I knew right away, he was trouble. Or rather that I was in trouble. I made excuses. Why it wouldn’t work. How different we were. The fact that we lived together. And at some point, none of it mattered. We fell in love. Dusty and I have a connection that can’t be explained. Only felt. A knowing, a familiarity. It wasn’t until our birthdays that we both knew there was something there and that a line was about to be crossed that we couldn’t take back. We were on the roof of the house, watching shooting stars. It got quiet, but it wasn’t awkward. It was a quiet that could only be present because the connection allowed it to be. It was cozy and comfortable. I remember being the one to break the silence (big surprise there). “Hey Dust?” “Yeah?” “I like you.” It was dark but I knew he was smiling. “I like you too.” He grabbed my hand and pulled me closer to him. And we stayed like that for many more shooting stars. We took things slow. I liked that (early on that is…after some time it was like, ok man, let’s get this thing going!) It felt like there was something special to uncover and that not a single detail should be left unknown. So slow was good, very good. We never seemed to have the timing down in a traditional sense. We lived together before we dated. We had a little one on the way before we were married. And at last, here we are celebrating the love that has brought us together and that has created our greatest gift of all. Thank you so much for helping us celebrate the love we have for one another and the love we have found in our growing family! We cannot wait to hug, dance and cheers with you!

Kevin and I are really lucky we found each other. A lot had to line up for us to even be put in the same place at the same time. With him living in Germany and me in central Minnesota, he quite literally had to cross an ocean to find me. With many thanks to Coach Hegle, Kevin and I met on the St. Cloud State Swim Team. I remember seeing him for the first time and thinking, “Oh my, what a cutie pie!” We kept our relationship to friends and teammates the two years we swam together. Being only friends did NOT stop us from the flirty banter though. We would chalk it up to friendly joking and thought nothing of it, until my graduation night… At this point, I did not know that Kevin had a crush on me and was about to make his last-ditch effort. We were at the bars on graduation night, I was talking to some girlfriends and out of nowhere, my Kevin runs up to me, grabs my face in his hands, yells “YOU’RE SO CUTE!”, plants a big ole kiss on my lips, and then… RUNS AWAY!!! I figured he was being a silly college boy just playing tricks, so I did nothing and went on with my night. Summer came, I moved over an hour away from St. Cloud where Kevin was still a student, and we maybe exchanged a handful of texts in total. I do not think either of us had each other on our radars at this point. But I went back to St. Cloud one day to see some friends, Kevin being one of them, convinced me to come back that weekend for a party. I went, we flirted (as usual), pretended he was my boyfriend at the bars, danced in the streets on our walk home, and FINALLY after years of flirtatious games realized that we had something undeniable and real between us. We have not gone a single weekend without each other since. Now being together for almost 5 years, we have a little girl on the way due in May, and continue to fall deeper and deeper in love with each other. He is my Kev, and I am his Mags. It can now be as simple as that! Thank you for being a part of our love story by celebrating with us at last!