We're excited to McParty with you!

Take it back to September 28, 2013 in Iowa City, IA. Both Mike and Beth were single and Tinder was the latest and greatest app out there to look for other single peeps. Beth and her friend Deidre had been watching the Iowa football game at a local bar, and once the game was over, they decided to head downtown to continue the night in Iowa City. Since Tinder was the cool thing to do at the time, Beth had been chatting it up with a guy named Aaron. It just so happened that Aaron was going to be at the same bar as Beth and Deidre (Sports Column, or as the hip kids would say, SpoCo) and they agreed that they would try and meet up with one another at the bar for the first time. Once arriving at SpoCo, Beth and Deidre were on a mission...to find Aaron. The only problem with finding Aaron is that they only had a few photos from his Tinder profile to identify him from and the bar was undoubtedly crowded post-football game. With a quick tour of the bar, Beth was certain she had spotted Aaron...game on! Deidre , after having a few drinks throughout the day, walked directly up to "Aaron," tapped him on the shoulder, and immediately asked, "Hey! do you have Tinder?!" Check, this guy in fact had Tinder. Deidre didn't wait around for long, because the next question she asked was, "What's your name?" (As a side note, it's always best to have a few "no filter" friends to help cut right to the chase). Well, the response wasn't what either of them were expecting because the guy in question responded, "Mike." Well, at that moment Beth knew she had the wrong guy as she was looking for an Aaron, but Deidre kept asking questions anyways. The third question Deidre asked was, "What year did you graduate from high school?" I thought the guy in question was super cute, but we needed to know how old he was without asking directly. He responded, "2010." This is the moment when Deidre said, "Well, see you later!" and just walked away because in her mind, this dude was three years younger than us and we needed to move on. Regardless, Beth kept talking to Mike for awhile, knowing that Aaron was somewhere roaming around the bar. After chatting it up with this cute guy for awhile, Deidre was ready to move on to a different bar. After only chatting with him for a little bit, Beth knew that this guy was super interesting, intelligent, cool, cute and she didn't really want the conversation to stop there. Beth was too scared to ask for his number, and after consulting with Deidre, it was agreed that she was going to help her out. Well, that's when Deidre walked directly up to Mike and said, "Hey! I think you should ask my friend for her number!" So, with Deidre standing in the middle of the two, Mike and Beth both awkwardly exchanged numbers. To be exact, Beth saved Mike's number as "Mike SpoCo" in her phone just so she could remember which Mike it was in her phone. After leaving the bar, Mike and Beth chatted for awhile and decided to meet up at a different bar to carry on the conversation a little bit more. Needless to say, Beth never met up with Aaron, and Mike and Beth have been together ever since. While Mike and Beth didn't meet directly on Tinder, they are both thankful for their Tinder mishap that left Aaron roaming the bars of Iowa City alone. On December 20, 2020, Mike decided to lock it down at the Chicago Botanic Gardens by popping the question with Mike's family and Beth's little sister surrounding them. It was the perfect ending to a year that was full of craziness, including a toilet paper shortage. Mike and Beth love to hike, explore nature, ride bikes, be involved within the community, hang out with their two cats, go on runs, collect plants, check out different ramen restaurants, jam out to rap music in the car, watch the Iowa Hawkeyes and enjoy all that there is to life with one another. P.S. - Aaron, if you're still roaming around SpoCo... you're the real MVP. Thank you for bringing us together.