When Andrew moved to Atlanta for a new job in late 2015, he barely knew anyone living around there. He found out about the website MeetUp, where you could join groups of like-minded people who might become friends, and the next year, his love of trivia led him to join "Something Punny," which was created by Ali's sister, Claire. It took until February 2017 for Ali and Andrew to actually meet. It was a pub quiz event at Rose & Crown Tavern, and it also happened to be Valentine's Day. They sat across from each other and talked about crockpot recipes and politics (among several topics) for quite awhile before Ali left a little bit early. Wanting to continue the conversation, Andrew sent Ali a Facebook message, and after some back and forth over the next week, he asked if she wanted to get together for drinks. Ali was in the middle of a bad date at the time she saw his message, and she was more than happy to accept a date offer from someone whose favorite drink wasn't Fireball. Ali had to get over the fact that Andrew was a Yankees fan (we all have our character flaws), but they had a wonderful time at Under the Cork Tree. They started dating shortly afterward, and they've returned to Cork Tree at least once every month since that night.

Ali had been away for the entire weekend at Claire's bachelorette party, surveying the wineries of North Georgia. She knew that Andrew was planning on cooking dinner for them when she returned. She had no idea about anything else. Andrew had cleaned up the apartment patio for the occasion and actually did a half-decent job preparing the Spanish chicken & rice skillet. He said that he had three surprises for Ali, too. First came the sunflowers before dinner. Afterward came the gift of a wine bottle that had the appropriate label of "A2017," for their shared first initial and the year they started dating. Ali later asked if she could have her third surprise, so Andrew gave her the notebook where they had been tracking destinations that they wanted to visit and places around Atlanta they wanted to try. He had added another section chronicling one notable event of their relationship for every month since they began dating. Ali thought that she had spied a ring box in his pocket as she was reading, but wasn't sure. Then, she saw that the last entry read "June 2019: I ask you to marry me," and that Andrew was down on one knee. The ring itself was a family heirloom – it had the same stone as the ring given to Andrew’s great-grandmother, Helen Hardinge, by his great-grandfather, Dudley Robinson, over 93 years ago. Through some amateur stealth, Andrew picked out a new setting, and he had the engagement ring. Andrew and Ali's engagement date of June 23rd is also significant. It's the same day that Al Mearns and Marian Brown (Andrew's paternal grandparents) got married in 1951.