We met at Andrews University during group dinner in the cafeteria. Melissa worked with a few aviation students, one of whom was extremely intent on bringing people together over dinner in the cafe. Nathan just so happened to be an aviation maintenance student. When Nathan moved into the dorms during his junior year of school, he found himself eating at the cafe more often, and who better to sit with than his familiar aviation buddies and some other randos? One dinner at a time "the group" became a well-established friend group. Melissa and Nathan's friendship grew exponentially. Nathan, being older and wiser than Melissa, started falling for her after he graduated, but she quickly informed him that the feelings were not mutual. Luckily for Nathan, he lived local to the university which gave him another year before Melissa graduated to woo and charm her but his efforts were in vain. After graduation, the group decided to have one last hurrah together at Cedar Point Amusement Park. At one point the group as a whole decided it would be fun to hold hands before the big drop on one of the coasters. Nathan cleverly positioned himself in line ahead of time so that he would be seated next to Melissa and would get to hold her hand. Following that trip, Melissa moved to Wisconsin and shortly thereafter both Nathan and Melissa found themselves missing each other's company. Even though she had rejected him months prior, Melissa realized through their continued friendship, that her feelings for Nathan were slowly growing. Upon telling him, Nathan assured her that his feelings for her had never changed. The two made things official soon after and the rest is history.

Nathan moved to Wisconsin in September of 2023 to be closer to Melissa. Both happened to have the first week of October off from work. Since Nathan had a season pass to Cedar Point Amusement Park, Melissa suggested they make a trip to Ohio to take advantage of the pass before the end of the season. Little did she know, Nathan decided he would propose the day they arrived. Unfortunately for him, the weather was abysmal, and it poured all day, ruining his plans for a beach proposal. Melissa joked weeks prior that she did not want to be proposed to in the amusement park, leaving Nathan very few options for locations. After the rain subsided, the two enjoyed an evening at the park. Melissa and Nathan returned to their hotel rooms and cleaned up before meeting for a late dinner. Knowing he had little time left in the day, Nathan began to look for any opportunity to pop the question. At one point in their dinner preparations, Melissa attempted to swipe Nathan's pocket knife from him to open their dinner items. Worried that she would notice the ring box in his pocket, Nathan, in the spur of the moment, grabbed Melissa's hands to keep them away and promptly got down on one knee. In her state of shock Nathan proposed to Melissa, and after multiple "are you serious" and "you're kidding me" statements from Melissa, she finally said YES!