Austin was always the "best friend's brother's friend" who was really good at hockey and who happened to share the same birthday as me. A group outing of bowling...if you know me at all, then you know bowling is not a strong suit of mine. Off we went, the night was filled with awkward teenagers doing what they do best...being awkward and moments of me embarrassing myself with gutter after gutter. Austin was nonetheless a gentlemen and cheered me on, I ended the night with 1 strike and an arm around the shoulder from a cute boy. After that night, we knew that we wanted to set up a date, our first date (ever). Though, schedules of cheer leading and hockey made this less than easy. The day that ended up working for both of us ended up being the 26th of December...yes the day after Christmas. Mr. Austin got a nice little phone from Santa Claus that Christmas so we of course were non-stop texting. The 26th came and Austin had decided to have our date at good ol' Glacier Pointe. An ice skating date...for a hockey player...who would have guessed? My dearest mom drove me to the arena and Austin's brother and sister-in-law drove him. Once the awkward introductions were over, Austin continued his gentleman attributes and laced up my skates for me and helped me hobble over to the rink. Little did you all know, while Austin and I were non-stop texting the previous night, a little bet was made. Now the bet was, whoever fell, owed the other one a kiss. (MY FIRST KISS). Who do you think would be the one to fall here..Bingo. I almost made it til the end and then whoops...slipped right on my tush. Now I held up to the bet and closed my eyes and went for it...and it was well...wet. Probably our worst (but best) kiss ever. Then I remember going out to the car to my mom and after her asking how it went, my response being.."I hate kissing. Austin is so sweet, but I don't think this is going to be a long term thing." Here I am now 8 1/2 years later...about to marry this sweet man.

Well, my version of the story won't be as "graceful" as Amy's, but here's my recollection of our story...Pretty close to 9 years ago (as of this writing) someone messaged me on AIM to talk about a shared friend. Little did I know, that someone would very quickly become "my" someone for the rest of my life. Our casual conversations moved slowly at first, us being only 15 and 16, we were new to the relationship process. As slowly as things moved, I quickly found myself spending more and more time looking forward to her AIM icon popping up on the side-bar of my AOL browser. Throughout the summer of 2010, we continued talking, getting to know one another better and better. School started in September and we kept talking, sharing glances in-between classes and at lunch as we would walk by. Then came December, well, more specifically, Christmas break. Our talks had grown to the point where I think we were spending more time on the computer at home than we were with our families. Early in the break we went bowling with our friends-group, this served as kind of a mini-first-date. Around that time we set an unofficially-official-first-date...December 26th. Me being a cocky teenage hockey player knew the best way to impress the girl was by showing off my skating "skills". So we decided to go open skate at Glacier Pointe. I can honestly say, I have never been more nervous about skating in my entire life, one mistake and I risk making a complete fool of myself in front of a very beautiful girl. Before we met, there was a deal made, whoever falls owes the other a kiss. A fairly simple deal, you'd figure two hours on ice someone would fall (you'd think). Well before we knew it, our time was running out and we were both still kissless. That changed, and I remember exactly where it was on the ice when it did, when she stumbled and fell. We both knew the deal, she held up her side of it, and we both shared our first, very awkward, kiss. The rest, as they say, is history.