We'll see you in November 2021 <3

Our story begins just as you'd expect two millennials stuck in between major life stages would: on a dating app. Emily - settling back into her hometown of Lewisburg after living in Portland, OR - downloaded Hinge purely for entertainment sake. Nick - stationed in Elmira, NY for his clinical training portion of med school - was looking for any reprieve from studying. Emily came upon Nick's profile and was immediately smitten by his kind eyes and sweet grin. She decided to send the first message after reading in his profile that he wanted to be a "mailbox maker" when he was little. The intrigue! Nick had already "liked" Emily's profile images prior to the first message due to her enchanting smile, piercing blue eyes, and cryptic profile - not to mention Emily's incredibly cute puppy and cat. Fast forward a couple weeks of witty banter over text, Nick offered to drive 2 hours from Elmira to Lewisburg to meet Emily for a drink on a Thursday night. Emily suggested the Brasserie Louis, as she selfishly always wanted to have a first date in the dimly lit cocktail bar. When Emily arrived to the bar, late from a meeting and completely anxious and sweaty, she saw Nick in the corner reading a sci fi novel trying to look preoccupied and casual while actually also being completely anxious and sweaty. The rush of excitement upon finally meeting was enough adrenaline to keep them up all night sipping cocktails, listening to Frank Sinatra records, and talking about their lives. Little did they know that these moments would be the story they would excitedly share with all the other people in their lives they love and care about.

To celebrate the anniversary of the day we met, we had plans to go to dinner at one of our favorite local restaurants, Cherokee Taproom. Emily had a busy week at work, and was exhausted by the time she got home on that Friday afternoon. Nick greeted her with a glass of champagne and walked her out to the back porch where a bouquet of flowers was waiting for her on the patio table. Not surprised at all by Nick's thoughtfulness for their anniversary, Emily sat on the back porch with Nick, sipping champagne, enjoying the beautiful early fall day, and trying to convince him that we should get married in our backyard one day. Nick interrupted her, not convinced. "This house might not be where we get married..." *annoyed eye roll from Emily* "...but hopefully it is where we get engaged." Emily looked over to Nick at that moment and he was down on one knee with a beautiful heirloom ring. Emily, completely shocked, repeated over and over "WHAT THE F***?!". Eventually, he politely asked her to say something other than expletives, and she said yes - of course. We went out to our dinner, singing at tops of our lungs on the drive there. When we got home, we danced to Neil Young's 'Harvest Moon' outside in the grass, record player playing through the screen windows, underneath an actual harvest moon. It was the luckiest Friday the 13th they could've ever asked for.

OK, so we've tried our hashtag out on a lot of friends and family and 0% of people understood it. But maybe that's why we like it so much? Here it goes: Emily's current last name ends with "ko" and Nick's last name ends with "ki". This means, pre-marriage, our self-assigned couple name is KoKi. After we get married, we'll both be Gorski, so that means we'll be KiKi. #KoKi2KiKi. Do you get it?