Our story begins the day we met on the Bonanza- a booze cruise out of Fortescue, NJ for a mutual friend's birthday party. Travis was home for the summer, after finishing his time in the Army & before planning to move out west for work. Niki was excited to celebrate with friends on the water. From the first conversation, our connection was instant. We spent most of the party, as well as the after party (@ the Bait Box) getting to know one another. We fell easily in love that summer and when fall came, we drove across the country together to help Travis move to New Mexico. This is where we would love to say "and they lived happily ever after" but the reality is that long distance isn't easy. Travis had committed to his career on the west coast before they met, and Niki was in the beginning of her career back east. After months of traveling back & forth, we agreed that our lives were taking different paths. Though, what's meant to be will always find a way.

This part of the story is similar to the last, in that again Travis was home visiting when we reconnected at another mutual friend's birthday dinner. After having not seen each other in some time, and of course with state of the world (damn Covid), it was awkward at first, to say the least. We sat on opposite ends of the large table & barely spoke besides initial greetings. As the night went on, we eventually were able to catch up on how life had been since we last spoke and found the connection as easily this time as we had before. At the end of the night, as our friends had said their goodbyes & we all started to leave, Travis ran back to Niki's car. And when she rolled down the window to see if everything was ok, he leaned his head in & kissed her. That night started a new beginning. At first, we kept our rekindling relationship to ourselves- we wanted to figure out if & how we could make things work. As luck would have it for Niki, Travis had already started planning on moving back to the east coast to be closer to family.

As most of you know, Travis is not necessarily a planner- he's more inclined to live life spontaneously, every moment as it comes. To say he was able to surprise Niki with his proposal is an understatement. She had no idea that he had planned for some time, wrote & recorded a song just for her. Then he gathered all of their closest friends back on the boat where they had first met to get down on one knee & pop the question. It was romantic, and thoughtful... the best kind of surprise. He asked, she said yes... And here we are now, ready to start our forever. Thank you all for celebrating with us! CHEERS!