I remember the day my mom called me on my lunch break at work a week before I met Patrick. She said a church member, Chari, wanted our family to come over for Potluck after church this coming weekend. She had a cousin that was coming into town and he was shy and asked if my brother and I could entertain him basically. I did not feel like babysitting so I tried my very hardest to get out of it and my mom ended up forcing me to go and asked that I dress in something other than yoga pants and a sweater. That should have let me know right there that I was being setup on a blind date but it didn't. Patrick later told me that Chari had been asking him to come over for Potluck for awhile to meet other girls and he always found a way to back out, but for some reason he went the time we met. We are both extremely grateful for Chari and my mom for matching us together...even though some of us didn't want to go at all at first :)

Patrick had planned a mini weekend getaway for us since we had both been stressed out about life. He told me he wanted to do a little shopping rehab, dinner and a carriage ride the next day and what girl could turn that down? We went to dinner the next night and I could tell that he was a little more quiet than normal. Now the restaurant was extremely loud inside so it was sometimes hard to carry a conversation but I noticed he would do his awkward laugh at times. So I asked him if he was okay to which he replied, "Oh yeah, I'm just really full."...We had only had our appetizers at that time and if anyone knows him, you should know he can eat a giant meal, be stuffed as can be, but still take down some desert. I just thought maybe he wasn't feeling good and didn't want to ruin our date. We finished eating in the John Hancock building and they had all of these trees decorated for Christmas outside. I took a couple of pictures in the lower section and we climbed up the stairs so I could take a picture of the giant tree from the street level. As soon as I snapped the picture I hear Patrick say "Hey Mrs. Shetler!" from behind me. I turned around so quick and there he was down on his knee with the biggest smile I've ever seen! My heart melted and anyone who knows me knows that I'm not very emotional but he brought the tears out of me.