Kourtney and Matthew met on July 1st, 2022 at their Grad School orientation. Matthew immediately was enamored by Kourtney’s beauty, and laugh. (She has a laugh that lifts your heart to the moon and beyond), but told himself that he was looking for friends right now not romance and resigned himself. Kourtney decided Matthew was funny and not weird after she found herself enjoying a bizarre Snapple joke, he made. They ended up hanging out at the orientation and afterwards went to Bakersfield with a group of some of the new students (and Kourtney’s best friend/cousin Emily). While out and about Matthew would make a joke and Kourtney would laugh, and due to her great laugh, he would proceed to make more jokes and get more laughs, acting as a positive feedback loop that led to Matthew making far too many jokes in one evening than any respectable man would make, but luckily for him Kourt laughed the whole time. Despite Matthew’s convictions about needing to be just friends, when Kourt asked him if he wanted to get drinks one time in an individual text and not the group text with other students that had been used for making plans, he was getting excited that it might just be the two of them and no one else from the grad program. (Almost like a date?!?!) As he showed up at Taft’s ale house excited, he was quickly humbled as he showed up at the same time as another student from the program. This would in fact, not be just a Kourtney and Matthew hang. “That’s right”, Matthew told himself, “We are just friends”. Despite this, the next time Matthew invited Kourtney to hang out with him and some of his friends, she informed him (to his great surprise and delight) at the end of the night he really should have kissed her goodnight. They talked and decided that due to them being in the same cohort at school, that they should take things slow. They didn’t want to complicate school if things didn’t work out. They both agreed. Then they both proceeded to ignore that and dove head first into the relationship with gusto. Fast forward and Matthew proposed on May 4th, 2024 and despite his love for Star Wars the date was not intentional, but fortuitously will serve as a great help to remember which day of the year he proposed on. The proposal was a success (and much better than a proposal at the Seattle Space Needle that Kourt thought was going to happen). We are now so happy to get married and celebrate with our loved ones. We are excited to start our next chapter in life and are so grateful to all of our friends and family who have helped us get this far. Peace and Love!- K&M ​