Benton and I met my freshman year and his sophomore year at our campus ministry, Cru's, annual spring break trip. We only spoke a few words, and then Covid sent us home for the remainder of the year... During the beginning of the 2021 school year, our mutual friends organized plans for a group of us to hang out after Cru, and thus began an amazing friend group! Our friends ended up hanging out almost every day for that school year, staying up until the late hours of the night playing games and getting to know each other. Six months into this friendship, after getting to know each other super well as friends, there was simply no denying that it was more than that! Benton and I went on our first date in March of 2022 and I was NERVOUS. Although we were such good friends, he was my (soon to be) first boyfriend and he had already captured my heart. Our first date was at El Rodeo in Blacksburg. Funny enough, my parents first date was at El Rodeo in Raleigh! We went to the Pylons on the Virginia Tech campus and talked forever. That night he said to me "I've been praying and I asked God to either make something happen between us or to make me stop thinking about you. And I never stopped thinking about you." He asked me to be his girlfriend one week later while sitting at the New River. Benton graduated just 2 months later, and we spent the next year-ish doing long distance! He came down for every football game, and I went up to Northern Virginia a couple times to visit him. Soon enough, I graduated, and Benton proposed on our friend group's graduation beach trip to the Outer Banks. It was so special and felt so fitting to have all of our friends back at the house to celebrate! Nowadays, Benton and I love playing pickle ball and getting into some good competitions (I've still never won), hanging out with our friends having game nights, going to Virginia Tech for football games, going to get ice cream (it's our weakness) and simply spending quality time together after a year of long distance. I absolutely can NOT wait to marry him and spend the rest of my life with my best friend!

Emily and I met during my sophomore year (her freshman year) during Cru at Virginia Tech’s spring break mission trip in Panama City Beach, FL. I thought she was really cool but that I had no chance with such a pretty girl with so many friends. So even though we met in 2020, we only really knew of each other. During my senior year (Emily’s junior year) my friend group happened to watch a VT football game with her friend group, and we all hit it off! We formed a new close knit group of friends that virtually became inseparable. We all hung out between classes on campus, after Cru Large Group, every weekend…okay maybe every day and every night. I remember countless nights where our friends stayed up playing games until 3 or 4 in the morning. All the while I was developing a huge crush on Emmy. There was just something magical about Em. She had the kindest heart and the most beautiful smile I’ve ever seen. She filled every room she was in with joy! And she made me feel so comfortable and known, even when we were just friends. I debated asking Emily out the entire Spring semester but couldn’t work up the courage. The Cru Spring Break mission trip my senior year was in Miami. We could not stop spending time with each other and the feelings I had for her from the whole semester were multiplied tenfold that week. When we got back to campus I knew that I couldn’t keep my feelings a secret and I also had a feeling that she felt the same way. The Monday we got back I did what any respectable manly guy would do, I texted her. We went on an amazing date to our favorite Blacksburg restaurant, El Rodeo, and then talked at the Pylons at the center of campus for hours. One week later, I decided to ask her to be my girlfriend on a date stargazing by the new river valley. Seeing each other every day lasted through the semester and the following summer. And then that dreadful day came for Emily to go back to VT for her senior year. I was lucky enough to be able to visit almost every weekend for football games and spend quality time with Em. After a year of long distance with lots of FaceTimes and lots of growth, I knew that my Emmy was the one. So on our friends beach trip in May, I asked her to be mine forever, and she said yes!