Corinne and Amanda met online. OKCupid to be exact. Both had spent some time on dating sites. Both had been on dates before. It is hard to know what to make of profiles. Will she make me laugh? Will we have anything in common? Is her profile a good representation of who she is? Amanda made the initial contact but Corinne reciprocated quickly. The first invite for a date in person was a Philly Pops concert on a Sunday afternoon. Amanda didn't yet know that Corinne worked in baseball when Corinne had to turn down this invite due to a game that same afternoon. But Corinne followed up immediately with a counter offer and their first date was set: Independence Beer Garden! The date set the tone for many aspects of what was to come. A center city date reflected a shared love for Philly, two pints of Dogfish 60 Minute foretold a mutual taste in beer, and a conversation which floated topics of family, work, friends, baseball, music, and travel suggested overlapping interests. Amanda remembers Corinne’s straight-faced joke delivery that made her throw her head back and laugh. Corinne remembers being immediately charmed when she arrived to find Amanda working on a crossword puzzle and leaving the date with a mix of excitement and nerves over her hopes a second date would soon follow. It took just 3 dates for them both to know something truly special was building between them.

One of the silver linings of life as we knew it coming to a halt in 2020 was the unanticipated opportunity for Amanda and Corinne to spend extraordinary amounts of time together and realize this relationship was indeed the one they had been waiting for. Corinne knew she wanted to be the one to ask the question and to do so in a way that honored the combining of their two families. With the help of Amanda's parents (and unbeknownst to Amanda), she arranged for the two to spend a quiet weekend away at the home Amanda's dad built in Schuylkill County, PA. The last weekend of October 2020 they headed up to the home under the pretext of getting away from the city to enjoy the quiet pace of life at the family home known as "the farm." Then on Saturday, October 31, 2020 (an unintentional Halloween engagement!), Amanda and Corinne took their dog, Gabbie, on a walk down to the pond on the property where Corinne got down on one knee and proposed using her Grandma Landrey's engagement ring -- 78 years after Grandpa Landrey proposed with it. Amanda immediately said yes.

With. You. There.