Our story began during our junior year at Harding University in Searcy, Arkansas. It was the beginning of the semester. My good friend Rebecca and her now husband Parker asked if I wanted to get dinner in the cafeteria and catch up. We sit down to eat our meal and Parker says that he is inviting one of his good friends to eat with us. It is not too long before I see my future wife come and sit down beside us. The face is not one of a complete stranger. I had sat behind this girl the semester before in a U.S. History class. However, due to me being shy, and concluding that she had an irritated look on her face 50% of the time (which I now know is just her concentrating face), I never really spoke to her. Thankfully that began to change as I had dinner with her on this occasion. Parker's birthday was coming up shortly and he invited both Tori and I to celebrate. Fast forward a few weeks and we are in Chuy's Tex Mex in Little Rock with a large group. I end up sitting by Tori. I still did not know what to make of her. She was very cute and very funny, but she was also loud and outspoken. If you know me you know that this is slightly different than my personality. But something about her made me want to continue to make conversation with her, she was just a cool, unique person. We went back to Parker's for cake and ice cream. As the festivities wrap up for the night I realized that it would be nice to spend some more time with this girl. I message her on Facebook (embarrassing right?) asking for her number and that we should hang out sometime. Luckily, she obliged and from that point on we regularly hung out around campus and with friends. I took her to every function that my social club offered over the next few months. Finally, in April of 2015 I asked if she would be my girlfriend. The rest is history as they say. Since then we have traveled, hiked, eaten across several states and enjoyed each others' company every step of the way.

It was a very hot May weekend in central Arkansas. A few weeks before, I had bought the ring for the girl of my dreams with my friend Owen who was their for moral support. Owen, a skilled photographer and one of my best friends, was in town again this weekend for Benji & Jill's wedding. The plan was to tell Tori that we were going to go hike at Petit Jean Mountain which is a favorite hiking spot and state park an hour outside of Little Rock. I thought it would be sweet not only because we have hiked there many times together, but also because Tori's middle name is Jean and I thought it would be cute. Owen would tag along with his camera to take pictures of the beautiful scenery and hang out with us which was not out of the ordinary at all. I couldn't believe it but a few days before Tori actually told me, "We should go hiking on Petit Jean." This made it easy as I had been agonizing over how I would suggest hiking on such a hot weekend. Little did Tori know that her Parents and best friend Ashlee would be there waiting for her along with my family. We arrive at Petit Jean and the plan is to propose on the overlook before we were all sweaty. As we walked through the lodge I was petrified to see my mother and Tori's father sitting right in our line of sight chatting away. Luckily they were just off to the side enough for Tori not to notice as she stopped by the restroom. I quickly redirected our parents to a different part of the lodge. Tori and I walk outside and I am deciding how I want to do this. I stop by the mounted binoculars and quickly come up with a plan. The binoculars cost 50 cents to use. I ask Tori if she had any change knowing that she wouldn't. I kneel down to get some out of my backpack and instead pull out the ring. Tori is looking out on the horizon at this point but I get her attention when I say, "Tori, will you marry me?" (The box is upside down as I ask). She says yes as Owen snaps some nice shots of us embracing and kissing.