I’m so excited to share a personal life update with you all today: Mark and I are engaged! And before I get into all of the juicy details about the proposal, I thought it would be fun to take a step back and share our full love story. It truly feels like a story right out of a fairy tale or romance movie.

Mark and I first met over 8 years ago at a swing dance night that we went to with mutual friends. I’m older than Mark, so at the time, I was in college, and he was in high school. Here’s a photo from that night. We’re on opposite sides of the picture.

He came to that dance with his sister, Hannah, who ended up becoming one of my best friends! Hannah and I became close through swing dancing together, living across the street from each other, and then working together. Hannah is still one of my best friends today! And because of that, Mark and I stayed in each other’s lives as friends over the years as well. Here’s a photo of us a few years later.

I always knew that Mark and I had great conversations whenever we saw each other, but I never thought of him as anything more than a friend. Then, in 2020, we began to become much closer as friends when our friend group formed, and all of us started hanging out a lot more often. Here we all are, celebrating Hannah’s birthday.

At the beginning of this year, Mark started coming to church with me and asking me to hang out one on one, but I was pretty oblivious and didn’t think anything about it at the time. I thought he just wanted to hang out as friends. When Mark first told me that he liked me and wanted to date me earlier this year, I was shocked! I didn’t even know how to respond. I knew that I really liked spending time with him, but I didn’t think I could date my best friend’s brother, and I didn’t want to ruin my friendship with him either. But Mark was so sweet and patient, and never stopped pursuing me. About a month later, we took a trip with our friends to North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. It was on this trip that I realized I had strong feelings for Mark. Here’s a photo of us on a hike in Tennessee!

After a few more weeks of spending time together, I finally told Mark I was ready to date him on the same day that he told me he had accepted a new job offer and was moving to Greenville, South Carolina. I was sad, but I knew that dating Mark long distance was better than not being with him at all. He ended up moving less than two weeks after we started dating.

Our relationship has been filled with lots of driving back and forth between Indiana and South Carolina and lots of FaceTiming when we can’t be together in person. But it has also been filled with so much more fun, love, joy, support, adventures, hugs, and great conversations than I ever could have hoped for. Here’s a small glimpse into our many adventures over the past few months. These were all “selfies” taken with my tripod.

After 7 months of having so much fun together, Mark asked me to marry him last Friday! He asked me if I wanted to go for a sunrise walk in downtown Indy and bring the tripod along to take some photos of us. We set up the tripod on the War Memorial downtown and took a couple rounds of photos with the self timer. On the third round, he got down on one knee and proposed! Afterwards, he had planned a surprise engagement party with all of our friends and family at Hannah’s house! We had a lovely brunch with waffles and mimosas and all of the people we love the most. It was absolutely perfect, and so special. Here are the photos from the proposal!

And now I get to marry the best person I’ve ever met! Mark is so kind, thoughtful, hard-working, loving, caring, and self-less. I’m the luckiest girl in the world to get to spend my life with Mark!

Wedding planning has just begun, and now I’m in the same position as the couples that I get to work with every day, which has been so much fun.

I hope you enjoyed reading a little bit more about our love story! Engagement and wedding photos to come :)