Well a little over a year later, and I’m returning to the blog with an exciting update…

Tristan and I are engaged!

We have decided to take the next step in our relationship, into marriage. This has been such a bliss-filled time and one that I want to soak up for as long as I can. I have to admit, the newly-engaged phase of life, is as fun as everyone says! With it has come an overwhelming amount of love and support from loved ones - we feel so thankful.

Tristan and I have navigated cohabitating, growing in our careers, a pandemic and traveling through our bucket list. And now, we are settling into Edmonds and are bringing a fur baby, Grover, into our lives. The timing of moving into engagement and next year, marriage, felt so right to us. Timing truly is everything.

Before I get into the how it all happened, I have to share what’s been on my mind pre-engagement. When you’ve been with someone for as long as we’ve been together (eight years this summer) you’re bound to navigate the flood of questions like “When are you getting married?,” “Why aren’t you engaged yet?” I’ve truly never understood the need to poke, prod or try to diminish the choices your loved one makes with comments like this — which is why I want to pose the following questions to those that make these comments, What are you getting out of saying X to X person? Will my question or comment uplift this person (people) I love?

Receiving these types of comments and questions prior to being engaged goes on and on we’ve heard it all. More often than not these questions are rooted in the best of intentions and deep rooted curiosity, but to be honest, it can be down right frustrating to navigate. Because, it’s nobody’s business what your timeline and ‘next steps’ look like. If there’s one thing I know coming out of this experience prior to getting engaged, it’s reducing the noise around you and focusing on your love bubble as Teresa Guidice would say. It required us both to set some boundaries with loved ones in the process and keep focused on the life we have built and the life ahead. My uncle recently worded this process perfectly, he referred to this as “keep it to the two” and when you focus on “the two” and keep your priorities and needs top of mind, the rest falls to the wayside.

I wanted to caveat our ‘how we met’ and how we got engaged story with this because I’ve recently had multiple conversations with individuals who are currently or have fielded these kind of questions and judgements (intentional or not) from loved ones and are left to process in isolation or with their partner. The reality is, relationships are personal — every decision you make: who you choose to date, travel with, settle down with, marry, cohabitate with…it’s a choice. As is every next step and big life decision you make. Take the time needed for you and your relationship (there is no one size fits all here) to navigate each and every step of the way and keep your focus on, the two.

Now, let’s get to the fun part.

For those that don’t know our ‘how we met story’ I thought it’d be fun to share.

We matched on Tinder in July 2015, when it was in its infancy and a reliable way to meet people. Fun fact: I was Tristan’s one and only Tinder date. He was my second, sorry T! On our first date, we met for drinks at a bar in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle. We talked for hours.

After a few drinks, Tristan suggested whiskey flights at a nearby bar. I (who, fun fact: hate whiskey) agreed and lied about how enjoyable I thought the flight was. It wasn’t until a year later that Tristan would learn that I do in fact, hate whiskey.

We don’t have a dating anniversary because after our first date, the rest was history. However, I will say: pro-tip, men (or women) out there, I highly recommend you have the official ‘are we exclusive/are you my girlfriend’ talk like we are in middle school. I constantly poke fun at Tristan about this. All joking aside, like I said above, we have built a life and relationship filled with love, trust, adventure and unwavering partnership. We moved in together after 3 years of dating. I loved having time for each of us to navigate solo living and adapt and build a life together when we decided to cohabitate. During our time together, we have traveled around and outside of the country, spent time with friends and family and prioritized connecting over food, travel and exploring the outdoors together.

In 2022, we moved north to Edmonds together to experience a slower pace of life and we have since fallen in love with our little waterfront town. We are excited to hopefully put down permanent roots here, soon (post-wedding).

Everything really came into place for us in 2023 - we have worked hard in our careers in tech, know that Edmonds is where we want to settle and we are also bringing a fur baby into our lives this month.

The proposal

Tristan proposed on Sunday, March 12th, 2023 at a private area on a beach in Edmonds. Funny story - I was told this was a walk to a beach so I wore what I planned on wearing (Edmonds chic attire) to a wine tasting that afternoon. This did in fact end up being more of a hike to the beach and my beige jeans and white Nike’s were trashed by the time we got down there.

The moment was just so us - intimate, next to the water and in our waterfront town. While an engagement and marriage was in our near future, the day of the engagement I was not expecting this to happen at all. Being able to learn more about the planning that went into the proposal (which included Tristan flying out to Denver and back in a day to ask my parents) was so touching. I could not believe the amount of thought, love and care that went into this day. After soaking up time just us on the beach and sharing the news with loved ones, we headed into town to have a tasting (what I thought was our original plan for the day) at our local favorite wine tasting room Dusted Valley. That evening we treated ourselves to dinner out at a local favorite restaurant and sat on their covered string lit back patio while it rained. It was a magical end to the evening.

A week after we got engaged we headed down to the desert (all part of an original plan to spend two weeks there) and we ended up dedicating our time there to venue tour and get some wedding planning done (since we have known for years a desert wedding was the goal for us).

The past two months have been an absolute whirlwind in the best way. We are so excited to continue building our forever, together and say I do next year in September.

Throughout this experience, I’ll do my best to share learnings and wedding planning as we navigate it all. Transparently, I’ve whole heartedly LOVED the experience of wedding planning to the point I’ve even reconsidered what I’m doing in my career.

I’m appreciative of those who have reached out to share their support and excitement about our engagement! It means the world to us both.