When Abi saw an old college classmate in a picture with a guy she met just outside her hometown, she just had to know the answer to the question "How in the world do you know Tony Scinta?"

When Sam, living six hours away from his hometown, heard Abi ask, he just had to know the answer to the question "How in the world do *YOU* know Tony Scinta?"

And from that began a five-year, four-state path that leads to College Station, Texas, on October 4th, 2024.

For Sam, it was love at first sight - he told his friends the morning after their first date that he was "going to marry that girl."

Abi needed a little convincing, but by the time the question was finally popped, she was more than ready to say yes.

We're so excited to begin forever after, but can't wait to share I Do with you all first!

Abi was born in September of 1998 to Bob and Mandi Brannan in Toledo, Ohio.

She grew up in nearby Whitehouse with her older sister, Kelsey, and originally wanted to be a vet before choosing a life in the military through an ROTC path at Ohio State University.

It was there she unwittingly met the brother of the man she would eventually choose to marry, although they would not meet until she had transferred to school back home at the University of Toledo.

Abi has worked as a manager for Amazon since February 2020 and is currently running operations for the largest-volume distribution building in the Amazon network in the city of Houston. Her career has allowed her to work everywhere from the hills of Central Pennsylvania to the scorching deserts of the Sonoran to Pacific Coast.

Sam was born in November of 1994 to Sam and Kerry Scinta in Arlington Heights, Illinois.

He grew up in O'Fallon with his younger brother Tony and, despite his family suggesting he should explore a future career in writing, decided to pursue a degree in music education from the University of Kansas instead.

Flash forward a little more than a decade, and Sam is now the Managing Editor of the Wharton County Leader-Journal newspaper outside of Houston, a career that includes a fateful stop at a small-town newspaper in Ohio, just outside of Toledo.

Sam will be missing his grandmother Cathy Cayley, who passed in 2001, his grandfather Sam Scinta, who passed in 2020 and his grandmother Joan Scinta, who passed in 2023. He knows both his Grandma Cayley and Grandpa Scinta would have absolutely adored Abi - his Grandma Scinta sure did.