December 3, 2016: Having moved from Arlington Heights to Naperville and having decided to date exclusively through Tinder, T.J. logs on to OKCupid to delete his profile. It's there that he notices a 27-year old from Schaumburg with the user name 3cmdavis has "liked" him.

T.J.: Good smile. Cute. Her profile felt genuine and I liked that she described herself as "annoyingly optimistic." Seemed like bad timing that I had just moved out of her area, though. But I ended up messaging her a few days later.

Chelsea: "You had me at annoyingly optimistic" was his opening line. He says that I "liked" his profile, but reading that message is the first memory I have of him and his witty profile.

T.J.: Initial conversation was pleasant; we set a date to play trivia together

Chelsea: He fell off the grid once we set the date.

T.J.: I slow played it, then sent a "Happy First Date Eve" text the night before our date. It was my go-to move.

December 14, 2016: Chelsea and T.J. meet for their first date at Riley's in Elmhurst

Chelsea: I had almost cancelled the date a few times. He didn't seem all that interested. We set a date in Elmhurst of all places and I was afraid of being seen by students (which did happen) and to top it all off, I spilled my lunch all over my shirt at work that day. Lucky for him, I had an extra shirt in my car and was left with no reason to bail on him.

T.J.: I had a funny trivia name I wanted to use. Feel her out a little.

Chelsea: He suggested a trivia name and it was the perfect way to break the ice.

Their trivia name was "This is Our First Date and If We Get Last Place There Won't Be a Second."

T.J.: After the host read the team names the whole bar was rooting for us. It was awesome.

Chelsea: The host read the team names aloud and all of a sudden everyone in the bar was interested in our first date. It was super weird.

T.J.: We finished in 4th out of about 10 teams. Respectable showing for a first date.

Chelsea: The next few dates were also to play trivia, something that we still do weekly.

T.J.: After a few more dates I deleted my Tinder and OKCupid profiles for good.

We sort of have a thing about paint colors.

The kitchen cabinets are Chelsea Grey.
T.J.'s Badlands wall color is actually named Badlands.
Our living room wall is painted Smoky Mountain Grey and adorned with pictures of our trip there.

On Monday, September 24, T.J. took the day off of work (Chelsea thought he was golfing) and painted another wall. He decorated it with pictures, inside jokes, and other mementos. When Chelsea came home from work, he told her that he had redecorated. He brought her into the room and showed her the wall. While she was taking it all in, he handed her the paint swatch that showed the color he picked out.