We first met in 2013 when Jackie's family joined the Epiphany Catholic Homeschool Organization (ECHO). Jackie was 11 and Luca was 10 years old. While we met at a very young age, we wouldn't become friends until years later. Through the following years, we would often attend the same events and participate in the same activities.
We became friends after joining the E3 High-school youth group at the Church of the Epiphany. We attended a retreat with the youth group in April of 2018. It was at this retreat that we first bonded. We ended up talking quite frequently and spent lots of time with each other. At that time, we were both going through a rough period. Each of us had an unrequited crush on another person! We each ended up praying that God would show us what to do in our situations.
Later that evening, we ended up playing frisbee in the gym by ourselves for a few hours. There had been a huge blizzard, and there were about six inches of snow on the ground. As we walked out of the gym, Luca threw a snowball at Jackie and we had a snowball fight that ended with Jackie tackling Luca into a snowbank. We fell in love that night, and a month later Luca asked Jackie to be his girlfriend.
Through the six wonderful years we have been together, we have had many joys and many challenges. We have learned so much about each other, and have helped each other grow in ways we didn't know were possible. The most recent season of our relationship has been long-distance, since Luca attended college at the University of Mary in Bismarck, North Dakota. Luca has pushed through year round schooling in order to graduate sooner so we could get married.
Some of our favorite things are music and food, and most of our dates involve the two. We love going to the State Fair, and we go to concerts often. Our first actual (chaperoned!) date was at a Twenty One Pilots concert in 2019. Luca proposed to Jackie at a concert from the same band on August 18th, 2022. We will both be enjoying another fun concert from Twenty One Pilots the day after the wedding to start off our honeymoon.
We are very excited to finally be married, and we are feeling happy and blessed that we can share our special day with you. We ask for your prayers as we prepare to enter the next chapter of our lives, so that we may be the best husband and wife to each other that we can possibly be. Thank you for reading! We hope to see you at the wedding.