HER STORY:

We were friends since we were 4 years old, from summer swimming lessons, to seeing Clifford the big red dog live, and hanging out with each other's families for summer play dates. This went on for about 4-5 years and life got busy, after school activities took off with girl scouts and dance for me, we just fell off. I would see him occasionally outside playing soccer, or doing yard working as we lived 30 seconds down the road from each other.

One summer my pool had stopped working, That was the summer of 2017. I called Lindsey Mercer to ask "Do you think we could possibly go swimming at Mrs. Bobbie's Pool?" She said "We can always go ask..." and so we did and we talked inside with Mrs. Bobbie for probably 45 minutes just catching up on life that we had missed for the last 7 years. Lindsey and I then went swimming, and probably an hour later this super cute guy came outside with another boy who looked like his little brother (who turned out to be Cameron Miller ) and started playing soccer like they did sometimes. The cute boy kicked the ball super hard to where it landed somewhere in the woods. And the first thing that boy did was come over to me as I was sitting outside of the pool with my feet in the water and asked "Did you see where the soccer ball went?". I pointed and said "Into the woods somewhere." They went and searched the woods for probably a good 10 minutes and could not find the ball, They gave up and came swimming with us. That cute boy then reintroduced himself to me as Kenneth. We then talked in the pool for hours. We caught up on life these last years that we missed out on each other lives. We found out that we had a lot in common, and did I mention I thought he was really cute!!

Later that night I went home and told my mom that "I had met a boy" and since then the rest is history!!!

Oh and to this day the soccer ball has still not been found!!

HIS STORY

In all honesty, I do not truly remember meeting Kaitlyn. I just remember her being there as one of the neighborhood kids throughout my childhood. As time went on and life happened I saw her less and less until one day, not at all. Come the summer of 2017, I had graduated from high school and was preparing to go to college so the last thing on my mind was finding a girl. God, of course, had other plans.

The day we met was just like any other day and I found myself out in the front yard playing soccer with my cousin when all of a sudden I misfired on a shot and the ball flew yards over the goal into the backyard coming to rest somewhere in the woods. Dejected and frustrated with myself, I began the shameful walk to the backyard to find my lost soccer ball when I noticed that there were some neighborhood visitors in Grandma’s pool. I assumed it was some of our other neighbors that regularly came to the pool every summer so I did not think much of it and continued my trek to the woods. I searched for my ball but did not have any luck finding it so I thought it might be worth it to ask the people in the pool if they had seen where it went. Upon walking up to the pool from the woods, I quickly realized that the girl in the pool was not who I thought it was. It was a beautiful girl who looked very familiar but someone I knew I had not seen in a very long time. At that moment I remembered her name: Kaitlyn. I asked if she had seen where my ball went to which she said no but for some reason I did not want to play soccer anymore. I wanted to go to the pool with the pretty girl I had just met. So I forfeited my search for the soccer ball and got in the pool. Kaitlyn and I talked for quite a while and found that we had much in common. She came back the next day and the next… and a few more after that until I got the hint to ask her out to which she said yes.

Here we are now, seven years and a lot of life later and we are engaged to be married. I think about that day often and how lucky I am. Lucky that I get to call the girl I met at the pool that day mine forever.

Photos