When I first laid eyes on Kylin, I had recently moved to Waco to pursue my dream in aviation while she had been attending Baylor in pursuit of her bachelor’s degree in Cell and Molecular Biology. It was our first life group meeting through our church and though I didn’t interact with Kylin, I had eyes for her. Around 6-7 weeks passed by and we found ourselves looking into each other's eyes for the first time as the last two participants in our life group game. A couple weeks later after evangelism and a movie with our life group Halloween night, I had the special opportunity to walk Kylin to her car where we struck our first conversation that proceeded to last hours late into the night. Within a span of a week we found ourselves at multiple sorority events, church services, and late nights at the Baylor library together. I took her on our first date November 16th that featured GF pizza and cookies, a nerf war, the train bridge, and a movie. Our second date December 1st of 2023 featuring the Waco dam, pumpkins, flowers, and a mysterious bottle with a message inside where I officially asked her to be my girlfriend. Soon to follow was our “firsts” together such as our first kiss, first Christmas, first time saying I love you, first solar eclipse, first birthday celebrations, first hike, first time overseas, first road trip, first concert, first wedding, first pumpkin patch, first sunset flight, and many more. February 1st, 2025 I got down on one knee and made it clear in that moment that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her, and her response of “YES YES YES YES YES” clarified our intentions were aligned. The Lord worked a beautiful story crossing our paths and aligning our lives that we now get to share with you all.
-Liam Gardiner