Tallie and Avery’s story is unique to them in many ways, and it’s one that neither of them could have seen coming. In 2020, Avery showed interest in Tallie and after some texting back and forth, he asked her out. They started officially dating long distance from Poctello to Ellensburg after spending a weekend together in Washington. Both Tallie and Avery wanted to get to know each other better and saw a potential future, but the timing wasn’t right the first go around.

Time revealed that there were certain things God wanted to mature, grow and refine in each of them while they were still single. Tallie and Avery were separately able to develop more as multipliers on staff with Resonate, understand themselves better and become even deeper friends with the people God had placed in their lives. Funny enough, they even both lead students from Ellensburg at Elevate San Diego for a summer.

In April of 2022, Avery began thinking about Tallie again, wondering if there could still be something between them. At Resonate Staff Retreat in May, Tallie caught herself looking for Avery in every room and wondering the same thing. Barely a week went by, and Tallie was receiving a phone call from Avery. They talked through how they wanted things to look different this time and admitted that they both had feelings for each other. God must have known what he was doing, considering they were about to spend yet another summer together in sunny San Diego!

From Mexican food in Seattle, to watching dolphins at the beach, leading village together and learning how to spend time together in the same city, that summer in SD made all the difference. Avery and Tallie both got the sense that they wanted to choose each other, knowing that they were signing up for lots of facetime calls, and trips to see each other.

In the following months, Tallie and Avery’s relationship progressed from figuring it out and really liking each other to being truly known by one another and growing to love each other. Tallie started to see how well Avery could balance her out by bringing out a fun, free side to her, just as Avery saw the way Tallie was uniquely suited to encourage who God’s making him to be and lead him to think deeply about things.

Soon enough, the plan for a proposal was in place. Tallie picked up Avery from the airport, thinking she was helping him plan their date day together, but little did she know, Avery was carrying around a diamond ring with him the whole day. They revisited the place where they went on their first date at Base Camp in Cle Elum, and Tallie was clueless. Some of her close friends showed up, and she knew right away what that meant. Avery immediately left to the spot where he would propose. After some time to pray and chat with her girls, it was time. She arrived at Lake Cle Elum and saw Avery standing there, ready to ask her to be his wife. She said yes!

It is clear to Tallie and Avery that the author of this story is their good and loving Father, who has planned all along that they would choose each other and choose Him for all of their days. Avery and Tallie see a thread of God’s faithfulness through their own individual stories, and the way that theirs became one. They are so excited to start a life together and to continue pursuing Jesus together as husband and wife.

Wedding Party