It all started on July 3, 2022. I was driving home with my friend McKenzie after a day of boating on Rend Lake with Holly and Joel. My phone started ringing with a Facetime from Meredith Chaffin who is my best friend from grad school. I thought it was weird that Meredith was Facetiming me instead of just texting me, but I answer it. On the phone was not Meredith but a guy who I had never seen before. he starts talking and McKenzie looks at me and says, "Is that Collin Pierce?" I had no clue who it was, but McKenzie did. McKenzie and Collin went to high school together. He also knew Joel from both being on their town's fire departments and Joel being a police officer in Freeburg where Collin lived. Also, he was on the fire department with my cousin Andy. So Collin knew one of my best friends, and two of my cousins, but I still had no clue who he was. He kept trying to Facetime me from Meredith's phone that evening, and I kept handing my phone off to people who knew him because I was NOT interested. He wanted me to meet him for fireworks that night. Instead I went home, ate mac and cheese (my hangover meal) and went to bed. That was the last time I thought I would hear from Collin Pierce.

Fast forward to October 8, 2022. Meredith texted me that her and some friends were coming to Red Bud to visit the Pour Winery. Meredith and I hadn't gotten to see each other much since grad school so I jumped at the chance to go see her since she was in my hometown. I honestly don't remember much from that day other than walking down the stairs of the patio of The Pour and seeing only one chair available in the group. That chair was next to Collin Pierce. I walked down those stairs saying to myself, "This is a f***ing set up." Meredith's whole friend group had been in on it especially Collin. I would barely look at him because I was not interested in being set up. The only other thing I remember from that day was Collin saying he preferred Carrie Underwood over Miranda Lambert. Meredith had trained him well.

A couple weeks later, Meredith invited me to soup and movie night with her friends. I did enjoy the group I got to meet at The Pour so I agreed. It was definitely another set up because Collin was hosting. I asked Meredith to send me his address, and once she did, m mouth dropped. I knew exactly where he lived. His parents house was on the same street as my cousin's house. Did Collin know the entire Fults side of my family?

I went over to his house, and he had made homemade potato soup for dinner. We were all sitting around talking and not really watching "Hocus Pocus 2" which was the movie choice that night. Collin and I started talking more, and I was starting to think I could possibly like him. I was one of the last people to leave his house that night.

About a week later, I was at the Fox with Kelsey to see Frozen. I get a direct message that says "I believe I heard you're suppose tp sing as loud as possible for tonight's play" from Collin. We continued to message back and forth in between acts, but I stopped after the show and let it be. The next morning he asked me how the show went, and we have talked every day since.

November 2022 was very busy for me. I had a trip to Branson, a Carrie Underwood concert, and a trip to Wisconsin planned. During this time, I continued o talk to Collin and kept wondering when he was going to ask me out. He finally did when I was on my way home from Wisconsin with McKenzie. I was so excited, an I had never been excited about a date before. I usually had so much anxiety and would try to get out of it, but that didn't happen this time.

Over the course of the rest of November, Collin and I had many dates. we went to see Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, went on lunch and dinner dates, had a Christmas movie night where I introduced him to DiCarlos pizza, I crashed Friendsgiving, and went to see Christmas lights. I almost cancelled our date to go see Christmas lights because I was not feeling well at all. Collin convinced me to go, and I am so glad I did because that is the night that Collin asked me if was feeling "thumbs up or thumbs down" about him. I told him "thumbs up", and then we were officially boyfriend and girlfriend on November 30, 2022.

We have been together ever since. A little over six months after dating, Collin and I started looking at house together. It took us about eight months before we closed on one so in between, we spent as much time together going back and forth from our parents' houses. We weren't officially living together, but it may has well been considering we usually spent six out of the seven nights of the week together.

Shortly after Collin and I moved in together in February 2024, Collin started asking me to send him ring ideas. I always said I wasn't going to constantly pester my boyfriend about getting engaged, but he kept bringing it up so I was getting antsy. He made me wait almost 6 months, but he finally asked on July 28, 2024 at The Pour Vineyard where we first met.