Robbie and Xiomara met at Crossbridge Church in Miami and became friends after joining the same small group. Their friendship grew with an affinity for playing games, making travel plans, laughing at puns, love for family, and most importantly deep reliance on their shared faith. Then the tables turned, the running joke is that they were no good at being "just friends," and thank God for that! One of their first dates was at Fairchild Tropical Gardens, it was already a popular spot with Robbie who loves to be outside and for Xio who is a sucker for a volunteer-led tour, but quickly became one of their favorite spots. [Be sure to ask them about the time they were so in love that they broke the rules at the garden...] It's no surprise that they have chosen to celebrate their wedding day at two of the spots that mean the most to them. Hopefully you can all enjoy and feel a bit of the love yourselves!

His Version...

The backstory:

Coming up with a proposal granted me an opportunity for creatively showing my love. We had already discussed marriage at length; the potential for surprises came not in the fact that it was going to happen but in the where, when, and how it would happen. My desire to do something unique and unexpected led me to decide to tap into our collective love for music by writing and performing a song. Despite never having written a song and not being a very experienced guitar player, I embarked on a quest to write a musical proposal. I wanted a way to record it all, so doing it at a beach or a park was out. My house where any recording device would be easily noticed also seemed like a bad idea. We met at Crossbridge church and that is where we had talked about getting married. They have a recording studio there which meant that any sort of recording equipment would be a natural part of the scenery.

How on earth do I get Xiomara to come into a recording studio to be with me while I play an instrument that she's never seen me play before? In comes Marcus. Xio and I had discussed asking Marcus to officiate our wedding ceremony so it seemed appropriate to include him. It was further fitting because he is the worship music leader at the church so it would make sense if he was involved in a "recording session." All I needed to do was to get him to request my presence for a false recording session to which I would invite Xio. We met a few days before and came up with a story about recording some background music for a promotional video. The bait was set.

The day of:

It was important to me that I gently encourage her to come to the church for this "recording session." I would rather put off the proposal an entire week than insist that she MUST be at the church despite her very valid argument that it wouldn't make logistical sense. Because of this, I had only dropped a couple offhand references to a recording session by the time the afternoon had rolled around. The two of us had somewhere to be at 7 and I had managed to pull off an intentionally early dinner. Just as dinner prep was finishing, I casually cast my request: "it would be great if you could come to the recording session even if you just hang out and do your own thing."

She wasn't having it.

She told me she wanted to get her nails done instead. I listened to her over dinner while she talked about her day, secretly trying to come up with a way to get her to the church if only for a few minutes. After dinner I suggested, "what if you leave a little early to get your nails done so you have time to meet me at the church and we carpool to our evening plans?" I was then told, "we can play it by ear but if I run late I'll just meet you there." My proposal plans were being taken over. By a manicure. I tried one desperate last ditch effort, trying not to cross the line of forcing her to be somewhere against her better judgement. If this didn't work, I was going to have to push everything back another week.

"What if you leave right now?"

A little put off that I was kicking her out so soon but fortunately not looking too far into it, she agreed and went on her way. I met up with Marcus at the church where we got everything set up and then we waited. And waited. And waited. It's amazing how antsy you get when you're on the precipice of engagement. We waited some more. She wasn't running that far behind but when you have one of the most special performances of your life and you're more than ready to make it happen, it's amazing how slowly the clock turns.

Finally she arrived. With a quick hug I shuffled her into the studio and shut the door. It was so unusual that I would play guitar that I didn't want to give her time to think about it so I started playing almost immediately.

While still strumming and singing the closing lines of "marry me, Xiomara," I pushed the stand away and got down on one knee. After the final chord, I pulled the ring out and asked her to marry me. After the unexpected response of "you're ridiculous," she then accepted. So here I am, a ridiculous fiancé who couldn't be more excited to take this wonderful woman as my wife.

May 2, 2017 - Replaying the video together later that night

What was Xiomara thinking?!

First of all, I was completely surprised by the proposal. Who gets engaged on a Tuesday after work?! It's also hilariously fitting that I was so out of touch with Robbie's romantic plan that I insisted on getting my nails done before meeting up to hang out with friends. In my mind, it was going to be my only chance before heading out of town for two consecutive weekends of travel. Priorities… right? Once at the church, and in the recording studio, it still didn't faze me. In fact, embarrassingly enough when we play back the engagement video I look totally unamused for the whole first verse of Robbie's proposal song! But it couldn't have been more perfect: musical, personal, and even bilingual (you go, gringito lindo)!! [Insert heart-eyed emoji.] My reaction? Well that leads to some funny sound bites too: "do I know this song?" "are you kidding me?!" "you're ridiculous" and finally… "yes!" With a few tears and lots of laughs in between. Robbie got down on one knee, guitar still resting in one arm with my gorgeous and sparkly eco and socially conscious ring in the other hand. It still leads me to ask, can this possibly be real life?