How We Met
We met in June 2013 at a friend’s get together. I saw Maddi dancing alone to a Bachata song called “Corazon Sin Cara,” which translates to “heart without a face” in English, and I asked her to dance. Little did we know, this set the tone for our relationship-we love to go out dancing and have always bonded over music. I asked to take her out on a date… that date turned into date after date that entire Summer, however with us being college students at that time and Madi was only one semester away from graduating college, we decided to part ways and focus on school.
Two years later, we crossed paths again. She was living in NYC at the time, finishing her Master’s degree program, and I was finishing school as well. Once again, it was so easy to talk to her and reconnect. We decided to work towards a relationship, which then developed into a long-distance relationship, as Maddi relocated from NYC to Houston to start her career in 2015. I knew I wanted to make a relationship work no matter the circumstance. Five years later, here we are, engaged! We got through the challenges of a long-distance relationship for two out of the five years being together, and while it was hard, our journey was worth every second.
How They Asked
The proposal took place at Parque Ridley Creek beside a large fountain on Sunday, December 13th. The weather turned from being miserable and rainy to sunny and mild!
I had reached out to Andy Greenlee, a live event painter from Philly, to come up with a plan to paint our proposal. I sent her tons of images to work from to create a sketch of me on my knee and even let Andy know what we were wearing that morning so she could get an accurate likeness. The weather forecast was very concerning, and due to COVID we knew we couldn’t really pull this off easily indoors, so while we needed to find a backup plan of an outdoor covered area that was beautiful we really wanted to make it work at a fountain in Ridley Creek State Park. The weather ended up being beautiful and mild, so Andy was able to set up hours before we began our casual stroll through the park… ending up at the fountain where we’d also hidden a photographer.
We saw Andy painting, pretending she was just a painter capturing a beautiful scene, and asked for her permission to see her work. During the week leading up to the big day, Andy had begun a sketch and initial painting based on the photographs I had sent her of the two of us. When Maddi saw the painting she loved it at first, but then the recognition hit that she was looking at the two of us with me on one knee before her! She said, “that’s totally us… Kevin” and turned to see me on one knee. I asked for her hand in marriage, and she said “of course!” A photographer, Jay S Vito, was there to capture it all while Andy Greenlee also painting and taking video. Jay joined us for more photos as Longwood Gardens to follow.
