Now I have to be very careful about how I tell this story, because there has been some bickering about who introduced us ;) To preface this story, our church, Auburn Community Church, hosts family dinners each month, and the November family dinner was at the Fichtner's home. I showed up with my Pinterest cookies in hand (which, as many of us know, never go as planned). After we said the prayer and grabbed our food, I sat down at the kitchen table next to Tatum and Caitlin, two girls I had met through the women's Bible study group. Drew was sitting right across from me! At the end of the meal, Miles (our head pastor who just so happens to love a good awkward moment) walks up to Drew, puts his arm around him, and says, "Now this is my favorite single guy in Auburn!" (Now would be a good time to mention that I was the only single girl at the table). Drew apparently had been training for a marathon, so Miles starts asking him about how that's going, and what his fastest mile is. So of course this got Drew and I chatting. At the end of the night Tatum tells me that she's heading out, and I started to walk out with her. Then she tells me, "No way, Drew is totally into you! You're staying!" Not even a minute later Drew walks up to me by the desserts and asks me, "Have you tried these cookies? They're really weird." These were the cookies I made!! After telling him this, he doesn't even blink and says, "Well, they're really weird." Right then I realized that I could like this guy. He tells me that he and his sister are running a 5K race on Sunday and asked if I wanted to join. I told him I thought I might be on call that weekend but I would love to otherwise. Then he asked for my number so I could let him know what my schedule looked like. I found out that I did have to work that weekend, so I text him "Hey cookie hater," telling him that I can't run but would love to another time. A few days later we go for a walk around Auburn's campus...and the rest is history :)

They always say church is the best place to find your significant other. Our church is very intentional about giving the core families a chance to get to know one another outside of Sunday mornings. One way that is achieved is through a monthly dinner. It was November 3rd, and at this point our church was still small enough to meet at a members house. This month was at the Fitchtners. The food was prayed over and everyone started going through the line. I remember I wasn't feeling super well that night so I didn't eat. Instead I headed straight to talking to some people. After a few of my friends had gotten food, I decided to go sit with them at the kitchen table. A few minutes later I happen to get up to get something to drink about the exact same time this one girl I didn't know was walking over. I even remember the first thing I said to her, "You can sit here. I'm not eating." So romantic...right? I also remember thinking, "She's kind of cute." I was kicking myself I wasn't at the table and quickly got back to the table. I sat down across from her and found the first chance to introduce myself. Our pastor came over to the table, and sat down right beside me. You could see the matchmaking in his eyes. He literally did everything he could but say "hey, you two should date." After people started to leave I found myself in the kitchen talking to Shelby alone. I don't remember if I was trying to keep the conversation going or trying to be funny, but I asked her if she'd tried "these weird cookies." She responded, "I made them." Talk about putting my foot in my mouth. Somehow she still gave me her number a couple minutes later. We hung out only a couple days later and I knew there was something special about this girl.