Both Lauren and Jay went to college at Virginia Tech and had many mutual friends, but their paths had never crossed during their time in Blacksburg. Lauren had just graduated from Veterinary School in the Spring of 2018 and moved back to Northern Virginia to start her new job in Alexandria. Memorial Day weekend was coming up and the summer was getting ready to begin! One of Lauren’s best friends, Laura Boster, invited her to attend a Memorial Day pool party at a house in McLean, VA known as the Bent Twig mansion. Laura’s boyfriend (now husband!), Chase, lived there with 6 other guys— one of the guys being Jay! Lauren happily accepted the invitation to the party and had hoped to reconnect with one of the other roommates she had met a few months prior. Lauren picked out her favorite new swimsuit in her signature color- hot pink, and got all fixed up to go to the party. She pulled up to the unique looking house (full of fung shway as Jay would say) where Laura greeted her and they walked into the party together. Lauren met the group and was immediately drawn to Jay— it turned out that the original roommate Lauren thought she was going to see ended up going out of town that weekend. The group had a fun day full of pool basketball, going down the waterslide, and other games, but Lauren had not wanted to get into the pool to maintain her curled hair. Lauren and Jay, talked and got to know each other throughout the day. When an afternoon rain rolled in, the group shifted to games and hanging out inside. It was over a game of flip cup that Lauren winked at Jay from across the table and he knew it was game over from there! The rain slowed to a light drizzle and Jay and Lauren went outside to talk a little more. It was then when Jay started to tease Lauren about coming to a pool party and not getting into the pool, and then proceeded to surprise Lauren by sweeping her off of her feet and jumping into the pool with her! They both laughed and proceeded to share their first kiss in the pool as the rain started to pick up slowly. After a couple of more weeks of getting to know each other, a second pool party, and Jay helping Lauren move into her Arlington house (the day after their first official date), the two quickly became inseparable and the rest was history! Jay proceeded to ask Lauren to be his girlfriend on July 15th, the day after they attended a Thomas Rhett concert together.

Although Lauren and I both went to VT, we didn’t meet or know each other while at school. I had heard of her as she was good friends with one of our fraternity’s sweethearts, Laura, but it wasn’t until 2018 when we would ultimately meet. Leading up to Memorial Day Weekend 2018, one of my roommates, Chase, was dating Laura at the time. Chase said he wanted to have a handful of people over to our house to have a pool party for the holiday weekend. In our roommate group text he said Lauren Doss was coming, and I had known that another of my roommates recently met her at a bar and was interested - my natural response to this was to reply with “dibs” in our group text. It turned out that roommate was going to be out of town for Memorial Day weekend and that “dibs” would translate into a lifetime. Lauren came over with Laura and we hit it off. She avoided the pool all day because she had done her hair and the weather was crappy, but I couldn’t let her entirely escape it. I picked her up and jumped into the pool with her. It wasn’t quite sealed yet though as I was preparing to move to Richmond (2 hours from DC) in a couple weeks for work, and Lauren had just moved to the DC area after graduating vet school. Lauren ended up coming over again a couple weeks later for another pool party and we again had a blast together. After that time, we continued talking and we spent a lot of time together the next few weeks. The move to Richmond didn’t matter all that much as I moved back the following year (and probably spent 40+ of the 52 weekends back in Arlington over the course of that year!). As they say…. The rest is history… or wait one more detail - our relationship was almost over just as quickly as it started. About 3 hours after we started officially dating, Lauren found out I’m a University of Miami football fan (a bitter rival of Virginia Tech). She tried to break up with me, but ultimately my good looks and cheesy humor prevailed - just kidding, but she thought twice. Then the rest was history…

The Doss family purchased a lake house at Smith Mountain Lake (outside Roanoke, VA) in the Spring of 2021. Lauren and I spent many weekends there that summer, and while riding on the boat one day, we saw a beautiful yellow home on the water in her parent’s neighborhood. It had a beautiful point with spectacular views of the mountain, the lake, and the sunset. We didn’t know who owned the house, but I knew that was going to be the spot for our special moment. Lauren and I were at the lake in April 2022 for a weekend, and I found time to slip out and knock on the door of the house. They were not home on the first try, but I tried again later that weekend and was able to meet one of the homeowners and received permission to propose to Lauren on Memorial Day Weekend of 2022, exactly 4 years after we had originally met. I knew Lauren’s parents would want to be there, so it was time to ask for permission and fill them in on my plans. I won’t get into the story of the conversation with Lauren’s dad, Brad, but after much persuasion by me and consideration by Brad, he provided his permission. I devised a plan where I would tell Lauren that one of my friends was at the lake for the holiday. Meanwhile, her parents would conveniently say that they were going over to a friend’s house for a neighborhood happy hour the same night, so all would work out. Fast forward to Memorial Day Weekend – Lauren and I attended a friends wedding on Friday, and woke up Saturday and headed to the lake. Her parents left by boat to “go to their friends house” and we were waiting to “go to my friends house”. On the way over, we pulled onto the final road and Lauren saw the street name - “Island View Drive” and said “isn’t that where the yellow house is?” I told her I wasn’t sure and we continued on. As we approached the cul-de-sac at the end of the street, you could see on the GPS that we were indeed heading towards THE yellow house. Lauren was completely shocked and said “we better make a good impression” hoping that we would be invited back over. We got out of the truck, and Lauren said “this must be fate” and we laughed. As we walked around the house, Lauren later told us that she thought to herself “too bad Jay didn’t think to propose right now!” Little did she know… We walked around the house to the back as my “friend” (aka Brad) had texted me saying they were finishing up dinner. We made it out to the point and I quickly looked back to make sure the photographer was ready. I was so nervous that I didn’t want to waste time, so I pointed towards the mountain telling Lauren to look at the view. As she faced that way, I took a step back and got down on one knee and took the ring box out (which I opened facing backwards). My voice cracked as I tried to get out a few words, and Lauren turned around and was in complete shock. She kept saying “oh my god, oh my god”. It wasn’t until I stood up, picked her up and we hugged and kissed, that she finally said yes. It was a perfect moment and Lauren was completely surprised!