Mackenzie River Pizza, downtown Bozeman. She was the waitress, he was her boss. Back then, Mackenzie River was the hippest place in town and the staff were more than co-workers, we were all friends. We rode bikes, skied and boarded as much as possible, and often tipped back a cold microbrew (or three). In late 2001, Julie moved to South America and Coops moved over to the local skate and snowboard shop, World Boards. Their lives moved on, but they always remained friends.

We ran into each other one unexpected night at Ale Works. Julie was out on the town with Gomez and Chrismac, and Coops was with his good friends, Erok and Farris. Coincidentally, all of us worked at Mackenzie River together back in the day. We all had a beer together and laughed that it was an impromptu Mac River reunion. As the night got late, Julie went to call an Uber so Coops offered to give her a ride. Turns out, they were practically neighbors! They had one more drink together that lead to a LOT of laughter. The next day, Coops sent a text to Julie asking her out to dinner. "A date?" she thought. Why not! We went out for dinner the next night...it was St Patrick's Day. When we sat down, the conversation started to flow as though we had been in each others' lives forever. We talked and laughed for three hours before we even thought about food. It was as if time stood still. We laughed, we joked, we told stories, and neither of us wanted the night to end. This was the start of endless time spent together. For the next month, we had dinner together over and over again. Then Julie had to leave town. She was gone for nearly two months and, instead of losing touch, we talked on the phone every night and only grew closer. In the months to come, we quickly realized what this was, we had found "the one."

When we first started dating, we quickly discovered that we both LOVE mountain biking, camping, and going on adventures. If you know Julie well, then you can probably imagine how quickly she was saying things to Coops like, "Let's go to Costa Rica next month" and "Why don't you meet me in Peru?" This was a little outside his comfort zone (at first) so they started their adventures a little closer to home. Our first year together, we planned a 10 day tour around the Pacific Northwest to ride bikes. It was crazy smoky with wildfires, but we went anyway. We kicked off the trip with Devil's Gulch outside of Leavenworth. This ride is often done as a point-to-point shuttle, but we wanted to ride the whole thing up and back (that makes it about an 8-hour adventure). Our plan was to leave by 8 or 9 am...we started the climb at noon. Many would say that's a late start, but for us it worked out perfect. Over the next week and a half, we enjoyed late nights by the fire and relaxing tea and coffee in the morning at camp. Without planning it, we started to notice a trend. We seemed to always hit the trail about noon. It started as a joke...and now we embrace it. Relaxing mornings followed by full day adventures, which are topped off with a beverage at sunset. To us, that's just perfect timing! We are shamelessly "Team Noon."

2020 started off with so much potential...Julie kicked it off guiding back-to-back trips in Costa Rica and (little did she know) Coops was designing an engagement ring. Come March, Julie finally got Coops to join her down south. They met in Costa Rica for a week on the beach. They explored beaches, went sea kayaking, rode bikes in the heat of the day, and watched some of the most memorable sunsets. One would think this was the perfect time to "pop the question"...but a world pandemic broke out and, before we knew it, we were just trying to figure out how to get home and survive the next moment. On July 18th, we were in the Tobacco Roots for with our good friend, Ellie. We were headed up to the Curly Highline for a big day's ride. Once we reached the summit, we decided to take a jumping photo. (Again, if you know Julie, you know she loves a good jumping photo!) It turns out, Coops and Ellie were in cahoots. Ellie got us to jump for a couple shots and, after the third jump, Julie looked over and Coops was down on one knee. "Julie Hanen, will you marry me?" he said. You can watch the video for full details, but the answer was a resounding "YES!" 2020 sure as hell was a doozy, but this truly added something bright and shiny to a dark and stressful year. More than anything, we couldn't be happier to be planning a day of celebration with all of our favorite people...YOU! Thanks for shaking off the cobwebs from social distancing with us and finding happiness in the joy of life and love. We truly believe that life is short and so you might as well live it up to the fullest. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for coming to celebrate with us.