Joe and Kaia first met on the athletic field at Camp Widjiwagan in Ely, MN in the summer of 2014. After a friendly introduction, each went on their own way, leading backcountry canoe trips in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) as first-year staff. Joe was an junior at Carleton College, and Kaia a sophomore at St. Olaf College. With both located in Northfield, MN, it was surely a recipe for an age-old rivalry. January 17th, 2015, Kaia crossed the mighty Cannon River for a Northfield-Widji reunion party, and there was Joe! When Kaia returned to her dorm back on the St. Olaf hill, she told her friends all the details, and was honestly pretty charmed right from the start. Next Friday, she found a purple Friday Flower in her P.O. box (a shared St. Olaf and Carleton tradition) from Joe. From there, the predicted rivalry melted.

In the summer of 2016, after his senior year, Joe moved to South Royalton, Vermont to start his first year at Vermont Law School. Kaia went back to Camp Widjiwagan to lead trips for the summer. In August, Kaia went out to first visit Joe and got a taste of rural, no-street-lights-in-the-town life. After a week of hiking, studying, and eating Ben and Jerry's, Kaia went back to St. Olaf. In the following August, Kaia moved out to Vermont to begin her career as a cardiac nurse at Dartmouth Hitchcock in Lebanon, New Hampshire while Joe worked his way through Law School!

On December 31st, 2019, while walking in a dog park with Kaia's sister, Siri, and her pup, Lyra, Joe got down on one knee and proposed. Kaia, surprised by the timing and location, began to cry and forgot to answer. Finally, after being prompted by Joe "Keeks, can I get a yes or a no?", she joyfully shouted yes, and that was the start of their next adventure!