Picture it. A hot summer day in 2007. A scrawny 17 year old boy in sunglasses shows up at service camp. An 18 year old girl, just a few weeks from starting her first semester at St. Joe's, is there on staff. Boy meets girl. Girl was very unimpressed. The end. Just kidding! Well, about 'the end' anyway. It's true--there were no sparks there (pun intended) for a while. The service camp was Wave Week, the organization was called Spark the Wave, and Matt joined the volunteer staff a year later. Over the next few years, Katie and Matt became friends as they helped teenagers organize service projects together every summer.

Fast forward to 2015: Katie's working for Spark the Wave and Matt's the part-time director of Wave Week. They're co-workers, I guess? Anywho, one night the two of them are taking a walk by the koi pond on Georgetown University's campus and Katie asks the question--could this be something more? Boy says no. Boy was wrong.

Girl invites boy to work event. Boy is smitten by girl. The sparks finally fly at a nonprofit gala Katie and Matt were attending on behalf of Spark the Wave (fun fact: Matt arrived late and missed meeting Wayne Newton). Katie and Matt begin 4 years of long-distance dating between Philly and NYC. If this wedding had a corporate sponsor, it would be Megabus (yes, we tried).

Katie and Matt finally decided it was time to live in the same city and settled down just in time to experience a global pandemic together. They used the time to learn how to make pickles and hot sauce, and to get to know their neighbors from the natural 6'+ distance provided by their porch. In the neighborhood? Stop by for a drink :) With the help of Katie's 4 year old niece, Winnie, Matt popped the question on February 12th, 2022 in East Passyunk--the neighborhood where Katie lived while they dated all those years.