Tyler and I met on a blind date set up by a very near and dear mutual friend, Christine. He worked at the Police Department where she worked as a dispatcher and I had spent most of the summer hanging out with her youngest daughter. She had talked him up to me for about a week before we went on the date, telling me how he was family centered and always went to visit his family, How he was a gentleman and just an overall great Christian guy. He sounded like an amazing guy, a dream but I wasn't really looking to date anyone at the time, especially in Florida, I was getting ready to move to South Carolina in 5 days for my dream teaching job and starting a relationship wasn't in my plans. However I agreed to go on the date anyway, just so I would know someone my age when I came back to visit my parents. The day of our blind date, July 19, 2016, Tyler picked me up, he met my parents, opened my car door, and took me to a small little Italian restaurant in town. We spent hours talking and laughing about our families, school, jobs, and life. When I got home that evening I knew I had just gone on a date with the man I was going to marry. I was leaving in 2 days but I knew that I was going to do everything in my power to keep in contact with him. I did!! We have talked and laughed everyday since that blind date on July 19, 2016. Tyler and I dated long distance as I finished out the school year in South Carolina. I then moved to Florida in June of 2017 where I have been permanently ever since. I thank God for placing Tyler in my life everyday. My relationship with Tyler is proof that God's plan is always bigger and always better than what we may plan for ourselves. I cannot wait to continue God's plan for my life when I become Tyler's wife on July 19, 2018.

The day Tyler proposed was like any other Saturday. He finally had a weekend off so we had plans to go to Destin for the day. For Valentines Day we had both discussed buying each other a pair of converse, with this being our first available weekend since February we planned to hit up the outlet malls and finish our day at our favorite restaurant Dewey Destins. The morning started with me not being able to find anything to wear, a pretty common occurrence in the life of Kaitlyn, but nonetheless an hour long affair of trying on everything in my closet and hating all of it. I eventually settled on an outfit and we began our day. Around 11 we made it to the converse store and bought each other new shoes and walked around a couple of the other shops, and then I uttered the words that would stress Tyler out the remainder of the day, "I'm not really in a shopping mood today". You see Tyler had planned to propose at Dewey Destins around a 4 o'clock with both our families there to share in the occasion. This meant for the next 5 hours Tyler would drag me from store to store, that I didn't want to go to, to buy time until the proposal. He succeeded, with terrible driving and extra corny jokes (the only obvious tell of his nerves), and we arrived to Dewey Destins around 4. We ordered our food and sat down on the pier when Tyler asked if I wanted to go take our sunset picture before dinner. I thought this was a little weird because he's not the picture taking type but I agreed and walked out to the edge of the pier with him. When we got to the end of the pier he turned and said "the real reason I brought you out here wasn't to take a picture". He then got down on one knee with the most beautiful ring and asked the question every girl dreams about "Kaitlyn Aleece Stradtman, will you marry me?" I of course first asked "is this real life?" before responding "yes!" We walked back to the table and our parents and sisters joined us shortly after to celebrate the very b-YES-t day!