Kyle: I showed up to work and there were this cute girl that spilled my tea on my papers. She was kind of flirty and cute, and later she walked up to me and gave me her number. We had started talking and she essentially told me to ask her out to dinner, and on our scheduled first date there was a blizzard and we had to postpone for a week. But we got noodles and the rest is history.

Paige: As Kyle puts it “student got hot for teacher”. On the first day of my EMT class this really hot instructor (Kyle) introduced himself to the class, and I remember going back home to my college roommates and freaking out. No joke, I told them that I was in love with my hot EMT instructor and I was going to marry him (yes I was that crazy girl). 5 years later and now he’s stuck with me forever!

Kyle: We went on a medical mission trip to Tanzania and after several days in clinic and visiting an orphanage, I just remember looking at her knowing she was different. And we started talking about our thoughts and values and that’s when it clicked. I remember sitting there talking to her and I think there was a moment we both looked at each other with this mutual understanding we were probably going to get married one day.

Paige: Its crazy to say, but I really knew when I first met him that he would be the one, it just felt right!  But I know that our medical mission trip to Tanzania really showed the both of us that we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together. That trip showed us who we really were and what we wanted out of life on an individual level and a collective. It made us grow together in so many ways and I know both of us are so thankful we did it together!

Kyle: Paige is the hardest person to surprise, girl knows what I’m doing before I even figure it out myself. So basically the idea of a proposal was an impossible task. Luckily, I disguised it as a surprise date, so when we showed up to a wine and paint session with a few of our friends she thought that was all I had planned. Little did she know I had run numerous proposal ideas by some friends and settled on this particular plan for about 3 weeks. Paige is also very proud of her art, so she became overly focused on finishing her painting. So once I finished a bottle of wine, I painted “Will you Marry Me” on my painting and asked her what she thought. Lucky for me she was surprised and now we have the paintings hung in our home. I think the worst part leading up to the proposal was having to hide the ring. Here I had this wicked expensive piece of jewelry, basically the only significant sum of money I had left to my name, sitting in one of my dress shoes next to our bed. And there it sat for the better part of a month. The feeling of relief when it was on her finger and no longer my problem to worry about losing was amazing.

Paige: Poor Kyle had the task of surprising me, which I’m usually impossible to surprise (I’m very observant). I knew he was proposing within a few months time since we went to pick out the ring together, but had no idea it was going to be so soon! I was having a though week and Kyle insisted he take me out on a surprise date, so when I got home from work late I got ready quickly and didn’t think twice. He surprised me with a wine and paint night (I was so excited cause I LOVE to paint) and come to find out that he invited a bunch of our friends! For some reason, I was so into painting that I didn’t realize the obvious reason of why we were all there. So I’m just painting away, Kyle drank almost the whole bottle of wine he brought (minus the cup I clumsily knocked over) and we’re all just having fun. Then Kyle asks me to look at his finished painting, so I look over and think to myself oh he did such a nice job, and then I realize in the clouds of his painting it says “Will you marry me?”. I then just see him slightly stumble to one knee (since he’s tipsy at this point), open the ring box and just smile! In true Paige fashion, I took the ring out of the box and put it on my own finger and nodded yes with a huge smile!

Kyle: The thing I love most about Paige is that she is the only person that can genuinely make me laugh. And not just a regular laugh, I mean a hearty guffaw that just lifts the stress out of me.

Paige: That no matter what, I know Kyle always has my back, making sure I’m happy, supported and loved through it all. And his laugh, oh it just melts my heart.

Kyle: Sometimes when Paige is ready and waiting on me, she’ll hum this random song (no idea where it came from) and do this weird dance where her limbs flail in every which direction.

Paige: Well, Kyle has this habit of brushing his teeth whenever he’s bored/feels like he needs to (basically every 2 hrs if were home, for a solid 5 minutes at a time). He just loves to brush his teeth at the worst times too… his favorite being at ungodly hours of the morning sitting over me in bed. Why? Because he just wants to spend extra time with me. But at least he has great dentil hygiene and a killer smile!

Kyle: Becoming a fully-fledged member of the rockin’ Ryan family.

Paige: I am so excited to see him in his AWESOME tux jacket, and then to see him breakin’ it down on the dance floor in said tux jacket (with his classic grandpa dance moves)!

Kyle: Matthew McConaughey in a velvet green tux jacket

Paige: The jacket! Kyle loves to be different and I wanted him to be excited about what he was wearing on our wedding day too. So I stumbled upon the velvet green tux jacket and just worked around the color!

Kyle: How many things there were to actually plan.

Paige: There’s a lot of extra little things that sneak up on you the last week before the wedding.