A Multi Location Engagement Session

Rachel + Luke’s multi location engagement session was SO MUCH FUN!! This was Tara’s second engagement session to capture for MLP. I went along as a coach, but let me tell you. She did NOT need me! My girl Tara hit the ball out of the park with this gorgeous engagement session!! I am so thankful she is on my team!!

How they met.

When I asked Rachel how they met, she replied, “Wellll….it came as quite a shock to both of us, but our initial interaction was through a dating app. We quickly forewent the app and just went with the old fashioned exchanging of phone numbers. I had recently been to San Francisco, CA for the first time, and he had recently moved home from San Francisco. We also knew a lot of mutual people. Our first date was to see Jim Gaffigan (one of my favorite comedians) at the Brandon Amphitheater. Hands down, the best first date I’ve ever been on. It was fun, effortless…we immediately had chemistry and a connection. We talked about big topics, and it wasn’t weird or awkward. All those things aligned. It didn’t take but a couple dates for us to realize that this was something real and serious. By about the 2-3 week mark, it was official, and the families knew. By 4 weeks, we’d said “I love yous”, and the rest is kinda history.”

How he proposed.

Let me tell you…he went above and beyond. We had just gotten back into town from a beach trip with my family (where I thought he might possibly pop the question). It was a Monday, and I was supposed to work that night. I noticed he was being a little chattier than usual for a work day, but I just chalked it up to maybe he was missing me after being together for a week.
Around mid-afternoon, I got a text from my charge nurse at work that I might not be needed that night due to low census. I told Luke, and he’s literally never been so interested in the fact that I might get canceled lol. He suggested that if I got canceled, we should “continue the beach trend” and go to a nice seafood dinner. Very nice but also very unusual for us to do on a Monday night.
I ended up falling asleep in “prep” for possibly having to work, and I think that about caused Luke to have a heart attack. He was texting and calling me, and eventually got my roommate and her dog involved to “naturally” wake me up. I was awoken by Lindsey’s dog scratching on my door (something he’s never done in the year+ we lived together – turns out it was some assisted scratching from Lindsey haha.) When I woke up, I was canceled from work, and Luke was telling me to get ready to go to dinner.
I got ready, he picked me up, and we headed to what I was told was Bonefish Grill (I’m not super familiar with Madison). I don’t really pay a lot of attention when I’m the passenger seat going somewhere, but I did notice that we had driven past the usual turn onto Main St. and kinda come around the back way onto Main St. – something that I thought was odd, but I just went with it.
We pulled into the parking lot of Madison Methodist church, and Luke started to get out of the truck, so I said, “What are we doing here?” His response was a coy, “I just gotta talk to you about something.” We walked to a bench in their outdoor courtyard. There were flowers set up all around, and we sat on the bench. He started telling me about how this is where his parents got married, and he wanted to do that with me. 🙂 I’ll keep the rest of his speech to myself, but he ended up on one knee and asking me to marry him! Of course, I said yes, and then a photographer came from around the corner and snapped several pics for us and even caught the proposal.
Afterwards, Luke said we were now actually headed to dinner, but it was at Table 100. (The whole Bonefish Grill thing was just a ruse to get us to Madison.) I thought the surprises were over, but when we got to the restaurant, we were escorted to a room in the back where both of our immediate families were waiting to celebrate with us! (And that’s no small feat…I’m one of five kids, and Luke’s brother and his fiancee live in Dallas.) He did an incredible job, and as if the proposal itself wasn’t enough, he gave me the most special day! 🙂