Eric and I met through a mutual friend, Kera Walker.  I was visiting Kera for the weekend, and she had scored two tickets to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers game.  We went to a tailgate prior to the game, where Eric and I met for the first time.  Can you believe he didn’t even offer me anything to eat?!  Hungry and bored with the tailgate we decided to head over to the Bucs game.  After the game, we met up with Eric and one of his friend’s Lew for a night on the town.  Eric and I made small talk, but no real sparks at that point.

He met Kera and me for church the next morning, and then it was time for me to fly back to North Carolina.  I left thinking “what a great weekend”, but never giving thought to the possibility that I had just met MY FUTURE HUSBAND.  We continued to talk periodically over the next several months.

On December 23, Eric called to let me know he would be stopping in Winston, on his way home to Asheville for the holidays.  He asked if I would like to meet him for lunch.  Somewhat reluctantly, I said yes, and we agreed to go to West End Cafe.  Lunch was amazing and I was instantly in awe of this man.  We met later that evening to watch a Wake basketball game; afterwards I headed home to bask in the splendor of the day.  And then the ‘ever-famous’ text appeared… “Red or White?”  Eric was so sure that the day’s events had gone well, that he didn’t ask if he could stop by for a visit…..he assumed it was a given.  I answered back, “Red”, and shortly thereafter, he showed up on my doorstep with a bottle of Rosemount Shiraz in hand.

We stayed up all night talking and laughing, and have been smitten with one another ever since.  We continued to date over the next several months and on September 1, Eric proposed to me!