Meet Brandon…

We’ve been best friends since 3rd grade, and guess what… He’s Getting Married!!!!!

Growing up is a funny thing. Over the last 18 years that I’ve known Brandon we’ve been through a lot together. When we first met in 3rd grade, I was the smart one. The big to-do of the year was when I won our “Math Superstars” competition, and beat him out of a trophy and a Butterfinger candy bar!  In High school, we both started off in the honors magnet program together. Shortly there after, I found photography and started hiding out in the darkroom instead of the biology lab. Roles began to turn. Our senior year, Brandon graduating with the step of honor for “Math”, not to mention he would go on to become an aerospace engineer.  There was a day our senior year, when I met him by his car with a KING SIZE Butterfinger, I had to figure in interest, to prove my surrender. We joked that if he ever ate it our friendship would be over. To this day that candy bar still sits on his dresser at his parents house.

After high school there was college. We both went off to the University of Central Florida together to become Golden Knights! We were growing up. But most importantly, we were growing up together. Sophomore year in Florida proved to be one of the worst hurricane seasons I can remember being alive for. As a result of the need to “Honker Down,” I brought some friends out of the direct path of the storm and home to Sarasota. As did Brandon.

That’s where it all started.

Meet Esther….

Esther and I met through a mutual friends in college, and saw hurricane season as a way to escape the middle of the state and head to the beach. Shortly after arriving in Sarasota my worlds collided. Brandon met Esther for the first time that week.  Thanks to the lovely need to evacuate and stay dry, we all got to spend a lot of time together.

Now, four years later, they are inseparable. On April 1st 2011, Brandon proposed to Esther on that very beach where they met.

It makes my heart so happy to see them happy together.

When Brandon and I were younger we always talked about being friends forever. But as a teenager, who really knows what forever means. Our senior year of high school, he signed my year book and said it’s been a nice decade knowing you. In March, I’ll sign his wedding card saying I wouldn’t have made it for the past two decades without you.

So here’s to my best friend and his fiance! I am so grateful to be sharing their journey with them.