How We Met & College Years: 

If you don’t know the story of us, we are going to break it down for you!

Mitchel and I met our freshman year of college, during welcome week, which was the first week of school when Anderson University hosts lots of get to know you type events that hype students up for college and provide tons of opportunities to get to know new people. 

I (Katie) was pretty shy back then and only came to college knowing two people from my hometown who also went to AU. I was in an alpha group (AU’s version of a freshman year experience group that you stay with the entire first semester of college). So I had a few people that I had met but didn’t necessarily click with. Through one of my Lugoff friends that attended AU, I met a group of girls that she lived with. One of the girls in that group was in Mitchel’s alpha group. 

One night, there was a free pizza event on the porch of The Grille/teeeeny tiny student center (RIP- it was torn down last year since they have a brand new student center). I went only for the pizza with the group of girls that I was getting to know and we had planned to head back to their dorm with the pizza. Remember, I was pretty shy, and I was literally only there for the pizza, not so much for socializing with new people. 

Well, Brittany, the mutual friend of me and Mitchel, was one of the girls I was with. She happened to run into Mitchel and they said hello and she introduced him to the group of 4-5 girls we were with. I didn’t think much of it, and again, was focused on getting my pizza. (If you know me, this is hilariously SO me. Free food over everything). Well I said hey to Mitchel just like everyone else. I was in a group of girls who were all way taller than me. I’m 5’2” and every girl I was with was at least 5’6” or taller. His first words to me after I said “hey I’m Katie” was “WOW! You’re REALLY short!” Seriously? So I said, “yeah, you’re freakishly tall”…and that was that. I didn’t think another thought about him until a few days later. 

He messaged me on Facebook, “hey, how are you?”.  I stopped and texted Brittany. “Your friend Mitch just messaged me on Facebook. So random!” 

I’ll let him chime in here: I had been waiting until I’d see her on campus again. I thought for sure, with this small of a campus, surely I’d run into her. Well it had been almost 2 weeks and hadn’t run into her. I thought, if I don’t reach out, some other guy will swoop-in!

Brittany responded to my text, something like “oh yeah, he is super nice and friendly! We have been hanging out a good bit with our alpha group.”So, I didn’t even realize that he was interested in me. I just thought he was a social guy just trying to meet people on campus. 

We began to see each other more around school and in the dining hall and would say hey when we passed. I thought it was nothing more than acuaintances, but he was taking notice of me and spending more time around our friend so that he could see me. We saw each other and got to know each other more in that group of friends.

Finally, at the beginning of October, he asked me to hang out one on one. I am pretty sure it was a Sunday night and I had just gotten back from Columbia. I don’t really know why I decided to hang out with him, because I still didn’t really even know he was interested in me. I kind of thought he was, but honestly I was so oblivious. 

We watched the movie “How to Train Your Dragon” on a laptop in the his dorm lobby with a full lobby of tons of other people. A few days later, he asked me out and the rest is history! 

See Part 2, The Proposal Story, here!