Puzzle pieces form the couple’s relationship
By Alex Nester
Puzzle pieces have always been a big part of our relationship. From the very first time we hung out, everything just seemed to fit together so perfectly like we were each other’s missing pieces.
My fiancé, Jake, and I have been together for almost three years now, and engaged for about a month. He has a 6-year-old daughter, Jennie, who I have become very close with through the course of our relationship. Although I did not know it at the time, he had taken her with him to pick out my engagement ring. The next time we visited my mother, Jennie pulled my mother aside privately to tell her that “Daddy bought Alex a ring! But you can not tell her!” The week before Easter, we were trying to coordinate plans so that each of our families got to spend part of the holiday together before Jennie went to visit her mother’s family. My mom called me the week before Easter and asked if we would agree to have Easter dinner with her Saturday night, that way she could still give Jennie an Easter basket. We agreed. Unbeknownst to me, this was a plan between Jake and my mother the whole time. The day before Easter, we get to my parents’ house and Jake tells me and Jennie that we have to do an Easter egg hunt. Together, Jennie and I found all the eggs. When we opened them, there were puzzle pieces inside. Each piece had a letter on it. Our next task was to unscramble the letters to decipher the hidden phrase. After a lot of thinking, and many hints, the puzzle was complete. “Alex, only you can complete our Stouch puzzle. Will you marry me/us?” I was so focused on trying to figure out the puzzle, I didn’t notice that my brother was secretly filming the entire thing, perfectly capturing the moment, tears, kisses, and all.
