Kelly's Story

On a cold January night in 2011, I took a train from New York City where I was living and got off at the Irvington Station in Hudson Valley New York. I didn't realize that that train ride was the start of the rest of my life. On the platform I met Brendan, and by the end of the night I knew that there was something different about him. I have to tell you, I really didn't want to like him. He was finishing his senior year at the United States Military Academy at West Point, and then would be in the Army... I had just gotten my dream job earlier that week working in sales at a 5 star hotel on the Upper East Side and was going to start on Monday.

The thought of getting into a relationship with someone who I knew was moving in a few months seemed impossible... The next week, I told him that, which he countered by telling me that he decided to be stationed in North Carolina instead of Alaska because he didn't think I would follow him there. I figured that if he had taken that big of a risk after only knowing me for one week, I should at least give this thing a shot, so we started dating...

We spent the next seven months exploring New York City together

and went on trips to Vermont and Maine

I watched him graduate West Point

And we visited his family in Indiana

We spent those seven months pretending that we had all the time in the world, but in the back of my head, I knew he was leaving. Four weeks before he left for Fort Benning, Georgia to complete Basic Officer Leadership Course and Ranger School, we went on a hike up a mountain and at the top he asked me if I loved him, I said yes, then he asked me if I loved him enough to marry him and pulled out a ring... (I said yes!)

Fast forward two weeks I gave up my apartment in New York City and my career to move with him to Georgia and become his wife... I have never lived in the south, never lived with a guy, never lived that far away from my family and friends...it seems that my entire life just turned into a series of major adjustments. 

Along the way, when Brendan was in Ranger School and I was in Georgia waiting for him, we both became Christians around the same time but separately, you can learn more about Brendan's time in Ranger School and the beginning of my walk with the Lord here.

Now we are navigating the path of a Christ-centered life and marriage, and thank God for His grace because we get it wrong a lot of the time! We moved to North Carolina in October of 2012 and have begun planting roots here... until the Army tells us to go somewhere else of course!

Earlier this year we found out that we would be parents in January to a baby boy, so we are eagerly anticipating his arrival and looking forward to our new roles as parents!