Emilie and Rob

Our story began on May 23rd, 2011. Although Wikipedia doesn't consider this notable enough to document https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_23, we will share our story here with friends and family!

May 23rd, 2011 was the day we both started internships at Shure, a company in Niles, IL. Though working in different departments, we had a kick-off meeting where all company interns could meet and mingle. It must have come out in my introduction that I recently moved from France, because the next thing I knew, Rob was “cleverly” introducing himself to me in “French”. He attributed his errors to the fact that French was a classroom language for him – an excuse that did not fly, because it was the same for me, having Dutch as a native language :).

Luckily, Rob had a few jokes up his sleeve and humor knows no language. From that point on, we used cross-departments get-togethers as an excuse to spend time with each other. After a while, we took it on ourselves to stay in touch. Throughout that summer, we goofed around, had lunch together nearly every day, and went for a coffee break each afternoon at the Starbucks across the street, though at the time I didn’t even drink coffee. Our interactions at work turned into online scrabble, off-hours texting, and dates. By the end of the term, we were best of friends.

After that summer, we already knew what we had. I decided to find a job around Chicago while Rob finished his final year of school. Through the 4 years of dating that followed, we continued to dig deeper into each other’s lives. The rest is history.

The night of our engagement began street-level at one of our favorite steakhouses and ended in a helicopter 1200 feet above the city that has been ours up until this point, Chicago. The logistical challenge for me, the proposer, was how to pull this off while maintaining some semblance of surprise. It began with acknowledging that at some point, Emilie would catch on to what I was planning. It was just a matter of trying to postpone the “aha” moment as long as possible.

The night began in similar fashion to other special nights we have shared for dinner. Usually, we take our time and enjoy the luxury of an unhurried pace, but in this case, I knew we had to be near Midway Airport by 10pm. I told Emilie I had a small surprise and that we would have to make sure to leave the restaurant on time. This unusual constraint coupled with Emilie’s sharp intuition had her certain something was strange this night, she admits. 

Things continued to get more confusing for her when we got in the car and started driving. Instead of heading north toward our apartments, I had us speeding directly to the southwest suburbs, an area I am not sure we’ve EVER spent time. Our route took us into smaller, darker streets and beyond any notable landmark. We arrived at a dimly lit parking lot with a sidewalk path to a lobby entrance – there was a 50% chance she would recognize that behind the lobby was a helicopter hangar.

I cannot remember when I finally admitted to Emilie we were going on a helicopter ride. It happened sometime after walking into the lobby and definitely by the time we signed our safety waiver. From there, we boarded the helicopter, took flight, and as we toured over the city, I asked her to marry me.

P.S. While it sounds romantic and enchanting (think: the Bachelor), it is actually pretty loud up there… and there is a pilot listening in on the whole thing. He’s a good guy; however, and we can thank him for the picture above.

Ceremony

4:30 PM

Lyonsville Congregational Church

6871 Joliet Rd, Indian Head Park, IL 60525

Click here for directions

Reception

6:00 PM

Oak Brook Bath And Tennis Club

800 Oak Brook Rd, Oak Brook, IL 60523

Click here for directions

(For the reception, you will notice the driveway is a little long. Just keep going straight past the first fork until you see a second fork with signs that direct you to the clubhouse or parking. We recommend that you use GPS.)

6:30 PM at Vaucelleshof

Vredestraat 17, 8340 Damme, Belgium