Colton and Paige met in the 4th grade at a wedding: their cousins' wedding. We know how this sounds...we aren't related in any way (even though this is Arkansas YEE HAW). Colton's first cousin, Chris, was marrying Paige's first cousin, Libby. See? No relation. Just weird.

Paige remembers meeting Colton at the rehearsal dinner the night before the wedding and thought he was super cute...in a way you would think a baby or a puppy is cute. Colton met Paige and immediately thought she was years older...because she towered over him. They didn't interact much because girls and boys had cooties at that point...also they didn't really think they were the same age anyway.

Fast forward to 2017- the year they both were graduating high school and heading to college. Colton's instagram was shown to Paige a ton. Everyone said that they had to meet up and become friends.

Colton pledged Phi Delta Theta and Paige went Kappa Kappa Gamma. August and September went by and both were consumed in being pledges and school and all the new stuff that came with starting college. Paige met some of her best friends through being a Kappa. One was from White Hall (shout out Allie) and she took Paige in with her and her other White Hall friends (shout out Bess and Savannah) and they all started to hang out.

One day Paige was snap chatting Allie and she recognized Colton in the background of a video. She told him that she knew him and they were “basically family” (lol) because they met in the 4th grade and had known his family for so long. Allie told her that Colton was her Owl-o-ween date (Kappas Halloween function) and that they would all get to hang out at the function!

Paige met Colton Owl-o-ween night dressed as Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz- and he as a S.W.A.T. cop. The first thing that came out of Paige’s mouth was “omg hi- I don’t know if you remember me, but we could basically be cousins” (facepalm).

Paige third wheeled with Colton and Allie the rest of the night…then hung with them basically the entirety of second semester. Colton’s roommate, Ethan, was added to the group and the 4 hung out every Monday night at Whataburger; thus starting the tradition of “Whataburger Mondays”- as well hanging out every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night. Every. Single. Week.

Sometimes the group would hang out so late at night that they would just wait until sunrise to go back to their dorms and then nap in between classes and head back out that following night to do it all over again.

Paige and Colton became very good friends for a year until they realized that maybe what they felt for each other was more than friendship (cheesy). They both tried so hard to not like each other because it seemed so weird how they had family who had known each other for so long.

Everything was kind of slow and secretive at first because everyone around Paige and Colton knew them as friends- and the fact that Paige had made the “cousin” comment so many times because she was clueless that they would ever have a possibility of ending up together. They had to break the news to everyone…and it was WEIRD.

Colton asked Paige to be his girlfriend Sept. 3rd, 2018 at an OLIVE GARDEN because it was Memorial Day and all of the nice restaurants were closed. His exact words were; "so...are we gonna do this?" (which are coincidentally the same words he used to propose to her).

In the 6 years that they have been together, they rescued their first child, Casey Binx, in 2019 and adopted their second-born, Oliver Henry in 2020. Paige also adopted two bunnies in 2021, Bubbles and Thumper, without telling Colton. Their relationship has endured Covid, eight hours long distance for two years, and three hours long distance for two more years.

Colton proposed to Paige on January 20th, 2024 at Mount Sequoyah...in his truck because Paige was freaking out too much to go outside in front of everyone so that he could get down on one knee.

He had told Paige that their families should meet in Fayetteville for his mom's birthday that weekend- so she didn't expect a proposal would happen. When it was suggested that they go look at the sunset at the top of Mount Sequoyah, something clicked in Paige's head and she started to realize what was happening. Naturally, she had a silent panic attack and her nose started bleeding on the way up the mountain. She was so excited and emotional that when he got out of the truck he just started laughing because he could see that she already knew what was happening.

She was crying so hard that her makeup started to run and she looked like a raccoon- or a metal goth singer. Colton and their family and friends planned a surprise party and the crying got consistently worse throughout the night (in the best way possible). Now Paige and Colton are counting down the days until everyone from that party (and more) is together again to celebrate their WEDDING DAY!!!