In 2016, Jason and Melissa met while working together on a game called Marvel's Avengers Academy, where Jason animated the characters that Melissa designed!
Over time we became friends over shared lunches, after work activities with friends, and genuinely enjoying each other's company.
After leaving the company, Jason and Melissa made sure to keep in touch. Then, one evening at a disco themed birthday party Jason got the courage to express his feelings for Melissa!
Our first date was seeing the movie Solo at the Alamo Drafthouse. The movie wasn't perfect, but our date was. Afterwards we had to keep the night going with some bowling and a late night stop to McDonalds. Love at first McNugget!
Our second date was a hike and picnic in the North Bay redwoods, near where we'll be getting married! It was a beautiful misty morning, and despite one of us wearing the wrong type of boots we still had a romantic day.
We spent many of our first dates together going on urban hikes in San Francisco after work.
From Paso Robles to San Diego, Palm Springs, Colorado, Hawaii, and the East Coast - we love to explore new places and revisiting old favorites. But our favorite type of travel is getting in the car and spontaneously taking a trip to one of the many charming little towns that California has to offer.
(Next stop, honeymooning in Italy!)
Halloween brought out our creative sides, working hard on our costumes...
...and bonding over our shared nerdy love of fantasy!
On occasion, we can also get a little gussied up! A wedding is the perfect occasion for us ;)
It wasn't hard for Jason to see Melissa's big heart for family, which of course includes dogs! A dog walk is always part of the Hester house visit.
In 2020, we learned how to truly be each other's everything during lockdown. Jason even had to become Melissa's hairdresser! In May of that year, we moved into a cute condo in San Francisco.
To keep ourselves entertained and keep us from going crazy, we both got into cooking and baking... it kind of worked...Ha!
But, cooking and baking were not enough. We knew there was something missing from our lives that we greatly needed...a dog-hter! In December of 2020, Poppy Seed Rayner became part of our little family and keeps us quite busy. She has taught us a lot about how to be good puppy parents.
Truly, we couldn't be happier.
In November 2021, we did a road trip of the North East, going from Boston to Maine to Vermont to New York to Pennsylvania. And although Melissa had an injury at the time, she had the best trip getting to see Jason's home turf!
Jason, realizing he had the perfect family in Melissa (and Poppy), proposed at the end of their East Coast trip...at an Air BnB in Philly! Ok, not the most thought out, but he poured his heart and tears out and she accepted him nonetheless.
Jason reassured her of his promise to marry in a follow-up date pictured above, back where we first went on a hike in the Mill Valley redwoods. A bit more romantic of a setting!
Though we grew up on different sides of the country, we are overjoyed to have found each other...
...And look forward to laughing and dancing together for the rest of our years!