Mike, Jen and their families toasted their wedding with champagne at Telegraph,
but it was wine (just a little) that brought them together
One of the more reliable signs that a couple is in love: Happenstance turns into tradition, because it happened to them.
Mike and Jen are in love, and as such, they will probably be found in some type of wine bar on the 11th of every month, for the rest of their lives. Because they found themselves there on the 11th of the first two months of their lives together.
When Mike asked Jen on their first date, they went to Rootstock on May 11, 2011.
"We pretty much knew we were right for each other, right away," Jen would say later.
Exactly one month later, while checking out the Old Town Art Fair, the new couple dropped in at Bluebird for a bite to eat.
They realized it was June 11. One month after their first date, they were in another wine bar.
It became Mike and Jen's thing. Every 11th, for almost two years now, the couple has gone to a new wine bar. A few times, work has taken one or the other to a different city on the 11th; they still go out, to different bars, sharing the experience from afar.
"It's a lot of fun, exploring the various wine bars in the city," Jen said.
Mike proposed on Aug. 24, 2012, and their full-sized wedding ceremony and reception is scheduled for Aug. 3, 2013.
But Mike is Canadian (and sometimes tries to pass himself off as an Iowa Hawkeye fan...which is an issue in a family full of Iowa State Cyclones), and to expedite the paperwork, he married Jen in March in a small ceremony with their families at St. Luke's Lutheran Church of Logan Square, a remarkable building that I'm glad the couple introduced me to.
There are a lot of 11ths to come in these newlyweds' future.
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