Mammen Mania

In response to Emily's blog here's Kyle's and my story of how we met. Check out her blog to view other fellow bloggers' stories on Sunday, May 6th. I had to do this early because we're headed to San Antonio tomorrow and won't be back 'til late Sunday afternoon and I didn't want to be late! Here it is, how I met Kyle P. Mammen:

I loved living at Regency Apartments in Provo, Utah. I had the best roommates and lived in a fun ward. Near Halloween in 2000 my FHE group planned a night to tell spooky stories. (I know, SUCH a BYU thing to do!) One of the guys in my FHE group happened to be Taylor Mammen. Taylor was a nice guy and lived with some fun roommates. He freaked us all out by telling us about his brother who had worked in an old mine as a tour guide when he was in high school who apparently had heard miner ghosts walking behind him once.

I distinctly remember thinking, “Hmmm…Taylor has a brother.”

I later found out his brother was in China teaching English. After that, I didn’t think anything about it. And by November of that same year, I was tired of guys, and just swore them off for awhile.

One January night, I decided to accompany my roommate, Andrea, to her institute class. I’d forgotten that my home teachers were supposed to show up that night. Andrea and I had a fun time and were surprised to find two guys sitting in our living room when we got home. One of the guys sparked my interest seeing as he was attractive, tall, and intelligent-looking (must have been the glasses). My roommates reminded me of the visit, so I sat down with them to finish their lesson. Apparently the one I thought was cute happened to be Kyle Mammen.

“Too bad, I’ve sworn off guys,” I thought.

A couple of months later our paths started crossing more and more - at church, home teaching visits, volleyball games, a friend's birthday party. About a week before we started dating he took one of my roommates to a work dinner. Knowing about my crush she asked him how he felt about Texans at that dinner. Since there were two of us from Texas, his response was, "Well, it depends on the Texan."

By this point the crush was mutual, and despite my embarrassment at my roommates big mouth (which I'll always be thankful for G!) I found out he liked me too and we started seeing more of each other. We actually had our first kiss before we’d actually been on a real date! The rest is history!

So there ya have it - a classic BYU fairy tale, but it worked for us!