Our Story

We met on a ski trip with friends in early 2017, but were living on opposite sides of the country at the time. A year later, Steven moved to San Francisco. Shortly after that we ran into each other at a rock climbing gym and started climbing together. After first trusting each other with our lives on the rock wall, we started dating, and we fell in love. We’ve since traveled around the West and abroad together: climbing, skiing, backpacking, running, and now biking(!). We survived the pandemic, multiple presidential campaigns, ultramarathon races, and many moves together. During the pandemic we left San Francisco and pursued summits and trails across Utah, Oregon, California, and New Mexico. We adopted a dog named Denali in 2021 and eventually moved to a home in Truckee in 2022. Steven supported Julia through political upsets and grad school, and Julia has benefited immensely from Steven’s many home improvement projects and unparalleled humor (hot tea for a real hot-tea?).

On a Friday afternoon in December 2024, we went cross country skiing together after work with Denali. Steven decided to take the scenic way home. He’s very proud of his green 1998 Toyota Tacoma, which he maintains himself and which didn’t have power steering, at the time. On a snowy, winding downhill road, he pretended like the brakes were failing. He pulled over to a scenic overlook above Donner Lake and got out of the truck to “inspect” the situation. Julia remained in the cab, Googling towing companies. Eventually she got out of the truck, and Steven got down on one knee. After a moment of extreme confusion (was that little ring the thing that had caused the brake failure??), Julia burst out laughing and said “yes.”

We’re so excited to celebrate our love with you all and to have our friends and family come visit our wonderful home in Tahoe.