Bethany and Jordan Speidel Engagement Announcement

Bethany Baker, daughter of Paul Baker and Elaine Baker of Las Vegas, NV and Spearfish, SD, has become engaged to Jordan Speidel, son of Craig and Donna Speidel of Watertown, SD.

Saturday, September 23rd 2017

Proposal

We went on vacation to Costa Rica in April 2016. One evening while staying at the beautiful La Mariposa hotel in Manuel Antonio that overlooked the Pacific Ocean, he woke up just before dawn and set up a path of candles (that he so stealthily packed into his luggage and hid the entire time) on the balcony that led to candles he formed in the shape of a heart. He awoke me and whispered there was a surprise on the balcony. As soon as the door opened and the display of candles came into view, I became exuberant. With tears welling in his eyes, he confessed his undying love and devotion (for real!) and charmingly got down on one knee and asked me to continue being his best friend and make him the happiest man alive. I jumped into his arms and we enjoyed the moment only briefly as the hotel security were beaming their flashlights towards the balcony and shouting about the apparent fire hazard displayed. A few minutes later the sun began to rise and I remember feeling lucky that I found a life partner and that we shared a special moment in such a spectacularly beautiful place. It was definitely worth the decade of waiting! It truly was a “sweet ‘16”!

How They Met

Our story began ten years ago when we met in college. It was the classic romance novel premise where boy loves girl - girl rejects boy - girl eventually falls in love with boy. Our first encounter together was because my fiance’s dorm room was right above mine. They would play basketball and Dance Dance Revolution which was quite distracting when trying to study. I blazed up to his dorm room to tell him to please be quiet and immediately formed a dislike for him and his roommates. A year passed by and we slowly became friends as we both studied chemical engineering and had many classes together. Once school let out for the year, we each went home for the summer and didn’t converse even one time. When the next school year started, we ran into each other and it dawned on me that I had missed him and that I didn’t want another summer to ever pass where we weren’t having fun together. We started dating and months turned into years (ten years to be exact)!