Laura Marie Acker was visiting her mom in Lewes, Del., in June 2023, when she joined a bunch of her mother’s buddies for a Ouija board evening. “Throughout the session, my father got here via by way of letters and numbers with a stunning message,” Ms. Acker stated. “I’d be engaged in 2024.”
When she tried Ouija once more 5 months later, she stated one other message from her father, who had died in 2016, suggested her to maintain going to church. “I believed the entire thing was loopy.”
It was the tip of 2023, and Ms. Acker continued to expertise an “unsatisfactory courting life” after years of dwelling in Miami and New York earlier than shifting to Charleston, S.C., in 2020. “I didn’t maintain out a lot hope as a result of I’ve all the time dated males with little interest in marriage or household,” she stated. “My profession was a precedence.”
Issues modified in April when Ms. Acker, 39, met Evan Alexander Menscher, 41, via a buddy from her Bible research group in Charleston. Her buddy knew Mr. Menscher, a divorced father, via their daughters’ ballet class and quizzed him about his curiosity in marrying once more. The buddy felt he and Ms. Acker had been a match and launched them by way of group textual content.
After a brief cellphone chat, Ms. Acker and Mr. Menscher met at Bar167 in Charleston later that month. “After I noticed Evan sitting on a bar stool, he took my breath away,” she stated.
Mr. Menscher, 41, stated Ms. Acker was 20 minutes late and carrying a brilliant yellow costume along with her hair pulled again. “I believed she was essentially the most stunning girl I’d ever seen,” he stated. “I used to be greatly surprised as we locked eyes.”
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They closed down the bar speaking about their life journeys, values, careers, totally different religions (she is Roman Catholic; he’s Jewish) and goals. “Time stood nonetheless,” she stated. “I felt my father’s spirit had a task in guiding Evan to me.”
After a parting kiss, she rapidly texted her greatest buddy from faculty to say, “I might need met my husband.”
Mr. Menscher referred to as his sister to inform her, “I’m going to marry that lady.”
Their second date was a couple of days later at a pizza celebration. Ms. Acker met Mr. Menscher’s 5-year-old daughter and watched as he engaged her in a sport of Mr. Serviette Head as everybody roared with laughter. “I considered the scene within the film, ‘The Vacation,’” Ms. Acker stated, referring to a scene within the 2006 Nancy Meyers movie by which Jude Regulation performs the identical sport along with his two daughters.
She later referred to as Mr. Menscher to say it was as if she ordered the proper boyfriend and his cute daughter on Amazon and so they arrived at her doorstep. “You higher not return us,” he replied.
Mr. Menscher, who was born in New York Metropolis and raised in South Brunswick, N.J., has a bachelor’s diploma in kinesiology and train science from Excessive Level College, and a grasp’s diploma in mobile and molecular biology from East Carolina State College. He works as a distant enterprise account govt at Zoom.
Ms. Acker was born in Raleigh, N.C., and raised in Clifton, Va., and holds a bachelor’s diploma in advertising and marketing and hospitality from Florida State College. She is an govt vp of Kreps PR & Advertising and marketing, based mostly in Coral Gables, Fla., overseeing the agency’s southeast workplace in Charleston.
Whereas they loved dinners, motion pictures and boating picnics, there was one early supply of pressure: totally different dog-parenting types. Ms. Acker’s 1-year-old canine Sawyer, a spirited rescue Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, had the run of the home, together with a seat on the dinner desk begging for meals. Mr. Menscher, who grew up with canine and had two throughout his earlier marriage, is extra of a disciplinarian.
“Evan uttered a unfavorable remark about Sawyer’s habits underneath his breath, and I obtained indignant, speeding to Sawyer’s protection,” she stated. They talked about it and their first battle was resolved.
On Sept. 22, whereas the couple and Sawyer had been having fun with a sundown seaside stroll on close by Sullivan’s Island, Mr. Menscher obtained down on one knee and proposed. “I used to be so shocked I jumped in his arms earlier than saying sure,” Ms. Acker stated.
They had been married on Jan. 2, in entrance of a roaring fireplace on the Farm at Outdated Edwards Inn in Highlands, N.C. The Rev. Carl Southerland, a priest at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Franklin, N.C., officiated earlier than 10 company. (5 minutes into the ceremony, his daughter yelled, “Kiss her already!”)
Of their nine-month romance, Mr. Menscher stated, “We moved quick as a result of there was by no means a second of doubt for both of us.”
Ms. Acker stated Mr. Menscher made her really feel assured, secure and at peace. “Evan inspired me to all the time be trustworthy and clear,” she added.
