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FEBRUARY 2017 I BOROMAG.COM 21 Katie & Owen Katie Stearns, 28, moved to Astoria four years ago with two close friends. They were all new to the city and didn’t know anyone in the neighborhood. “As we began to settle into our new apartment, we took notice of the apartment next to ours,” Stearns said. Her kitchen window was directly across from the kitchen window of a neighboring apartment, and the two windows were only about 8 feet apart. “There were some awkward encounters of noticing each other but not really greeting one another.” Since their neighbors seemed to be around their age, Stearns and her roommates joked about how they should meet, and one night, “after a bottle of wine, it seemed like a really good idea,” said Stearns, who works as a development program coordinator at Columbia University. “I wrote on a piece of cardboard, ‘Hey! We’re new to the neighborhood and are looking for some friends. Raise your blinds some.’ As I was making the sign, one of my roommates joked that I would end up marrying one of these guys.” They put the sign to the window, thinking nothing would come of it, but the next day, they were greeted with a sign from the guys next door that read “Welcome to the neighborhood” with a bottle of wine with a bow on it sitting below it. Owen Tyrrell, 28, an energy services manager, said that he had the idea of offering the bottle of wine as an icebreaker. When Stearns put up a sign with a wine opener and her phone number, Tyrrell remembers being surprised that someone with a Wyoming area code was next door. He texted her and they made plans to share the wine at her apartment. “I dragged my roommate with me to meet the new neighbors to help with some nerves,” Tyrrell said. “Katie’s beaming smile when she greeted us at the door put me at ease.” The couple’s meet-cute sounds like it comes right out of a television script: “We joke that it sounds like it’s on a sitcom,” Stearns said. The two sets of roommates hung out as a group a couple times before Tyrrell asked Stearns out for dinner by text. Stearns remembers that it was the week of Valentine’s Day, and the days he suggested for their date were everything but the 14th. For their first date, they went to Pachanga Patterson, followed by the bar William Hallet. The couple got engaged in May 2016 and plan to marry at the end of August this year. “She was (and still is!) sharp, witty and beautiful — everything I could’ve hoped for, just two panes of glass away,” Tyrrell said. “My only regret is never setting up a tin-can phone line.” Photo courtesy of Jenn Hall Photo courtesy of Katie Stearns FAVORITE DATE SPOTS: Q.E.D. Oliver’s Astoria Pachanga Patterson


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