When Christian Met Sarah...
Sarah met Christian on Christmas Eve, 2000. Their mutual friend, Karla Faulconbridge (Sarah's maid of honour!), had rented a car to go home for the holidays. She invited Christian and Sarah to share the ride with her to Ottawa, passing through Perth along the way.
That Christmas Eve, a major snow storm hit Eastern Ontario and the normally 4.5 hour drive, turned into a 7 hour ordeal under treacherous driving conditions. The long drive, however, afforded Christian the opportunity to get to Sarah.
Sarah patiently put up with Christian's desperate attempts to impress her with his knowledge of genealogy and beer, while trying her best to finish her Harry Potter book.
Three weeks later, they had their first date.
Almost exactly four years to the day of their meeting, Christian proposed to Sarah and became the happiest man alive when she said yes.
Sarah's Bio
Sarah grew up in Orleans on the outskirts of Ottawa in 1973. Sarah's parents, Bruce & Jean, decided that their family needed to 'see the world' - or at the very least Western Europe. Hence, Sarah had the chance to study at a lycee in Strasbourg, France and then on a different overseas stint, she graduated from the Lahr Canadian Military Base High School in West Germany. Ever since, Sarah has has to contend with a regular itch to travel and has seen every country in Western Europe except Portugal. (Which may soon be rectified during the honeymoon!)
In 1996, Sarah graduated from Glendon,the bilingual campus of York University in Toronto, with a B.A. Honours in International Relations and then continued with another year of graduate courses in the same field.
Having always been involved with politics, upon graduation Sarah began her career in Federal politics. She now works for the Ontario Provincial Government in the Liberal Caucus Service Bureau, building relationships and providing political advice to all of Eastern Ontario liberals.
Did you know that....?
- Sarah's mom and Christian's dad went to high school together! Check out the high school yearbook pictures below from 1963!!
- Karla Faulconbridge, Sarah's Maid of Honour and best friend since kindergarten introduced Sarah and Christian.
- Karla and Christian lived on the same floor in residence at York University in 1992-93.
- When Sarah met Christian, she happened to work with someone who actually went to high school with Christian. Sarah was able to hear all the dirt on Christian during the first few dates!
Christian's Bio
Christian was born in January 1974 in Montague, Massachusetts. Soon afterwards his parents moved to St. Catherines, Ontario. His sister Carrie was born two years later in 1976. During the early 1980's his family moved to Richmond, a small town near Ottawa. It was during this time, that his parents, Donald and Judith started their own business, Knudsen Engineering Ltd., designing and building underwater acoustic sonar systems for navies and research vessels around the world.
As a teenager, Christian moved with his family to Perth Ontario, when his parents bought McKinley Place and began to restore it. During this time period, Christian became interested in theatre, film and history.
In 1996, Christian completed his Bachelor of Fine Arts in film at York University in Toronto. After graduating, Christian went to the UK with his best friend Jon and his girlfriend (now wife!) Ashwini. They shared an apartment together in Edinburgh. They ended up being kicked out by a shady Scottish landlord, so Christian moved to Newcastle in north east England, where he worked for the next 8 months in a print management company.
When he returned to Canada he put his film degree to use, and worked in variety of positions within the film industry, until he went back to school to pursue graduate work in 2002. In 2004 he graduated with his Masters of Arts in Medieval Studies and is currently working on his PhD at the Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto in Toronto.