Anna Davila and Bryce Cole had planned to elope in late March, while in New Orleans to attend the wedding of friends. Their plan was to leave their two children with Ms. Davila’s mother while they took what they told her would be a quick break.
“It was just me and him, nobody knew — nobody had any idea! My mom thought she was babysitting my two kids and we were just having a vacation,” said Ms. Davila, 32. “I had flowers, a dress, the whole shebang.”
But with fears about the coronavirus and shutdowns, the couple decided it would be prudent to skip New Orleans and elope closer to home instead.
Ms. Davila, who has now taken her husband’s name, and Mr. Cole originally met in 2015, when both worked at John F. Kennedy International Airport for a company that developed restaurants there. Ms. Davila grew up in Colts Neck, N.J., and both graduated and received a master’s degree in human resources management and international business from Iona College.
Mr. Cole is originally from Sydney, Australia, and ended up in the United States about 15 years ago. He graduated from TAFE NSW in Sydney with a degree in culinary arts, and is now works in Washington as the chief operating officer of the American division of Paul, a French bakery. His previous marriage ended in divorce.
When the two initially met, Ms. Davila said, there were no sparks.
“I didn’t like him. I didn’t like him at all,” she said. “Work Bryce and outside-of-work Bryce were two different people. Outside-of-work Bryce was fun, laughing, joking, and I didn’t see it until later on.”
At first they went out with groups from work, and soon they whittled their group down to just the two of them. Then there were football games and car shows together, and soon they were in love.
“We’re so identical the way we think about things, our appreciation for each other,” he said. “She’s a gorgeous girl, and she is a great mother.”
Last August, just before Ms. Davila’s birthday, the couple and their daughter, Addysen, now 3, went to a floating lantern festival in Washington, and on one of the paper lanterns that the couple planned to set sail, Mr. Cole had written, “Will you marry me?” He pulled out a ring.
On March 21, with just Addysen, five-month-old Kendal and a friend to watch the children in attendance, the couple were married at Ciao Bella Celebrations, a private wedding chapel run by Mona and Dan McLinden in Warrenton, Va. Mr. McLinden, a marriage celebrant authorized by the Commonwealth of Virginia, officiated.
This time they did tell their families about their plans. “We got to celebrate our wedding with our two kids, so it was a blessing in disguise,” Ms. Davila said.
