Laura Restivo ’13 and Taylor Restivo ’13

The first time I saw Taylor he was working at Marketplace. Since I lived in Apollo and had a meal plan, the pizza station where he worked was one I became quite familiar with in my first semester as a freshman. We hit it off one day while I waited for him to finish up a batch of cheesy bread. A few days later we ran into each other at the UCF Rec Center where I was practicing with my IM basketball team. He waited until after my practice and we played a game of 1:1. I let him win but he seems to remember it differently! We exchanged numbers and he invited me to a Halloween party that weekend where I met all his friends, which would later become my best friends as well. We were pretty much together all the time — attending basketball and football games, hanging out on campus and eventually moving into off-campus housing with our friends. We had the same graduation date and got to travel and experience college life together. After college we moved to Miami, got married and continued our education. Life would lead us to Seattle, WA for a job opportunity and we supported each other every step of the way. Once the pandemic hit, we found ourselves back in Florida. We welcomed our first child, who we promptly took back to UCF to see where her parents met and fell in love. Over 13 years later, UCF will always be a very special place for us, and we will continue to support and love it forever!