Over the years, our close proximity to our Pi Kappa Alpha (PIKE) neighbors has given us some pretty incredible Chi Omega and PIKE love stories. Several Sisters who have worked at the Executive Headquarters have left their role at Chi Omega with far more than experience – many have left with their life partner!
To usher in Valentine’s Day coming up this week, we caught up with some of our sweetest Chi O and PIKE couples who met while working at their respective Executive Headquarters!
Payton (Gartman) and Josh Murphy
How did you meet? Josh and I technically knew of each other as of June 2013 when I was in my first year of consulting with Chi Omega, and he was in his second year of consulting with PIKE. However, we officially met in December 2014 at a large fraternity/sorority conference in Nashville. After the conference and over the next several months, the PIKE and Chi Omega staff members all started hanging out together in Memphis. Long story short… I played hard to get over those two months and Josh was intrigued. We finally went on our first date on February 12, 2015. When there were sweet tarts in a brown paper bag waiting for me in the front seat of his car, I was hooked!
How did he pop the question? Josh and I got engaged on July 8, 2017, on top of the Peabody Rooftop in Memphis. He enlisted one of his dear friends and fellow PIKE staffer, Logan Seger, to be the photographer for the occasion, and my pledge Sister from college, Ellen Shapiro Celosky, to take me out for a girls’ day and get me on the rooftop at the right time. It was special to share that time with those two specifically, and we celebrated the rest of that weekend with friends and family!
Payton and Josh’s engagement 
Shades circle at Payton and Josh’s wedding 
Payton and Josh’s pregnancy announcement
When did you get married? April 21, 2018, in Atlanta, Georgia, and we were blessed to have Chi Omega Sisters and PIKE Brothers from across the country come to celebrate with us! We are excited to welcome a little Chi Omega legacy into our family in just a few short months!
Page (Wood) and Ben Boden
How did you meet? Amanda Werner Getschman considers herself a matchmaker and decided to make it her mission to set us up. At the time, Amanda was working as the Chi Omega Director of Extension, and she and Ben had been friends since their time at Iowa State together. Fast forward to Memphis, and Amanda decided to find a way for our paths to cross without us even knowing it! After a few small group dinners, we decided to grab a drink together one day after work, and Ben was able to turn it into dinner. We went on our first date the day before Thanksgiving 2009 and have been together ever since!
When did you get married? We got married in July 2014 with our family and closest PIKE and Chi Omega friends. We made sure to weave in Chi O and PIKE details into our wedding. My cake topper was a bride and groom owl, carnations were subtly worked into flower arrangements, we both wore our badges, Ben’s pinned on his heart under his tuxedo jacket and mine pinned my to the handkerchief my Chi O Big Sister gave me the day of my initiation wrapped around the stems of my bouquet. We also had Lily-of-the-valleys (PIKE’s flower) worked into the groomsmen’s boutonnieres, all of whom were PIKES.
Page and Ben on their wedding day 
Owl caketopper featured at Page and Ben’s wedding 
Page and Ben at Convention 2016
What’s life like now? Since being married, we’ve traveled the world together and welcomed our son Davis in August 2018. Ben and I have made Memphis our home, and Ben continues to work for PIKE and their Foundation while I have moved onto a career with International Paper. We both value our shared Chi O and PIKE friend group and often joke that there’s a fraternity within the fraternity: Chi Omega and PIKE staffers who met in Memphis and have gone on to get married!
Angie (Alpert) and Chuck Fellers
How did you meet? I moved to Memphis in the summer of 2002. Chuck had lived in Memphis while a Leadership Consultant for PIKE but after doing it for a year, he moved to New York City, where he stayed from 1999 – 2003. In January 2003, he took a job with the PIKE Educational Foundation. Upon his return, he reached out to friends at Chi Omega Headquarters he had known when he was a consultant. He scheduled lunch with two friends, and as I saw them leaving they invited me along. We decided this was a fun way to spend lunch so it became a weekly event. Anyone who was in town on Mondays would get together for lunch. We all traveled quite a bit so some weeks we missed but most Mondays we spent getting to know each other over lunch. We officially started dating on St. Patrick’s Day 2003, complete with a visit to Silky O’Sullivans, owned by Chi Omega alumna Joellyn Sullivan.
Angie and Chuck in front of Chi Omega Executive Headquarters in 2003 
Shades circle at Angie and Chuck’s wedding 
PIKE song at Angie and Chuck’s wedding
How did he pop the question? Chuck asked me to marry him in the lobby of the Peabody Hotel on St. Patrick’s Day 2005!
When did you get married? We were married in July 2005 in Columbia, South Carolina. Of the six men in his wedding party, five were from his initiating chapter at the University of Oklahoma, and one was from the University of Montevallo. Of the six women in my wedding party, five were Chi Omegas coming from four different chapters!
Anna (Callaway) and Joe Wegelin
How did you meet? We met on June 13, 2011, in Memphis for Chi Omega Consultant Training. We were going bowling with the PIKE Consultants at the Cordova Bowling Lanes. Fast forward past standing in a circle and introducing ourselves, I asked Joe to be on my bowling team… which was basically our first date because, despite my terrible bowling, I was very good at getting him to talk to me! For some reason though, he didn’t ask me for my number or even tell me bye… so I was “discouraged never” and friended him on Facebook. After six months (and a few Facebook messages back and forth), we hung out again as consultant groups, Joe finally asked me for my number, we finally went on our “real” first date, and the rest is history!
When did you get married? We got married on August 31, 2019. We met in Memphis and decided to start our lives together there as husband and wife…and it’s all because of Chi Omega and PIKE! The people and this place will always be special to us!
Anna and Joe crossing paths in the airport during consultant travel 
Anna’s crest handkerchief around her wedding bouquet 
Anna and Joe on their wedding day in Memphis
Jaime (Phipps) and Scott Barron
How did you meet? We first met right after I graduated from Florida State University, during my first consultant training in Memphis, Tennessee, in 2012 at the Chi Omega and PIKE consultant social. The plan was for everyone to meet at Chi Omega owned Silky O’Sullivans, owned by Chi Omega alumna Joellyn Sullivan, but Scott beat all of his co-workers to the event so we actually first spoke waiting out front on Beale Street. One year later, I accepted the Regional Director position at Chi Omega’s Executive Headquarters and made the move to Memphis. Scott and I began spending time around each other through hanging out with mutual friends and playing in a kickball league. I was actually the first one to ask to do something with him one-on-one when I clumsily texted him to go for a run on Mud Island. Luckily he accepted my invitation!
When did you get married? We got married on September 16, 2017. Memphis continues to be such a special place for both of us, as it is where we both started our lives after college and with each other. We have a golden retriever named Jobelle, and Scott and I just welcomed our first child into the world on February 2, 2020. His name is Landyn Parker Barron.
Jaime and Scott 
Jaime and Scott with their dog Jobelle 
Jamie and Scott’s son, Landyn Parker Barron