At first, Summerlyn Nahinu wasn't interested in Tanuvasa Moe at all.

But her friends urged her to meet the Saint Louis High School football player, who was enrolled in summer school with her at Kaimuki High.

"My friends liked him, but I didn't," said Nahinu, 24. "They dared me to write him a letter and that's how we met. I was gutsy then."

So she sent him a short note with her phone number, adding, "If you want to talk, call me."

He called that evening.

It didn't take long — or many more phone calls — for Nahinu to have more-than-friends feelings for Moe.

"He seemed to be real, like he wasn't trying to be something he wasn't," she said. "And he wasn't a doormat. I liked that. I liked that he made me go the extra mile."

The attraction was mutual for Moe.

"(She's) the most down-to-earth person there is," said Moe, 23, a psychology major at the University of Hawai'i-Manoa, where he's a senior linebacker. "She never passes judgment and is always sincere with whatever she says. She's a very independent woman and isn't afraid to speak her mind. She is perfect."

That August, they had "the talk" at McDonald's in Palolo. From that day on, they were officially a couple.

And it didn't take long for their relationship to get even more serious. After six months of dating, Moe moved in with Nahinu at her father's home in Palolo.

In June 1999, Nahinu graduated from Kaimuki High and started attending Chaminade University that fall. She planned to major in accounting.

But during her first year, Nahinu found out she was pregnant.

"TJ (Moe) was terrified," Nahinu said. "He was the youngest in his family, no one else had kids, he didn't graduate yet. There were high expectations."

Only 19, Nahinu was also worried about the responsibilities of motherhood. Though she had grown up with younger cousins and felt comfortable about babies, she couldn't imagine what to expect as a mother.

"I was excited and scared," she said. "I didn't know what to totally expect."

She gave birth to a girl, Talyn, after 27 hours of labor.

Now a mother, Nahinu put her education on hold. She decided to stay at home with Talyn while Moe pursued his football dreams. He enrolled at UH and redshirted his first year in 2001.

At first, it was hard for Nahinu, who had her own dreams to finish college. But she knew that sacrifice was part of being a mother and she focused on raising her child. During that first year, she decided to get a part-time job to help pay for the additional family expenses. Her mother took care of Talyn while she was at work.

The couple moved out of her father's home and into a two-bedroom apartment in Makiki.

Two years after Talyn was born, Nahinu got pregnant again. She gave birth to a boy, Tanu, in November.

Now 22, Nahinu was raising two children, not working and still not going to school. She quickly sank into postpartum depression.

"I really had it bad," said Nahinu, who saw a psychologist. "I'd cry about little things. I didn't want to leave the house. I didn't want TJ to even touch me."

She was overwhelmed. Her weight had escalated to 220 pounds. She felt insecure and hated her body. She had to do something.

"I decided to make a change," Nahinu said.

So she started walking around her neighborhood or at the park nearby. Then she changed her diet, watching more carefully what she ate.

"It really brought me out of it," she said.

Six months after the birth of her second child, she took a full-time job at Honolulu Ford, where she works as a service clerk. Finishing college was still on her mind, but now something else dominated her thoughts: getting married.

"I kept asking him, 'Are you going to marry me or what?' " Nahinu said.

Moe insisted he'd marry her when he had enough money. Then Nahinu got pregnant yet again, this time with a girl, Teisha, who was born last year. Still, Moe didn't propose. After eight years of dating, marriage wasn't in the plans. Yet.

A proposal was the one and only thing Nahinu wanted for Christmas last year, but Moe didn't deliver. (His Christmas proposal plans were foiled.) Instead, he waited until her birthday in January to pop the question.

And for Nahinu, it was well worth the wait.

Moe organized a surprise birthday party for Nahinu at Karaoke Hut. All of her closest friends and family were there when Moe presented her with a birthday cake with a picture of their children on it. The cake read, "Mommy, please marry Daddy." He took out an engagement ring and dropped to his knee. She couldn't stop crying.

"That was awesome," she said, smiling. "Nothing could have ever topped that ... It was so perfect."

It only took Nahinu six months to plan the wedding.

"I knew exactly what I wanted," said Nahinu, who got her dress the next day. " I had been planning for this for years."

The couple was married on June 5 at the Hawai'i Okinawan Center in front of 400 guests. Taylen, now almost 5, was a flower girl; Tanu, now 3, was a ring bearer.

"It was really a very perfect ending and beginning for us," Nahinu said.