Contributor, PEOPLE
Joe Amabile and Serena Pitt only had eyes for each other on season 7 of Bachelor in Paradise.
During an interview on the Talking It Out with Bachelor Nation podcast, Pitt shared that she was interested in Amabile from the very beginning, even though he was “kind of a mess” when they first spoke. “I really thought it was endearing because I was like, despite this environment where you almost feel pressure to have this perfect persona of doing the right thing, saying the right thing, and looking great, he’s just sitting there, acknowledging his awkwardness, he’s sweating, he’s being open with me,” she explained.
The couple continued to deepen their relationship as the season went on and during the final episode, Amabile got down on one knee and asked Pitt to marry him.
After the show wrapped, Amabile and Pitt maintained a long-distance relationship for months before moving in together in New York City in March 2022. In August 2022, they celebrated another relationship milestone: their engagement party.
While they have not set a date for their wedding, Pitt told Life & Style in May 2022, “I think somewhere between next spring and next fall we’re gonna be having our wedding.”
From meeting on reality TV to moving to the Big Apple together, here's everything to know about Joe Amabile and Serena Pitt's relationship.
Amabile and Pitt were first introduced when they joined season 7 of Bachelor in Paradise, which aired on Aug. 16, 2021.
During the premiere episode, Amabile was having some doubts about being back on the beach for a second time and he debated going home.
"I don't want to be here just to hang out," he said. "So unless I actually meet somebody that I'm really interested in, I just don't see the point of staying. Do I want to go through all this again? I just don't know. I don't know if I'm up for it right now, to be honest."
His mind quickly changed, however, when he and Pitt began talking and shared their first kiss.
"Starting to develop feelings for Serena does make me want to stay," Amabile said.
The couple were named Prom King and Queen during the show’s ’80s-themed prom event. On the night the episode aired, Amabile posted a photo of him and Pitt wearing their crowns on Instagram. He jokingly captioned it, “and my teachers told me I would never be prom king … ”
During the season 7 finale, Amabile and Pitt got engaged, along with two other couples.
"Your smile, your charm, your looks, this whole thing. The Toronto accent. It's just really everything about you," Amabile told Pitt as he proposed. "It happened fast, faster than I thought, but at this point, I don't see myself not wanting to wake up with you by my side. When I think about forever, you know that's scary. And then I think about it with you, it feels right. You told me you were falling in love with me first. You told me you loved me first, now it's my turn. Serena Pitt, I love you very much, will you marry me?"
The newly-engaged couple celebrated the exciting news on Instagram, with Pitt sharing a sweet photo captioned: “And it’s only the beginning ❤️.”
"Let's do life," Amabile wrote in the comments.
The day after their engagement aired, Amabile and Pitt spoke to the Bachelor Happy Hour podcast about their wedding plans and shared that they were taking things slow.
"We're not rushing down the aisle. But we definitely feel confident in the fact that we want to be together," Pitt said. "It'll be nice to just take a breath, date, live together, and then marriage will come down the line."
In an interview with PEOPLE, Amabile said he never doubted proposing to Pitt, even when his ex-girlfriend Kendall Long showed up right before he got down on one knee. “No, it never made me question the proposal at all. I was really only focused on Serena and the ring in my back pocket,” he said. “So when Kendall came down, it was unfortunate timing. It was a quick conversation, and I wish her the best. But I was just ready to see Serena and do the damn thing.”
Pitt explained that her only priority was Amabile, saying, "He seemed completely steady about the whole thing, so I was like, 'Okay, you know what? It happened, let's move forward and keep this day about us as much as possible.' "
After filming ended, the couple had to navigate their new relationship from afar as Amabile was living in Chicago at the time and Pitt was in Toronto. On Amabile’s podcast, Click Bait with Bachelor Nation, the couple opened up about having to adjust to long-distance.
"We met and then we were never separated from each other. We had never had time apart. We were together morning to night, all day, every single day for a full month straight," Pitt said. "Then we got engaged and spent a couple days together in Mexico. Then we were together for 10 days nonstop because we couldn't go anywhere."
Things changed when Pitt went home to Canada. She said that the weeks she spent there felt "really long," but the couple were eventually able to adapt to the distance and see each other every other week.
Amabile and Pitt celebrated Halloween 2021 by dressing up as a ghostly Prom King and Queen, calling back to their time on Bachelor in Paradise. Amabile shared a photo of the two in costume on Instagram, writing, “On brand ?.”
The couple spent their first holiday season together in 2021. In an interview with Bachelor Nation, Pitt said that the two were spending Thanksgiving with Amabile’s family in Chicago and Christmas with her family in Victoria, Canada.
When asked what their plans included, Amabile said, "Eating, drinking, and shopping together!"
Amabile and Pitt were still living separately in two different countries in December 2021 when she spoke on Bachelor Happy Hour about how their long-distance relationship was progressing.
"Long distance can be weird because sometimes it feels like you're living your individual lives then you get to spend time together, but eventually have to go back to your individual lives," Pitt said. "So I feel like we're just trying to get to the point where it feels like we're doing life together the majority of the time."
The duo made a red carpet appearance at the 2021 People’s Choice Awards. They each shared pictures from the night on Instagram, with Pitt captioning a photo of the two, “walking the walk,” and Amabile writing, “all dressed up.”
On New Year’s Eve, Pitt posted a video montage of photos from the year. “2021 has brought more unexpected surprises than I ever could’ve [imagined] but it has truly changed my life for the better! Cheers to 2022 ?,” she wrote.
A few days later, Pitt and Amabile began the new year by going on a double date with fellow Bachelor in Paradise alumni Kenny Braasch and Mari Pepin, who also got engaged on season 7. “Date night,” Amabile wrote under two photos on Instagram.
In an interview with Bachelor Nation, Amabile and Pitt shared that they both enjoy cooking for each other. Amabile added that his Valentine’s Day plans included making Pitt some pasta with his own sauce, Sundays with Joe.
On the day of love, Pitt shared a throwback photo of Amabile on Instagram, captioned, “Happy Valentine’s Day ? This is the first photo I ever took of @joeamabile1 and still one of my favorites.”
Amabile posted a photo of the couple snuggling on the couch with wine, writing, “We stayed in ?.”
In March 2022, Amabile shared that he and Pitt would be moving in together on his podcast, Click Bait. “I can’t wait to move in with Serena so we just have one place because going back and forth between our two places has been pretty rough,” Amabile said.
He added, "We are moving to New York. My business is still in Chicago, so I'll be back and forth, but we're moving to New York."
The following month, Amabile revealed on Click Bait that he and Pitt had set up another Bachelor couple, Anna Redman and Chris Bukowski.
"Serena is friends with Anna and they were on the phone and Anna mentioned that she was sick of being single," Amabile explained. "Don't quote me on this, but I think that's how it went."
He went on, "Then that night, I met up with a few people to watch a game and Chris was there. He was telling me that he was also sick of being single. I was like, 'Well, I actually know someone who's also sick of being single.' It went like that, so I told him to text her. I texted Serena and told her that Chris was into Anna and that was it."
In honor of Amabile’s 36th birthday, Pitt penned a sweet birthday tribute to her fiancé on Instagram alongside two black-and-white shots of them kissing. Her caption read as a suggestion from her fiancé: ” ‘Make the caption Happy Birthday to the greatest, most amazing, most charming, cute, funny, handsome, legit the best fiancé ever! My one and ONLY! He’s just so great!’ – Joe.”
In May 2022, MTV announced the nominations for the 2022 MTV Movie & TV Awards. Amabile and Pitt were nominated for best reality romance, but later lost to 90 Day Fiancé‘s Loren and Alexei Brovarnik in June.
Pitt told Life & Style in May that she and Amabile hadn’t begun planning their wedding yet, but that they were thinking of a date. She said, “I should probably start planning it! I think somewhere between next spring and next fall we’re gonna be having our wedding.”
Pitt and Amabile packed on the romance with a May 2022 trip to Spain. They each shared photos from Madrid and Mallorca, with Pitt captioning a beach day photo, “Best day with you ?.”
Nearly one year after their on-screen proposal aired, Amabile and Pitt celebrated their engagement properly with an “elevated boho” engagement party in Toronto.
"I think my parents originally brought the idea to us for an engagement party, just because we obviously had an unconventional engagement," Pitt told PEOPLE exclusively. "We got engaged and it was a secret for a period of time. So this was a nice idea to bring some of our family and close friends together to celebrate a whole year later."
Amabile added, "It all happened so fast, but now we're a year down the road and we've realized our parents never even met in person yet."
Plenty of Bachelor Nation alums were in attendance as well as the couple's close friends and family.
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