With Chase Stokes and Kelsea Ballerini’s two-year anniversary approaching, the Outer Banks star is feeling the pressure to propose, a source exclusively tells Life & Style.
“They’re madly in love. Kelsea’s parents adore Chase and so do all her friends,” the insider says. “There’s added pressure to fit the traditional mold, so a lot of people have started asking when they’re going to get engaged.”
After Kelsea, 31, divorced Morgan Evans in 2022, she admitted that she didn’t see marriage in her future again. “Any time I’ve said a hard ‘no’ to something, I’ve come back later in life and challenged it,” she said on the “Call Her Daddy” podcast in February 2023. “So, right now, I would say I don’t think I will get married again. I love the idea, again, of a partnership, but I don’t know if I believe in the legality of it all anymore. And I think if you want to be with someone, it should be a daily choice. I am also just fresh out of a brutal moment, so … subject to change.”
In October, she changed her tune a bit when asked if she saw marriage in her future with Chase, 32. “Never say never,” the “Patterns” singer told E! News.
“Even though Kelsea did go through an anti-marriage stage after she divorced Morgan, she’s now totally taken that back and is saying she does want to marry Chase,” Life & Style’s insider adds. “A lot of people are convinced that he’s going to pop the question over the holidays. He’s very romantic and is always saying that she’s the woman he wants to spend his life with. They both say all the time that they’ve found their soulmate, so there really is no reason not to take that next step.”
Kelsea announced that she had filed for divorce from Morgan, 39, in August 2022. The split was finalized that November. In January, fans first started speculating that she and Chase were dating after he posted a photo with her at the college National Championship football game. It wasn’t until the “Call Her Daddy” interview the following month that Kelsea confirmed she wasn’t single anymore, although she didn’t put a label on the relationship at that point.
The couple got together after Kelsea slid into Chase’s DMs in December 2022. “I was like, ‘I’m not gonna get on an app,’” she explained. “And honestly, he shoots [Outer Banks] in Charleston and my manager lives there and he put the bug in my ear. He was like, ‘You know who’s really cute? When you’re ready? Chase.’ And I was like, ‘You’re so right.’”
After about a month of talking, the stars finally met in person when they were both in Los Angeles in January 2023. Although they had plans to meet up the second day Kelsea was in town, Chase ended up coming to see her one day earlier because she told him it was “crazy” that they were in the same city, but not the same place.
“He came to this party that I was playing and I had just gotten done playing,” Kelsea revealed in November 2023. “And I was … guys, I’m sweating just thinking about this. I thought I was gonna pass out. You can have chemistry over the phone but when you see each other you’re like, ‘What’s the height difference? Are we … are you …?’ I didn’t know what to do. And so I walked out to his car and he got out of his Bronco – hot. … He hopped out of his Bronco and he did not say a word to me. He grabbed my face and he kissed me and he pulled my face away and he was like, ‘Thank God you’re real.’”
