Reba McEntire’s Boyfriend: What to Know About Anthony ‘Skeeter’ Lasuzzo

Reba McEntire is hosting the Academy of Country Music Awards for the 16th time, and it’s the second time since she met her new boyfriend, retired oil geologist Anthony “Skeeter” Lasuzzo.

The couple met in August 2017 when McEntire was vacationing in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, with Brooks & Dunn singer Kix Brooks. Two months later, McEntire went back to Jackson Hole, where Lasuzzo, 70, asked McEntire out on a date.

“[They said] we’ve got a friend who is a wildlife photographer, and he knows all the good places to go and he’ll drive you around,” McEntire told CountryLiving.com. “And so he did, and we started dating about a month or two after that.”

“I was there almost a week and we spent every day together,” McEntire told PEOPLE.

The couple made their red carpet debut at the 2018 Grammy Awards.

“We’re totally in love — absolutely,” McEntire told PEOPLE. “I wouldn’t put up with somebody for two years if I wasn’t in love with ’em!”

Lasuzzo is a widower who splits his time between homes in Texas and Wyoming. Since he started dating McEntire, he has also spent time in Nashville, where she has a home. Lasuzzo’s Texas home is also only a 90-minute drive from McEntire’s family home in Oklahoma.

The couple have also traveled the world. They visited Iceland, Italy, South Africa and even the Arctic just to see the Northern Lights. McEntire said they are planning more trips. In fact, they visited Nashville, Los Angeles and Phoenix in a whirlwind vacation to celebrate their birthdays, which happen to be only a day a part. McEntire’s birthday is March 28, while Lasuzzo’s is on March 27.

“Skeeter and I get along really well,” McEntire told Taste of Country. “We love the mountains…We love going to plays in New York. He was in the oil and gas business, so being from Oklahoma, I was very familiar with that. As a matter of fact my very first job other than singing was checking records with an oil lease company! It’s so funny.”

After he retired, Lasuzzo began focusing on his other passion, photography. He also likes to meditate.

“Skeeter’s a meditator,” McEntire told PEOPLE. “He can meditate, and my meditating is my prayers, but my prayers are quick and often.”

Lasuzzo’s first wife, Marlon Tyler Lasuzzo, died in 2013 after a battle with breast cancer. He has four children and five grandchildren.

When asked if she plans to get married again, McEntire told Fox News the couple is just “having a really good time in the dating process and traveling all over the world.”

“We’ll see what happens,” she added.

McEntire, 64, has been married twice before. She was first married to rancher Charlie Battles from 1976 to 1987. Two years later, she married her manager, Narvel Blackstock. After 26 years of marriage, the couple split in 2015. McEntire began stepmother to Blackstock’s three children. Blackstock and McEntire are also parents to race car driver Shelby Blackstock, 29.

McEntire’s latest ACM hosting stint is timed to the release of her new album, Stronger Than Truth. The album includes the single “Freedom” and was released on Friday.

The ACM Awards start Sunday at 8 p.m. ET on CBS.

Photo credit: Amy Sussman/Getty Images for Celebrity Fight Night