The Proposal

Some people mentioned that they wanted more proposal details, so here they are!

 

On August 23, 2014 John and I visited an old neighbor of mine- Tom Obray. When John and I got there, we sat down and Tom brought out 3 suitcases of rings. He seemed to know just what kind of style I would like because he opened just one of them and placed it in front of me. Gorgeous! But There were two that stood out to me. They were the cushion shaped, halo style. I thought I would get one of those two. John liked them too. I tried on a few others and wasn't too impressed. Then Tom said "I bet you'll like this one." And then handed it to me. It was beautiful! It had 56 small diamonds you could see from above it, and around all 4 of the sides (that you could see from the sides) and then some down each side of the band. I knew that one was it for me. John loved it. Later on he told me that he would have picked out the same one had he gone shopping alone. He was so happy that we had Tom to purchase from! He was dreading going around from store to store, just to get ripped off by a random salesman. Tom told us the rings would be done and sized in 1.5 to 2 weeks. 

 

[I have to make a side note here, to those of you who have ever accused me of being a picky shopper: It took me about 15 minutes to decide on my engagement ring. And! I bought my wedding dress about a week ago and it happened to be the very first one I tried on! A ring and dress are easy; it's those dang entrees on restaurant menus that don't have pictures that I struggle with!]

The ring was done Friday the 29th. I was very anxious and kept asking John if the ring was finished. Saturday night at his apartment, I even checked some plants and cupboards in hopes that he was hiding it. He just said "remember, Tom said it would take a week and a half to two weeks."  That had been the longest week of my life. I wanted the ring so bad and I wanted to be engaged to John so badly. It was so hard to do the everyday, mundane things, like work! John picked the ring up on Moday, September 1st. 

John texted Christa later that night and asked her to ask me if John and I could come hang out that upcoming wednesday night at their house. She texted me saying that their Young Women's activity night had been cancelled, asked us to come over.  I texted John if he would like to go over there Wednesday night for those activities, and he said "yeah! Sounds like a lot of fun. I texted Christa, yes, that we could go over there that night  and I suspected something at this point, because I was suspecting anything and everything ever since we bought the ring! But then another part of me warned myself not to get too excited. 

During work on Wednesday, September 3, John texted me saying Gordon and Brittany needed him to babysit the dogs that night; that Gordon and Brittany had to work late and that their sink was being repaired, so the dogs had to be completely out of the apartment. I texted Christa to ask if it was okay. She said that Buddy would love to meet them (Lucy and Charlie). I notified John. At this point I thought that this definitely wasn't going to be the night of the engagement; I didn't think that John would propose while having to watch over the dogs. 

Come 3:20 Christa texted me that she had to cancel. I asked if everything was okay. She said yes, and that Young Women's that night was back on and she needed to go to it. I thought that was odd. I texted John and told him our night with them was cancelled. He asked why, I told him about the Young Women's activity being back on and that I thought it was odd. Then I mentioned she could possibly be mad at me. John didn't want me to be sad AT ALL on this special night, so he texted Christa asking her to smooth things over. She agreed to do this. Meanwhile John texted me that he was wondering what he was going to do with the dogs. I asked him what he meant. He said that they have been couped up inside all day and that he promised Gordon he would exercise them. I was confused by this and just told him to take them on a walk at Sugarhouse park like he and I always do (I was somewhat relieved that Christa cancelled because I was so tired that day. But I was also bummed because I looked at Christa cancelling as another sign that tonight wasn't THE night.) Then he said he wanted to take them on a hike. I was surprised by this because John doesn't normally initiate hikes (I do. Or our friends). I agreed that taking them on a hike would be fun for them. He then asked me to come. I agreed to this even though I was super tired; at this point I was leaning more towards believing that tonight would be THE night. He was seeming very enthusiastic about all of this in his texts; lots of exclamation points... 

I decided to stop at my apartment on my way home to dresss for a hike. Christa texted me while I was getting ready and told me that she hadn't been feeling very well and that she was going to stay home from Young Women's and that our plans were back on. Again...confusing. I said okay and let John know. He said okay. Later on, I found out that John texted Christa at this point and said- what's going on? Heidi said that you said that the plans our back on for us to go out to Kaysville?! Christa then told him not to worry. She then texted me and said that she wasn't going to young women's and that she wanted to hang out with me, but that Charity was wanting to hang out with just her that night. And then she asked if I could come over at 8:30 that night. I said that was too late since John and I both had to work the next morning and that we would just have to reschedule. She agreed.

 

At this point John called me and asked when I was coming up. I told him I was about to walk out the door. We hung up, I texted him that I was REALLY hungry. He said he had already eaten but that we could stop and get something on the way to our hike. 

I arrived and of course the dogs were there. He asked me what was up with Christa, and I mentioined to him how odd she was acting. He said that he didn't think she was mad at me. He told me he had some bad news and played a voicemail for me. It was Tom Obray saying that the ring was taking longer to size because my finger is so small. I got very suspicious at this point, because John was smirking a little, and it's not like him to voluntarily bring up bad news. He already knew I was super anxious to get the ring. And he was seeming super chipper and upbeat. Probably partly because he knew I was tired, hungry, and he wanted me to be in a good mood for that night. 

We loaded the dogs up in the car, and stopped off at Wendy's drive through. I ate it in the car on the way up to the trail and made sure to tease Charlie and frequently let her know that she was "really missing out" (in Nate's words). She begged for some fries like crazy. And she made sure to stick her nose in my sandwich and blow her dog mucus out on it. Ha ha.  We arrived at the trail and got out, with the dogs on the leashes and the poop bags in John's pocket.

It was a beautiful day. Plenty of sunshine. The hike was at an incline so John and I got hot. But it was well shaded with trees which was nice. We talked about our upcoming Seattle trip for our friends' wedding and a book that I had started reading the day before.

We stopped off at a stream, rested for a bit and then started up the trail again, but it soon disappeared and the trail that we were going up turned out not to be the trail at all. We couldn't find the original one. It was getting later and John didn't want us to get discouraged, so he said "let's just go back to the car." I was disappointed at this point because going back to the car meant that there was no proposal. Earlier John had said there was a pretty view at the very top. I thought that's where he was going to do it and that Brittany and Gordon would be there to take over the care of the dogs (Gordon and John had been texting frequently throughout the hike.) I remembered that on our way up, I looked at John's pocket to see if there was a shape of a box poking out,  but there was not. So, I laughed at myself for thinking that this was going to be his proposal. Plus, how did he know that I wanted to be proposed to somewhere out in a beautiful spot in nature? The only hint I gave him was my request that it not be in a restaurant (no offense to those of you who did get engaged in a restaurant. To each his own!). 

So we headed back down. On the way, we stopped by the stream again and sat down. We talked for a bit and then conversation led to John saying "So you think Christa might be mad at you?" I said "not sure".  He said, " well I know for a fact that she's not..." I said, "What do you mean?" He got this serious look on his face and He grabbed my hand, led me over to a flatter area and knelt down in front of me.

He basically said that what started out as a simple crush has turned into a deep love; that he knew from the beginning I was special and he didn't want to let me go. He then asked me to marry him, brought the ring out of a plastic bag from his pocket and placed it at the tip of my ring finger. I said yes, and then he pushed it onto my finger. He stood up and we hugged and kissed. 

I forgot to mention that from the moment he got down on his knee, the dogs (who were off their leashes) came right over to him and kept jumping up in his face. He had set his glassses down on a nearby rock, so I was multi-tasking the whole time, watching him and his glasses. Charlie, at one point, knocked his glasses off the rock and we thought they were scratched. It was pretty funny. They were fine, by the way :) Just in case any of you were worried.

We then started taking some pictures. We stopped a hiker and asked him to take a full length shot of us because we just got engaged. John then explained to me all of the lies that Christa and he made up and all the complications along the way. I was grateful he went through all the trouble to make it special for me! He was determined to make it a surprise .He called his mom and told her it was finally official; she told him that he's very lucky. Awwwww.  He then talked to his Grandma, she said we needed to go to Idaho and get married there :) Cute.

We went back to John's apartment, returned Gordon and Britney's unruly dogs to them, and discussed how the evening went. They congratulated us and Gordon went on and on about how wonderful John is and how I'm making the best decision of my life :)

We then headed off to Kaysville. I texted Christa and asked her to text the fam and tell them to come over to her house asap for something important. Graciously, they agreed to come over.

We arrived and not long after, everyone else did too (except Nate, he had to work :(). We told them the great news! They congratulated us.  Everyone seemed really happy. We all kind of hung out, it was nice. Emily was able to come too. She and I discussed how exciting it was that we were engaged around the same time! Brent told John that he would have chosen him over any other guy to marry me. How sweet.

 

I told everyone the story, they were so happy for us, it was really nice. Steve, of course was the life of the party. John kept wanting to talk about the Ice Bucket Challenge video that Steve made-the slow motion one. He couldn't get over how perfectly timed it was. I think Steven really liked that John Loved it. Those two will get along just fine. I made sure to inform them that everything was right in the universe because John likes Clifford and Pure Luck. They were relieved, to say the least.

It's so great to be able to tell people about our wedding plans! I truly am the luckiest girl in the world! I love John so much! It's going to be so awesome to live together and to have him as my husband!

 

(If you guys think this post is long, I actually condensed it quite a bit from the original, so be grateful!!)