There's something about Mike and I and weddings. We met at a wedding and we ended up getting engaged while in Monterey, CA for a wedding. Let's back up though to the fall of 2013. Mike and I had been dating for about a year and a half. We had survived an eight month deployment and I had spent about ten weeks in Hawaii that summer enjoying island life with Mike.
Mike was my first real relationship, but I think I knew early on that he was the one. I never really believed the whole "when you know, you know" saying, but it was something like that. Mike says that when I left after the summer, he knew. Regardless, we had talked about it and since Mike's time in Hawaii was ending, we knew that he'd have to make some big decisions that would potentially affect me. He came to visit me in Virginia that fall and somehow managed to get a few minutes with my dad to ask his permission.
That December, Mike's former room mates were having a belated wedding celebration in Monterey, so we decided to enjoy the wedding and spend New Year's in Monterey celebrating. Little did I know, Mike had been looking at and purchasing an engagement ring. That New Year's Eve, we had plans with our friends to go to a big New Year's party. Mike and his friend, Jud had been out all day skeet shooting, while Lizzie and I ran some errands. She conveniently convinced me to get my nails done, knowing what was coming (thanks Lizzie!).
That night, Mike and I ran back to the hotel to change for the big party. It's funny because, at the time, it felt so normal. In hindsight, though, there were so many little things that could have clued me in that something big was going to happen. Once we were dressed, we got back in the car and headed back to Lizzie and Jud's. Mike was pretty quiet in the car, but I didn't think much of it. On the way there, Mike was like, let's stop at the beach. I love the beach at night, so I happily agreed. We stood on the beach for ten minutes and listened to the seals barking and stared at the stars. I was so happy and calm. Meanwhile, Mike was trying to muster up the courage. Finally, he turned me around, got down on one knee. I'm pretty sure when I realized what was happening, I was so shocked I said "What are you doing?" Mike ignored that (thankfully) and just kept saying how much he loved me and finally asked if I would marry him to which I happily agreed.
It was dark, which was probably good. I teared up a bit, but if it had been light outside, I probably would have sobbed. After soaking up the moment, we got back in the car and headed to Lizzie and Jud's to share the good news. On the way there, we called my family who were all waiting for the call. In fact, when I called my dad, he tried to put me on speaker phone knowing what the call was for. Instead, we ended up getting disconnected, but eventually, we shared the good news. They were extremely excited and very happy. We also called my best friend, Anna, who was waiting anxiously for the call, as well.
When we got back to Lizzie and Jud's, they had champagne waiting for us. We celebrated a little before heading out to the New Year's party. The next few days were so much fun since we really just tried to enjoy our engagement without doing too much wedding planning. We returned back to the beach where we got engaged (which actually isn't that nice during the day, but whatever) and soaked in all of the text messages and phone calls full of congratulations. I loved being engaged and had a lot of fun wedding planning. It's such an exciting time!
 |
| Celebrating our engagement with a little champagne! |
 |
| At the beach where we got engaged |
No comments:
Post a Comment