C.P.
Rough_Rock
- Joined
- Aug 9, 2010
- Messages
- 23
Hello, ladies – longtime lurker here. I had been meaning to add myself to the LIW list, but then my fiance completely surprised me by proposing far sooner than I thought possible. I'm generally a private person, feel awkward talking about the proposal in front of others, but I want at least one chance to gush about all the details, and this seems like the best place if you'll humor me.
So, I ended a six-year relationship in late 2010, and spent most of the following year working on myself and enjoying being single again. I really felt like I'd wasted my prime dating years with this man, and relentlessly questioned why I had stayed in such an unhappy relationship for so long. I had serious doubts about whether I would find someone before my child-bearing years were past – or ever – but had reasonably made peace with being alone. After all, I was happier single than I was with him, my life had improved.
About a year after the breakup in December 2011 I decided to dip my toe in the dating waters again. I remember feeling completely at a loss as to how to go about it. I'd never really properly done the dating thing before. It seemed like a minefield, but...potentially fun? Plus I'm naturally a homebody and somewhat anti-social, which doesn't make it easy for me meet and connect with new people. I figured if I could just get out of my comfort zone a bit and be open minded, that would be a pretty good start.
So, I went on a few dates in December. Then one day in January, I was walking home on Saturday evening past a neighborhood bar, and I thought, what the heck, I'm going to go and sit at the bar and have a drink. Just relax and try to be friendly. A little while later, B came into the bar celebrating a friend's birthday. He spotted me and made his way up to the bar, cracked a joke that just happened to relate to one of my dearest childhood memories, and the rest is history. We had so much in common, it was amazing. Our personalities were seemingly different, but underneath that our lives had followed such eerily similar paths and we'd faced similar struggles. We'd even ended similarly long relationships around the same time and for similar reasons. We completely got each other. We felt a soul-level connection in that first conversation and we knew right away that this person was “the one” and that we wanted to get married. I always doubted people who married someone a short time after meeting them claiming “they just knew”--I just thought they were impulsive people with really poor judgment. Until it happened to me, and now I understand. We didn't get married immediately, but we could have easily done so! That's right, I met my beloved in a bar.
Now, the proposal! After 5 months together, B's lease was expiring and he wanted us to live together—but it was just too soon and I couldn't do it. So he had to sign a new 12-month lease, which meant we wouldn't be living together until mid-2013 at the earliest. Ouch. I wasn't ready to live together just yet, but I certainly didn't want to put it off for an entire year. Plans on hold. Over the summer we discussed timeframes and decided to get married winter of 2014 (that would be 2 years after we met). He had until then to propose, but needed the better part of a year to save for a ring, besides, he wouldn't be able to move in with me until summer 2014 anyway, no point proposing sooner.
So last month, we went back to his hometown in the Minnesota for two weeks over Christmas so I could meet his family. My birthday is Christmas Eve, so we'd be celebrating that as well. I'm a little bitter about missing out on proper birthday celebrations because mine basically falls on a big family holiday, so I really didn't mind celebrating away from home and didn't expect much.
B, however had other plans. He booked us an amazing suite in posh hotel in downtown Minneapolis for the nights before and of my birthday. Champagne, breakfast in bed, flowers delivered to the room upon arrival. The morning of my birthday, he had booked me a spa package. Manicure, pedicure, massage, facial. I came back to the suite all blissed out while he served me my late breakfast. He said, baby, do you think we could go to the sculpture garden this afternoon, I used to love going there when I was a kid, it's a special place to me (he grew up to be an artist, after all). It was frigid, but how could I refuse?
We walked cheerfully to the sculpture garden all bundled up, frolicked in the snow a bit, looked at a few sculptures. I spotted the famous Cherry Spoon sculpture, and ran off, leaving B behind to take pictures. Snapping, snapping, snapping away, to get my perfect photo of the famous sculpture. Completely ignoring B. B trailed behind, waited, finally said, “Baby, give me a kiss.” I turned around, and he was on one knee in the snow with tears in his eyes holding a box. He said, “Happy Birthday, Merry Christmas, will you marry me?” I was completely shocked, didn't see it coming at all. I hugged him, he put the ring on my finger, and we took a photo in front of the statue—which turned out perfect—then walked back to hotel. He said he wanted to give me the best birthday ever and that my three-stone ring would represent birthday, christmas, and engagement all in one.
We shared a celebratory round of drinks in the hotel lounge, before having dinner in the adjoining restaurant. They brought me a birthday cake. Then we went back to the suite and called our families and enjoyed all the facebook congrats while drinking mimosas and lounging in our cushy spa robes. Then B. played a song he wrote for me about how meeting me had changed his life, and he explained to me what all the lyrics meant, and we both cried. Then he showed me a beautiful video recording he'd made of the previous song he'd written for me, and that wrapped up our day.
That was our engagement day, that's our story. Thanks for listening. We will be having a small wedding in January 2014 on the beach on St. John U.S. Virgin Islands on the the 2-year anniversary of the day we met. He found a new renter to take over his lease as soon as we got home, and now as of this week, we're living together, just a block from the bar where we met. Yay.
And here's the thread on my ring if you'd like to check it out: [URL='https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/so-proud-of-my-elegant-3-stone-e-ring.185109/']https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/so-proud-of-my-elegant-3-stone-e-ring.185109/[/URL]
So, I ended a six-year relationship in late 2010, and spent most of the following year working on myself and enjoying being single again. I really felt like I'd wasted my prime dating years with this man, and relentlessly questioned why I had stayed in such an unhappy relationship for so long. I had serious doubts about whether I would find someone before my child-bearing years were past – or ever – but had reasonably made peace with being alone. After all, I was happier single than I was with him, my life had improved.
About a year after the breakup in December 2011 I decided to dip my toe in the dating waters again. I remember feeling completely at a loss as to how to go about it. I'd never really properly done the dating thing before. It seemed like a minefield, but...potentially fun? Plus I'm naturally a homebody and somewhat anti-social, which doesn't make it easy for me meet and connect with new people. I figured if I could just get out of my comfort zone a bit and be open minded, that would be a pretty good start.
So, I went on a few dates in December. Then one day in January, I was walking home on Saturday evening past a neighborhood bar, and I thought, what the heck, I'm going to go and sit at the bar and have a drink. Just relax and try to be friendly. A little while later, B came into the bar celebrating a friend's birthday. He spotted me and made his way up to the bar, cracked a joke that just happened to relate to one of my dearest childhood memories, and the rest is history. We had so much in common, it was amazing. Our personalities were seemingly different, but underneath that our lives had followed such eerily similar paths and we'd faced similar struggles. We'd even ended similarly long relationships around the same time and for similar reasons. We completely got each other. We felt a soul-level connection in that first conversation and we knew right away that this person was “the one” and that we wanted to get married. I always doubted people who married someone a short time after meeting them claiming “they just knew”--I just thought they were impulsive people with really poor judgment. Until it happened to me, and now I understand. We didn't get married immediately, but we could have easily done so! That's right, I met my beloved in a bar.
Now, the proposal! After 5 months together, B's lease was expiring and he wanted us to live together—but it was just too soon and I couldn't do it. So he had to sign a new 12-month lease, which meant we wouldn't be living together until mid-2013 at the earliest. Ouch. I wasn't ready to live together just yet, but I certainly didn't want to put it off for an entire year. Plans on hold. Over the summer we discussed timeframes and decided to get married winter of 2014 (that would be 2 years after we met). He had until then to propose, but needed the better part of a year to save for a ring, besides, he wouldn't be able to move in with me until summer 2014 anyway, no point proposing sooner.
So last month, we went back to his hometown in the Minnesota for two weeks over Christmas so I could meet his family. My birthday is Christmas Eve, so we'd be celebrating that as well. I'm a little bitter about missing out on proper birthday celebrations because mine basically falls on a big family holiday, so I really didn't mind celebrating away from home and didn't expect much.
B, however had other plans. He booked us an amazing suite in posh hotel in downtown Minneapolis for the nights before and of my birthday. Champagne, breakfast in bed, flowers delivered to the room upon arrival. The morning of my birthday, he had booked me a spa package. Manicure, pedicure, massage, facial. I came back to the suite all blissed out while he served me my late breakfast. He said, baby, do you think we could go to the sculpture garden this afternoon, I used to love going there when I was a kid, it's a special place to me (he grew up to be an artist, after all). It was frigid, but how could I refuse?
We walked cheerfully to the sculpture garden all bundled up, frolicked in the snow a bit, looked at a few sculptures. I spotted the famous Cherry Spoon sculpture, and ran off, leaving B behind to take pictures. Snapping, snapping, snapping away, to get my perfect photo of the famous sculpture. Completely ignoring B. B trailed behind, waited, finally said, “Baby, give me a kiss.” I turned around, and he was on one knee in the snow with tears in his eyes holding a box. He said, “Happy Birthday, Merry Christmas, will you marry me?” I was completely shocked, didn't see it coming at all. I hugged him, he put the ring on my finger, and we took a photo in front of the statue—which turned out perfect—then walked back to hotel. He said he wanted to give me the best birthday ever and that my three-stone ring would represent birthday, christmas, and engagement all in one.
We shared a celebratory round of drinks in the hotel lounge, before having dinner in the adjoining restaurant. They brought me a birthday cake. Then we went back to the suite and called our families and enjoyed all the facebook congrats while drinking mimosas and lounging in our cushy spa robes. Then B. played a song he wrote for me about how meeting me had changed his life, and he explained to me what all the lyrics meant, and we both cried. Then he showed me a beautiful video recording he'd made of the previous song he'd written for me, and that wrapped up our day.
That was our engagement day, that's our story. Thanks for listening. We will be having a small wedding in January 2014 on the beach on St. John U.S. Virgin Islands on the the 2-year anniversary of the day we met. He found a new renter to take over his lease as soon as we got home, and now as of this week, we're living together, just a block from the bar where we met. Yay.
And here's the thread on my ring if you'd like to check it out: [URL='https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/so-proud-of-my-elegant-3-stone-e-ring.185109/']https://www.pricescope.com/community/threads/so-proud-of-my-elegant-3-stone-e-ring.185109/[/URL]
How thoughtful of your FI to make sure you had a separate celebration just for your birthday and then come up with a ring design having such significance regarding the three occasions. So sweet!
300x240.png)