The Night I Said "Yes"

Today Kelly is doing Show Us Your Life - Proposal Stories... and I thought I would join in.

Jared and I had been dating for about 7 months when he proposed. We knew we were "the one" for each other, but I didn't have any idea he would be ready to propose so soon. We had planned a date night on October 1, 2005 to go eat at our favorite restaurant. We didn't get to go there often so it was a special date.

The week before that Saturday night he had been acting really weird. At one point, we were hanging out one evening and he had stepped out of the room. His phone started ringing and I picked it up to take it to him and I looked at the caller ID for some reason and it said "Jen's Mom".... what the? And he actually answered it and went outside to talk. I thought it was weird but he made up some story that I actually bought (yes, I'm gullible). Later, I found out that he had called my dad to ask his blessing (he tried to talk to him in person when we were visiting but apparently I never left them alone long enough!) and my mom was returning his call so he could talk to her about it.

So I got ready that Saturday evening for our date. Jared showed up with flowers... which he never did! :) And I still didn't know what was going on. We went to the restaurant and ate our dinner. Then J ordered dessert, another thing we rarely did/do. When dessert came, he gave me a card. This was totally normal because he has always been a card-giver! So I'm reading the card and he had written a lovely poem in it that ended in the words "to make you my wife" and I'm so engrossed in the card that I still didn't get it when I read that. Or maybe I was just too full from dinner AND dessert! And while I was reading, I totally missed him getting on one knee.

He pulled out a ring, said something through his tears and proposed. I was shocked! I picked up the ring then gave it back because I didn't know what to do! HA! Of course, I said yes and the whole restaurant cheered! Then I look over and see his sister there with a video camera - so we actually have video of our engagement! Love it! Apparently the waiter and a few other people were in on it. The boy did some planning!!

It was one of the most exciting moments of my life! We left and called everyone and went to visit his family and then some friends of ours who had also just gotten engaged. I loved every minute of that night. Sadly, the restaurant where he proposed has since closed down. We miss it!

Happy Friday everyone!!!!