Sunday, January 13, 2008

Our Engagement Story

I was looking through pictures on my computer today, thinking..."what can I blog about today?" I am really wanting to keep up on my blog, now that I know what a wonderful way it is to preserve our family's history. As I was searching through pictures, I came accross our engagement pictures, and thought about what a great story it is to preserve for our children and grandchildren.

The day was May 14, 2005. It was my 22nd birthday, my mother's birthday (I won't disclose her age at the time), and the day that I graduated with my bachelor's degree in Social Work from the University of Arkansas. Nick and I had only been dating for a couple of months, but we were very much in love, and I had a feeling that the engagement was coming soon...although, I didn't realize it would be THIS soon.

Nick called to wish me a happy birthday, and asked that I come over, so that we could go on a walk before graduation, and my graduation party. He felt that we wouldn't have much quality time to spend together on my birthday, and he wanted to be alone, if only for a few minutes. I was highly stressed out at the time, because here it was, 10:00, and I had to be in Fayetteville in an hour to take pictures with my dad's side of the family. I told Nick "We can go for a walk, but it has to be quick." Boy was I wrong!

When I arrived at Nick's house, his mother urged us to get going, so that I wouldn't be late. Here I am, thinking that we are just going to go on a walk around the block. Wrong again! Nick told me to get in the car (I'm thinking...okay...it's 10:15, where on earth are we going?) Then, we headed towards Bella Vista. "BELLA VISTA?! We don't have time to go to Bella Vista! I have to be in Fayetteville in 30 minutes!" Those were my frantic pleas for him to turn around so that I could get in my car and head south.

Nick convinced to me to just walk to the waterfall at Tanyard Creek with him, and then he promised to have me back at my car in time to head to Fayetteville. I compromised, and said we could walk to the waterfall, look at it for a second, then we had to RUN back to the car.
We got to the waterfall, and Nick handed me a sweet card, and appologized to me, for he hadn't gotten me anything for my birthday yet. I was a little dissapointed, but understood. He said he hadn't had time to shop for me, but he knew how much I loved getting cards.

We got to the waterfall, and he wanted to walk above the waterfall, to the reservoire of water that poured over the rocks to make the watefall. Reluctantly, I went. We sat down by the bank of the water, and he told me how much he loved me. Then, he looked into the water, stood up, walked out a couple of feet, and grabbed a large shell. He played with the shell for a minute, and then told me he couldn't open it. At this point, I was totally oblivious, and thought "why can't he open it? You can tell it is open already." So, I went along with it, and I opened the large shell. Inside it was a medium sized shell. I am still totally oblivious, and thought what a strange shell to have another shell inside. So, I opened the medium sized shell, and inside it is a small shell. Now I am catching on.

I opened the small shell, and in it is a beautiful diamond ring. My mouth dropped. I looked at Nick...wondering if he had done this, or if we had just found someone's ring in the lake. He again told me how much he loved me, and that he wanted to spend eternity with me, and he asked me to be his wife. Of course, I said yes, and I was crying. After I said yes, we heard laughter in the background, and his friends were standing on a hill taking pictures of the whole thing! They had also been present to safeguard the ring while it was in the water.

Needless to say, we had our moment, then reality set in and we RAN as fast as we could back to the car! What a wonderful day!

The Ring

So in love!

"Look at this cool shell!"

She said Yes!

1 comment:

Mary said...

I loved this story! Keep the flashbacks coming! :)