Okay, okay the planning has already begun, but I figured it would be best to start from the beginning… that’s always the best place to start, right?! Don’t worry we wont go all the way back to when I was just a twinkle in my parents eyes, but we will go back to the beginning of this love story (and I’ll try to keep it short and sweet, but I cant make any promises!)
The Love Story
Michael and I met in college (like freshman year of college!) while training for Cross Country season, we were both on the Cross Country and Track & Field team at the University of North Florida. Him a Jersey boy and me a South Florida girl… met here in Jacksonville, where it all began. It wasn’t love at first sight, although maybe I didn’t know it at the time and I’m sure Michael may tell the story differently but love is what happened nonetheless. Six years later (from our first“official” date) we went out to dinner to celebrate, Bone Fish Grill to be exact. Michael was calm, cool and collected during dinner, any thoughts I may have had about him asking the question took a backseat as he can’t keep a secret from me to save his life… I must say, well played Michael, well played.
Just before dinner ended, he suggested going up to the beach to take a walk and enjoy the night, once again the thought of proposing didn’t cross my mind as this was completely normal, although I still laugh every time I tell this story, how could I not know?! Hindsight is 20/20 I guess.
As we start walking up to the beach I see candles on the sand from a far (yup, still didn’t put two and two together!). There was a truck and a few people near the candles, people I didn’t recognize, so I thought someone else was having a romantic night on the beach, little did I know…
As we were nearing the said area, Michael and I were holding hands and I mentioned to him at least three times “babe, why don’t we walk the other way so we don’t make it awkward” and all three times he didn’t say anything (once again, still didn’t know!) He finally said something when we were practically on top of the candlelit area. This candlelit area was basically two benches and a table dug out of the sand and on the table area there were mason jars filled with flickering candles, roses and a bucket with a bottle of champagne and two glasses. Michael in his not so smooth way said, “hmm, I wonder how this got here? We should sit down.” At this point I was FINALLY starting to realize what was going on, but couldn’t believe it and not because he was proposing, but because of the elaborateness of it. This was way more than I could of imaged, all these questions started running through my mind: When did he get down to the beach to make this happen?! We were just sitting at dinner, how did he have time to do this? Where did he come up with this? How long did it take him?
I found out later that our Best Man, Tyler and Maid of Honor, Taylor had a hand in making all of this happen – thanks guys!
Before we popped open the bottle of champagne to celebrate, Michael got down on one knee and asked if I would marry him (more or less).
And yes, the planning has already begun and in his eyes is nearly done. He popped the question on September 20, 2013 and we will get married on April 11, 2015. I’ve loved the time that we’ve taken to plan the wedding, it has been so much fun and I can’t wait to share the rest of it with you!
I said I would try to keep it short and sweet, I guess I failed, but then again trimming down six years into this post is impressive if I do say so myself and even more impressive is that fact that you are still reading this – cheers to you!
Here are some pictures from that night!
