Hello everyone!
I just wanted to share my engagement story with everyone, as proof that sometimes you actually DO meet the person you're supposed to be with in high school - but also as proof that waiting to get engaged is sometimes the right thing to do.
Anyway, a little bacground: FI and I have been dating for over 5 years, and met in HS. I was ABSOLUTELY not looking for a long term relationship at the time(more like a prom date), and was not even remotely interested in dating a guy who was a year older than me and would be going to college while I finished HS. We ended up really liking each other though, and dated "just til graduation," then "just til summer's over," then "just til it is no longer fun/working while he was in college for a year without me," and on and on.
Now to the proposal. FI is currently finishing up his Master's in Accounting, and while going to school full-time he also works as an instructor, a research graduate assistant and worked at a tax firm in town during tax season. ONce tax season was over he said that he wanted to take me out to dinner for being so busy and cranky during tax season, so we decided to go to a new italian restaurant in town.
When I got home from working on a project and grading papers all afternoon at around 5:30 I was STARVING, and ready to go to dinner. FI said that he was thinking we should go to eat at 8:00 or 8:30 - which is not at all when we usually eat, but he was watching the first round of the NFL draft and I assumed that he was delaying dinner to watch the whole round.
When he finally decided we could go he said, "I was thinking that we could get dressed up, since we are going to have dinner on the town and all." To be honest, I was a little irritated about this, since I had been sitting around doing nothing for a couple of hours and could have taken 20 minutes to really look nice, but I just threw on a dress, put my hair up and said I was ready to go because I was starving!
We had a lovely dinner, except for the fact that one of my best friends kept obnoxiously texting me to come watch her practice a big presentation she had to give in two days. At first I told FI that there was no way that I was going to go watch her practice a presentation at 10:00 at night, but after receiving an especially panicy text I agreed to watch her practice her presentation ONE TIME before I had to get home to finish my own presentation.
When we left the restaurant we headed to the student union, where my friend had rented a room to practice giving her presentation in front of a projected version of her powerpoint - note that, if any other person told me they were practicing a presentation at 10:00 at night in this manner I would have been suspicious, but this was totally the kind of thing my friend would do. When we got to the doors entering the union my friend and another friend were there, but for some reason they were wearing black cocktail dresses and pearls and looked really great - again, I assumed that they had gone out to dinner or had some kind of event, which isn't all that uncommon. My friend made a comment about my purse - which I have had for over a year now, so I thought that was weird - and took my coat and purse from me before I even knew what was going on. As we walked around the corner to go to the room she had booked for her presentation I saw my two friends' boyfriends in suits standing in front of the double doors to get in to the presentation room. They opened the doors for us and the room was dark, and filled with roses and candlels with a baset with champagne flutes, chocolate truffles and strawberries - at this point I was FINALLY starting to get suspicious.
FI and I walked in to the room alone and sat down on two chairs in front of the table. He then reached for a laptop that was sitting on a chair next to him and started playing a movie he had made with pictures of us from the previous 5 years put to our song. The movie was really beautiful, and definitely had me laughing and crying (happy tears!) . At the end of the movie he got down on one knee, said some really nice things I don't entirely remember, and asked me to marry him!
Well, that's it, hope someone enjoys reading my story as much as I have enjoyed reading others' stories in the past!