Engagement!

On the night of Friday, March 23 David walked in from the airport (he'd been finishing up in London) and, as is his usual routine, said an excited hello to Ash and then to me. I had just gotten back from climbing and dinner with one of my climbing friends, and I had heard some great news from one of my other good friends, so I jumped right in telling him all about the exciting things I had done and heard that night. When I slowed down for a bit David asked me to stand up so he could give me a hug hello, and so I did. I think I then continued to ramble on for a few sentences and then he said "Caroline, I love you. And I have no doubt that I want to spend the rest of my life with you." I was thinking man, this sounds serious, but even at that point I didn't really guess what was going on. Right after he said that though he quickly knelt down and at warp speed said "Caroline will you marry me?" and THEN I was very surprised and I looked at the ring and said "WHAT?!!! YES!" It turns out that he has been working on the ring since the middle of February, and he decided in London to propose when he got home so he had his friend Matt help out and pick up the ring for him, and then hand off the ring to David while picking him up at the airport. Sneaky! The ring is absolutely gorgeous - David walked me through the whole process of what he was looking for, what options were shown to him, and ultimately how he designed the ring himself at a small jewelry store in Boston. To me, it's perfect! 

More pictures: https://plus.google.com/photos/111337432367013111703/albums/5723467708745491633?authkey=CIGcvtLNuOXd0wE

The funniest part of it all is that last week I was out walking Ash and decided to give Dad a call on his cell phone. While we were talking his office phone rang and I heard him say "Hey! How are ya? Man that came through as a strange number. I'm talking to Caroline! Do you want to talk to Caroline?" then to me he said "Caroline, I gotta take this call, I'll call you back." I continued on my walk trying to imagine who would have gotten that type of hello, been interested in the fact he was talking to me, AND potentially want to talk to me. Considering Dad said the number looked strange I started to think it might have been David, who was in London. Then I thought, wow, there is really only one reason I can imagine David would call my dad and my dad wouldn't tell me who it was... though I also didn't think David had plans to talk to my Dad before proposing. It was all very perplexing, and when Dad called back I asked him who it was and he changed the subject, so I asked again and he said "David from rotary" and I thought "why would he want to talk to me..." then Dad changed the subject again so I dropped it, but that just added to the suspicious-ness of the whole thing! I don't blame Dad's answer though, because I think based on what I heard when he answered the phone it wouldn't have mattered what he said, I still would have suspected David. It was just very coincidental that David and I both called Dad at the same time of day! I felt guilty that I might know David called my dad because David has been so focused on having the proposal catch me by surprise, so I emailed David and told him I thought it was him to give him a chance to change his plans if he wanted to. He said it wasn't him, and I decided to try to forget about it (I didn't really believe David either, but he introduced sufficient doubt in my deduction). Anyway, the funny part is that even with all of this knowledge I was still incredibly caught off guard and surprised when David proposed Friday night! I asked David about it after he proposed and he said that he called more to inform my dad, especially because he thought based on when my dad went to bed he might be the last to find out. In the end David proposed pretty late at night and none of my family found out until the morning, but it was nice that David thought of my dad. 

We spent most of Saturday morning calling/emailing friends and family, and it was a fun and exciting day to say the least. Since then we have spent some time picking a date and looking at venues. We are planning for the fall of 2013, and looking to have it near Burke, VT. We have some appointments to see a few different venues next weekend, and we are excited by all of our options!! It is good that we decided to start a few steps of the planning process early as Fall dates in VT are very popular - there are already several weekends that have been taken for 2013! It will be an exciting 1.5 years with my graduation and our wedding!