“The topic of marriage was something Eliza liked to avoid. I always liked to jokingly bug her about it because we had this mutual understanding that it would happen one day “but not anytime soon because we’re just too young,” or something like that. As a kid, I played house and played school and dreamed of the day I’d become a wife and a mom and have a cool job. Eliza’s dreams were a little different. Even if you ask her today, she’ll say she wasn’t a normal kid. She wanted to be independent and alone with her cat. She never wanted to marry or have kids. She wanted a job, some pets, and a nice kitchen. I knew coming into this relationship that things with Eliza may not last forever since she was so against the idea of marriage. We avoided talk of the future, focused on the present, and just enjoyed our time together. One day, probably a year or so into our relationship, I mentioned something I’d been scared of saying for quite a while. I told her that marriage and having a family was a dream I wasn’t going to let go of. I was terrified of the reaction, assuming that was the end of it all. Instead, she responded with the most loving, comforting words that really changed everything for us. I’ll never forget what she told me, and apparently neither will she. As I am sitting here writing this, I stopped to ask her to see if she remembered too. This was her response:

”I knew four days into our relationship that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. I knew I wasn’t ready for that step, but I did know that when I was finally ready for it, it would be with you. I also knew right then that I was already crazy in love with you. I don’t even know why. I just know I’ll never forget the feeling or the date. It was July 9th, and I had decided to go against all I ever knew or dreamed of in life.”

I sure am lucky.

So back to the story...In February of 2016, we were out shopping in Charlotte and I jokingly mentioned going into a jewelry store to find our future engagement rings. Turns out she loved the idea. We entered the store and she saw a ring she immediately loved. She tried it on, and the fit was surprisingly perfect. It was like it was meant to be. Well of course I bought it right then and there. Yes, untraditional...but there’s not much traditional about our story anyways! Then, in that same store, a ring caught my eye so I tried it on too. It was a perfect fit! That’s very surprising since I have tiny baby hands. I’d say it was meant to be for sure. Of course she bought it. This was the first big step towards our forever.

I was a pain from that point forward. I’d intentionally freak her out saying I had proposals planned or give her random dates to make her think it was happening soon. Luckily she stuck with me all this time. Flash forward to July 14th of 2017. That was proposal day. I had all these great, extravagant proposal ideas and plans, but knowing Eliza, she wanted something intimate and not out in public, and the last thing I wanted to do was put her in an uncomfortable situation. July 14th was a day that didn’t have any importance. It was just another day I had off of work. However, I woke up that morning and knew it was the day I was going to ask the big question. I recruited some help for this because I was a nervous wreck! My great hair lady, Mrs. Anne, helped me get all fixed up and ready for a nice dinner, and my cousin, Wade, helped me put together some pictures for the actual proposal. I can’t forget to give a shout out to the stars of the proposal, Tank and Stella, who cooperated quite nicely during what could have been a very difficult doggie picture time. I dressed Tank in his cute little bow tie and Stella in her fancy pink collar and attached cards to their dog tags. It only took four attempts to get four perfect pictures of the pups helping me ask the question: will you marry mom? Wade helped me arrange all the pictures I could find of me and Eliza into a photo album. We included the four dog pictures on the very last page. Finally, I made it to the post office just in time to mail the album to her so she’d get it that same day. Eliza came in from work with an unopened box in her hand. She said hey to me but proceeded on to her room, completely oblivious to my attire and hair and makeup, which was very rare to see on a typical summer day in the middle of the week. She came back out of her room with the unopened box still in her hand and began tearing into it. She stopped for a quick second to ask if I knew what it was. I lied and walked out of the room...what else was I supposed to do?! Honestly, I was freaking out on the inside. So she opened it and started looking through the pictures very cautiously, knowing obviously at this point that I was plotting something. She finally got to that last page and I walked in and got on one knee in front of her with her ring. Before I could even get my own words out to ask the question verbally, she was crying and saying yes. Best thing ever! Next thing I know, she’s flying around rummaging through boxes and ends up on her knee in front of me! She asked me if I’d marry her too. Silly woman...of course. She put my ring on my finger, and I felt like I was on top the world. Those childhood dreams of mine were finally coming true. I still don’t know what I did to deserve such a beautiful, supportive partner in life, but I’m so very glad that she decided to love me back and wanted to share her life with me too.

I just asked Eliza how she felt about the proposal itself and about the thought of spending the rest of her life with me. Her response was:

“I’m glad it’s you. I would never have agreed to marry anyone else. I don’t generally like people, you know that. But I like you, obviously. Well I love you. Put that on the website too. I think spending my life with you will be really exhausting, and you’ll probably make me mad a lot, but it’ll be totally worth it! Oh and I bet we’ll go on a lot of fun trips. I’m just really excited and I love you and you’re just perfect.”

Obviously I’m not perfect, but I do think I’m perfect for her, and I know she’s perfect for me. We can’t wait to see where our future takes us and our little animal family.“