The Engagement

The long awaited post.  I would usually at this point apologize for taking so long to write this up and give all the details, but for once, this was actually intentional.  I've just been soaking in the "I'm engaged" rays for a month, knowing full well that this is the quiet before the "storm" so to speak of what planning this event is going to turn into. 
Hopefully the delay has not lead you to believe that the proposal was off-the-charts extremely thought out, and full of sentiment. Because, well, this story then is going to be highly anti-climactic.  That being said, it was a surprise, both in the good and the bad way (I'll get to that in a minute), and after a little more explaining it was quite thoughtful. 

So March 31th was just like any other Saturday morning.  We woke up early.  We got on our work clothes.  We had coffee together, and we started planning out the House Work-day.  The majority of the work was being down in the hall bathroom, including tearing out the flooring, realizing there was another layer of flooring, and then realizing that we were standing on a floor of nails that needed to be all pounded into the sub-floor.  I was painting and homemaker'ing of cleaning the kitchen, changing out our winter to spring clothes, and starting the initial prepping for the Yardsale. (I did something else though, maybe mowed the yard, bc I was sweaty and gross, don't remember) The majority of the work in the bathroom was Terry intensive i.e. a 140lb girl was useless, but I would go in and clean out debri and scrap pieces as they were piling up.  Around noon, I went in with some food and water and we took a break in the process just to see where we were and what the next step was going to be.  We talked for a bit and then he told me that he forgot the Lowe's bucket out in the garage that we were using to carry out debri and dirt and asked if I'd go get it.  I jumped up as normal and ran out to go get it for him.  As I was approaching the bucket, I heard the garage door open and my first thought was, "well if he was planning on coming out here anyway, why didn't he just get the bucket himself?!?".  But with two more steps, I saw that the bucket had been cleaned out, and there was a wooden jewelry box sitting inside. 
So me being me, in my totally awkward nervousness, I turned around and said, "ohhhh, Jewelry from Lowe's eh?!". He just stood there smiling at me.  I opened the box and my jaw just dropped to the ground.  I looked at him and just stood there in shock.  He told me that he loved me; that I'll never understand how much he loves me but he'll try his best to show me every chance he can, and would I marry him.  And yes, he did get down on one knee.  I wrapped myself around him still in shock and said Of Course!  I kept telling myself in my head "remember this moment, this is it, take this all in", which is funny because I dont remember him putting the ring on my finger or what else was said after that, but I know we talked more.  I was just all smiles.  And then he tried standing up and almost fell over because he was so sore from all the work so far, and we laughed a lot. All a great surprise.
What was the bad part of the surprise was simply that I looked like a train wreck.  Maybe that was part of the conversation we had that I blurred out from my excitement.  We were both gross!  I never really pictured how he was going to propose, but I certainly always imagined looking pretty at least.  WRONG!  I was sweaty, I still had makeup on from the night before, I was in night clothes turned housework clothes.  Just NEVER what I expected I'd look like that someone would actually propose to me like that. Turns out, it didn't matter to him.  He'll take me anyway I am. 
It took about 5 minutes before the waterworks happened.  And they hit hard.  Terry had gone out into the backyard and was pulling weeds and maybe, possibly also ripping any enormous tree branch out of our oak tree. Yes, ok, that really did happen. I think it was his release of all the energy/excitement/holy smokes this is real. So I walked out sobbing to Big Bear terrorizing the backyard and just hugged him and sobbed.  This was where I think what he had intended to say but got too nervous came out.  As we were standing there he said, "we've been working on this house for over half of our relationship, building this together.  I just thought it was fitting to propose here seeing as I want us to build the rest of our lives together".  Clearly more waterworks. It was so touching.
After a little more time hugging and talking and me pulling myself together, I asked who he thought we should call first.  Back came funny Terry with, "Ohhhh no, I dont do the phone calls, that's on you, I've got a hammer to throw inside.  Work work work; Busy busy Bee!!"  Needless to say, we called our parents together, and then the rest of the phone calls came from me.
I'm sure it's not everyone's idea of a beautiful, incredible, amazing proposal, and that's fine. It was everything I could have ever hoped for and everything that was so very Terry (well besides there being no food involved, I did for some time think it would be incorporated with food or wine....hence always thinking at least I'd look nice); it was private, it was sincere, and it had so much meaning after all the jitters went away and he could explain it.  I feel like the luckiest girl in the world to be his and he be mine.