I've always thought I would get engaged at camp. Weeks ago, Justin asked me to block off a whole weekend on my calendar (because if he didn't I would have filled it up with other plans) so I thought the proposal was going to happen in the time frame of Oct 6th-8th.
I thought we were having dinner with Justin's friends on Friday night in Indy, but they cancelled that morning (which was all fake). I called Justin that morning and suggested we go up to camp to hang out with Elliott's (our good camp friends) rather than going up this coming Thursday as we had planned (which helped Justin that I suggested it so he didn't have to). We got up to camp in time to have dinner with the Elliott's at their house and then just hung out with the whole family.
Around 8:30 Tom mentioned he was hungry and went inside to order Monical's pizza to be delivered.
I was playing bananagrams with Justin, Tom and Katrina when they got a call that the pizza had been delivered to River Village Lodge accidentally. Meanwhile, Katrina asked if I'd heard about the Party Room (my favorite room in camp where CILTs do all of their activities) yet. She said that something had happened with the fireplace and an outdoor education group and there was damage but that it was going to be okay. I was immediately alarmed that something had happened to my favorite room and wanted to see it for myself. Justin and I offered to go get the pizza from the delivery guy in River Village so that I could also see the damage to the Party Room.
We drove down to River and the pizza man is nowhere to be found. While we were waiting for him to show up we walked into the dining room and I could immediately smell the smoke. The Party Room doors were shut with signs that said "Please stay out" (I think the signs were there because of the fire but they were actually so that no one at camp would go into the room since Justin had set up the proposal the day before with the help of Joel and Tom).
I opened the door and almost immediately shut it because I saw candles and heard music and saw rose petals on the ground and thought someone was doing something in there that I didn't want to interrupt. The last thing I saw was a framed picture of the two of us and I realized what was going on. I immediately got tears in my eyes and hugged Justin because I knew what was about to happen.
It was incredible. There were over 100 candles, rose petals all over the floor, a mix of my favorite Ben Rector and Taylor Swift songs playing, dry ice by the fireplace filling the room with fog. He had set up 12 station/podiums around the room-- each one had a framed picture of us and a letter he had written me about our first date, fruits of the spirit, our first facebook message, and forever. He read all of the letters to me as we made our way around the room. We just kept pausing and talking about things he had been keeping a secret for the proposal that he couldn't wait to tell me-- he had been planning this for weeks...months... and was so excited.
After about an hour we got to the main table by the fireplace-- I loved that all of this was such an experience and took so long. Anticipation is my favorite emotion and I got to keep looking forward to so many things during this proposal rather than it just being done in 10 seconds. There was a wooden box that belonged to his grandma Frances and he had three things inside for me.
1) In 7th grade he got a cheap metal/jewel heart for his girlfriend while he was on Spring Break but when he got home she had broken up with him. He was heartbroken but decided that he would keep the heart until he could give it to his wife one day... me!
2) Minglets are an old camp tradition-- you take the plastic ring on a milk carton and fold it into a heart and give it to your friend. I give minglets to him often. Our friend Ricky, who does metal work, hooked him up with some people who made a minglet out of brass and then 24 carat gold plated it. It's so freaking cool and so thoughtful.
3) The ring!!!!! I was part of the process of picking it out but he had sent me a decoy email just a few days ago from the person we'd been working with on the ring. The email said that the ring would still get here in plenty of time... because I thought it was happening in two weeks.
We prayed together and then he got down on his knee and asked me to marry him. I just nodded first and then remembered to actually say, "Yes!"
Justin has a large menu holder/folder that he uses to hold itinerary's for our dates or trips. It was up on the table as well with the plan for our life together.
Justin's parents have a little cafe table in their kitchen that they sit at together. Justin set up our own little cafe table in the Party Room with all my favorites-- strawberries and blueberries, pepperoni pizza (the pizza guy from Monical's eventually did show up and Joel made sure we got the pizza), a vanilla latte, sparkling water, Sprite, Diet Coke-- he thought of everything. The pizza pan was actually from my favorite pizza place in the world, Lui Lui in NH where my grandma lives. While we were there last month he had secretly gotten the pan from the restaurant and snuck it back to Indiana without me seeing. There were two tall candles in wooden candle holders that had held the unity candle at his parents' wedding.
Next we took an intermission from the Party Room to go to our favorite spot in camp and set off paper lanterns over camp.
We went back to the Elliott's to get sweatshirts and told them I SAID YES!!! and laughed with them about the whole plan of getting me down to the Party Room with the pizza delivery guy and the fake story about the Party Room.
Justin's proposal wasn't completely over yet so we went back to the Party Room. Justin had put together a video of our family and friends (including BOB GOFF) congratulating us on our engagement! So many people had been involved with this proposal and I had no idea. I felt so loved and known and celebrated.
Tonight was better than I could have ever thought of in my wildest dreams. The boy hit it out of the park. I am elated that I get to marry him and that we get to spend the rest of our lives together. We can't wait for what is to come.
The love and joy we've received from people excited about our engagement has been incredible. Some of the most memorable comments we received after sharing our news:
"TRIPPERS JUST GOT TIGHTER WITH AN ENGAGED COUPLE ON IT"
"Hooray!!! So happy!!! Boyfriend Justin is now FIANCE JUSTIN"
"I'm going to start saving my hair so we can weave it to make your wedding dress. No need to thank me. My gift to you on this special day."
"Your sweet boy has been planning this since the day he met you! God bless and love you both!"
"Welcome to the family, we're glad that you have come to share you life with us."
"#goodgraciousdavisbodacious #wrightmovejustin"
"Congratulations! We can add you to the family group chat now"
