A few people have asked to hear the story of J dropping the ring when he proposed, so today I thought I'd share a Throwback Thursday post with the whole story of the proposal, including the video so you can watch him drop it yourself! Enjoy :)

The most common question I’ve been asked about the proposal is this: Did you know it was going to happen?

Well, the answer is no. And yes.

I knew he had a ring (I helped pick it out – another story for another time) and I knew he’d spoken to my father to get his blessing. But I didn’t know when he was planning to propose. He kept saying he had something planned, but refused to say what I thought he would wait until April. We are going to a state park for the weekend, and I thought that would be the perfect place for him to propose. Of course, I was totally wrong!

The week of the proposal was a rough one for me. I lost two part-time jobs on Monday, and then I found out on Thursday (after buying that adorable blue dress I wore to the banquet) that my biggest client was moving all the work I do for them in-house. I’d been planning to get a mani-pedi on Saturday before the banquet, but I told my boyfriend that I couldn’t afford it now. He offered to pay for it, which made me a little suspicious. (When else does a guy offer to pay for his girlfriend’s mani-pedi? Every time a friend of mine has had a boyfriend pay for one, they’ve gotten engaged within days!) I told him it wasn’t necessary, I’d just do them myself. He didn’t push it, so I didn’t think much more of it.

I spent the morning of the banquet not-so-patiently waiting for the handyman to finish snaking the drains of my house. (The toilet had started backing up into my tub again. Yuck!) By the time he finished I was totally behind schedule, but I made it to the banquet on time. At the time I didn’t notice it, but all the other firefighters were super nice to me. The fire chief even gave me a hug when he saw me! I thought everyone was just in a really good mood for the annual banquet, but later I found out they all knew what was coming.

I looked through the banquet’s program as soon as we sat down and noticed a “special presentation”. My stomach flipped and I thought that maybe that was going to be the proposal! But first we had to eat dinner and sit through slideshows and speeches. I made myself focus on the banquet because I didn’t want to assume anything. I watched as my boyfriend’s grandfather was inducted into the hall of fame, and then it was time for the special presentation. The fire chief called my boyfriend on stage…and gave him an award for participating in the 9/11 Memorial Stair Climb. He came back to the table and I relaxed. If it didn’t happen then, obviously it wasn’t going to happen. Many more awards were given after that, and I heard some amazing rescue stories.

Then the fire chief called my boyfriend to the stage again, this time asking me to join him. As soon as I heard my name, I knew what was happening. I started shaking as I walked to the stage where he was waiting. As I walked up, he went down on one knee, opened the ring box, and asked me to marry him. I don’t remember actually responding, though he tells me I did say yes! I was shaking so bad (and so was he) that he dropped the ring as he tried to put it on my finger. Thankfully it didn’t fall in the numerous cracks in the stage!! And that’s how my boyfriend became my fiance

I actually told my fiance before that I did not want him to propose in front of a lot of people, but I’m glad he did because it was caught on video.

I was still shaking when the banquet wrapped up. The city’s mayor, who spoke at the banquet, came over to congratulate us, and a reporter asked to confirm my name for an article. After that is a blur of phone calls, texts, and more congratulations from strangers.

We ended the night with champagne and cheesecake. Ok, that’s not entirely true. After the cheesecake we were still hungry. We went to Whataburger, so the night really ended with hashbrown sticks and cheeseburgers. And if you know me, you know that is pretty much a perfect night in my book