THE END. Our Engagement.

Alright people, sorry for leaving you hanging. Its been a busy week with a mix of sick kids, drew double busy and then being sick, me not having a computer and not being able to find pictures for this post. haha Without further adieu, here is our engagement.

I finished my internship mid August. Drew came to Utah one last time to move me back to Oregon. Happy day, we were going to be living minutes apart instead of hours and hours! We got engaged on September 8th, 2006. He had set me up (lied to me) thinking we were going to some work dinner. Thinking about it now, I really don't know how I believed this.....well I kind of do, but its still doesn't make much sense to me now. Drew worked as a security guard at Target. No way would they ever get all the security guards together for some work dinner. But Drew even changed his sisters name in his phone to his bosses name and had her text things about the dinner to him. (Sometimes I wonder how I trust him. haha) He is good.

So I'm thinking we are going to a somewhat nice dinner on a Friday night. Drew had really been preparing all week for our engagement. (Note: Drew and I had previously gone ring shopping and I found THE ring in a matter of minutes. It was at the first place we went. At first I didn't think I wanted to shop for the ring, I just wanted Drew to pick it out. But then I got nervous not knowing what I really wanted because I'd never tried on an engagement ring before. And I wanted to love the ring Drew was proposing with and wanted it to be the ring I wear forever. I'm glad we went together. One, because it was so fun to do together. Two, because I had pictured something totally different than what I ended up getting and I LOVE it.)

Anyway, Friday comes around and Drew was "working" all day. A few hours before he was supposed to pick me up, he text me and told me to find a note he had left me on the window seat at my parents house. There was a sweet note and a shirt he bought me to wear that night. Now you would think that I would already think something was up. But by now you know Drew. Its not out of character at all for him to do cute things like that. So, I didn't think anything of it besides thinking how sweet and thoughtful it was. I got ready to go. Another text comes from Drew, I'm outside. Ready when you are. Usually he would come inside and get me so that was a little odd I thought. I walked outside and he was waiting by a black Ford Mustang he had borrowed from one of his friends. That is when I knew we weren't going to a work dinner.

I asked him what we were doing, where were we going? He would only answer me saying, "who, what?" We drove around Hillsboro a little bit. Past Grocery Outlet, we went by his friend Jason house and he picked something up. (Drew was living at his friend Jason's house at this time.) There he had another note and gift for me. I can't remember what it was but the rest of the night was filled with little mini notes and small gifts to go with it. The next place we ended up at was some property outside of Hillsboro. There I saw some small airplanes and I was a bit confused. I didn't think we would actually be going up in one of them. But oh we did! It was amazing and a little scary. haha We flew to the coast, where we were supposed to land but the weather wasn't good. That was the scary part, the ride to the coast was a little turbulent in that little plane. I was clinging to Drew pretty tight. Drews original plan was for us to get to watch the sunset on the beach and then fly back into Portland. With the bad weather, we watched the sunset from the plane. It was BEAUTIFUL. We took a lot of pictures. (I can't find them right now.)

(On the airplane, it was so cool.)

We landed at the Portland airport and from there went to the waterfront to kill some time before our dinner reservations. We walked along the waterfront blowing bubbles and laughing with/at each other. It was such a fun time. We went to the restaurant Rock Bottom, in down town Portland for dinner. It was delicious. In the middle of dinner, Drew had arranged with a waiter to drop a bouquet of flowers off at our table for me. They had another sweet little note with them. If you haven't caught on yet, Drew tied a lot of the night in with things from our past. Driving by grocery outlet, giving me sweet notes, flowers dropped off at the table (like the Olive Garden situation before his mission). After dinner, Drew drove us to the Cheesecake Factory in the Washington Square mall for dessert. It had just recently opened up. We love us some cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory. There, Drew gave me some fun dessert cookbooks because of my love for baking and my pastry chef passion. Once we licked our plates, we were off again to another surprise location. He took me to his church building in Hillsboro. There he had a pair of Nike Shox (I had been coveting those shoes for quite some time) and a pair of basket ball shorts with my nickname "Sugar Bunz" on the backside waiting for me in the gym. (About Sugar Bunz. I got that nickname during a cooking class I had with Drew and Chris in high school. I think it was our Junior year, Chris' senior year. It was totally random that we were all in that class together. But it was really fun. Anyway, we were looking at recipes and there was one titled sugar buns. I said "Sugar buns? That sounds like some pet name for a girlfriend or something. I would NEVER let anyone ever call me that. haha" It has been my nickname ever since. Should have never said it.) Drew said this part was purely for the fun of it. He had always wanted to give me a pair of shorts with sugar bunz on the behind just because its kind of funny and the shox went great with them. (I, of course, still have the shox and the shorts.) After that we drove back to my house.

(At the Cheesecake Factory)

(The Portland Waterfront. Love. It. Just a little tid bit of info. When I ran in the Hood to Coast last year I was lucky enough to have the leg running through the waterfront at around 6pm. I ran over that bridge in the picture and down the waterfront. It ended up being one of my hardest legs which I didn't expect, but it was beautiful.)

This is where I started getting confused. I was very sure that this was the night we were getting engaged. When he took me back to my house, it was like a "this is the end of the night" kind of thing. It kind of took the wind out of my sails. But I just couldn't believe that he would end the night without popping the question. Next thing I know, he says he needs to go to the bathroom, he goes up the stairs, and then I hear his car start and he is gone. WHAT? I was way confused but I knew I was right, the night wasn't over yet. He text me and told me to get on instant message. (Another thing tied in from our past together.) He had gone back to his house and was instant messaging with me. He told me that since instant messaging was a big part of the beginning of our relationship that he wanted it to be a part of this night. I can't remember what else we talked about on instant message--it was brief. But then he told me to go in my bedroom and look in my closet. I ran upstairs to my room. In my closet I still had all my old formal dresses hanging up. He had a note attached to the dress I wore on homecoming night. (Am I the only one eating this up? Isn't he just amazing?) The note said something about the dress and homecoming. We can't remember what he wrote, I'm sure I have the note somewhere. It also said to take the key that was hanging with it and go outside. So I did.

Outside he had his dads car parked in the driveway waiting for me. I was supposed to call him once I got in the car. I got on the phone with him and he told me to start driving to Hillsboro and that he would tell me where to turn when. He had music playing in the car that was significant to us. He talked to me all the way to the destination where he was waiting--Hare Field. (Our high school football field where I was crowned homecoming princess while he was watching me in the stands.) He had me park the car, walk across a big long field in the dark, up to the bleachers. I sat down and he walked up out of nowhere. He gave me a collage of pictures from Homecoming night and phrases that explained his feelings that night. It also included the current date to help us remember the night of our engagement. He got down on one knee with the ring in his hands and told me that it was there in the bleachers the night of homecoming that he knew he was going to marry me. He asked me to be his wife forever. I said YES! Now we are living happily.ever.after.

(The collage of homecoming, etc that Drew gave me when we got engaged.)

(Hare Field. Those are the very bleachers where the magic happened.)