love like flowers: Why today is great!

It's December 21st which means last year on this day Kyle asked me to marry him!

Since I didn't have my bloggy then, I'll take this opportunity to share our engagement story.

It was my last Christmas "break"

(my senior year of college, so those breaks are officially over now)

and we were spending the whole time together: the first week with my family in TN and

the second with his family in MS.

I was super excited :)

I was a little suspicious of an engagement on the 21st since it was our one year anniversary and we had talked about the future and all quite a bit...but he totally threw me off. The night before he said to me,

"let's go try on some rings sometime this week!"

Usually, I imagine, that suggestion would be quite exciting but a look of disappointment immediately came across my face. I had hoped he already had my ring.

But I faked up a smile and said something like that would be great.

Another thing that threw me off was that same night I told him I forgot to get an anniversary gift for him because I had just been thinking about Christmas (I was so bummed I didn't have a gift for him)

but he told me to not worry because he hadn't gotten me anything either.

anyway...on to the actual story

We had such fun plans for our anniversary!

Kyle had gone up to the Tennessee/North Carolina state line back in October on a personal retreat.

When he got back from his retreat he told me that the area was just beautiful

and he would have to take me there one day.

While making plans for break he somehow got me to suggest going up there on our anniversary

(he didn't want to suggest it and make me suspicious that he had something planned-so sneaky!)

That morning we took off for our trip. He was taking me up to the top of a mountain (where he had been just months before) called Beauty Spot. From there you had a 360 degree view of the gorgeous mountains of Tennessee and North Carolina. As we got further north in our drive we saw all kinds of snow. It was so exciting and simply breathtaking! We arrived at the foot of the mountain and found the road leading up closed-it was covered in three feet of snow. That didn't ruin our day though! We just walked up the road a little ways and played in the snow.

Kyle told me that we'll go back one day to the top to see the view since we couldn't that day.

We made snow angels, threw some snowballs, filled a cooler with snow and soaked in the beauty of our surroundings. Kyle asked me if I would like us to pray together (still not suspicious because this was pretty regular) so we prayed together on the side of the snowy road.

After we finished praying he told me, "Oh and by the way I lied about not having you a gift."

That is when he reached into his bag, pulled out the little wooden box,

got on his knee and asked me if I would marry him.

and yes, tears are coming to my eyes even now

He told me why he loves me and that he would always love me.

I said yes! Of course :)

All of a sudden we didn't notice how cold it was anymore.

I hugged him a million times all while saying oh my gosh over and over...

I was so shocked and so so happy :)

We played in the snow more and talked about how excited we were about spending our whole lives together! I couldn't stop staring at my ring :) I just couldn't believe it!

It was the perfect day.