4 years ago today was the best day of my life. And then 14 months later was the new best day of my life. And every day since then have been the best days of my life.
And here we are on our engagment- and I thought I loved you then. I thought THOSE were the best times, but every day since have been the best times. So to celebrate the beginning of the best days of our lives (or really to celebrate spring break, which coincides with our engagement-aversary), here’s the story of us taking the next step. And by the time you read this, we’ll be well on our way to spending a week in the Caribbean, cruising the waters and making new best days of our lives.
Thanks for wanting me for forever, SCB
Here’s a recap of what happened March 23, 2008… one of the best days of my life, forever engrained in my heart.
Sunday March 23 was Easter Sunday and having gone to the Easter vigil church service, Merrick and I had a nice, relaxing Easter day. We had brunch, watched some movies, hung out and then spent most of the afternoon at Laguna Beach. It was a perfect beach day - 80’s, sunny, gorgeous!
Merrick had made dinner reservations for us that evening, because in addition to Easter, it was also our anniversary. So we went back to his place and got ready. It was a dressy occasion, as anniversaries are – suit & tie, dress and heels…
We drove down to Dana Point, a beach community just south of him for dinner at an amazing seafood place, Cannon’s, complete with a perfect view of the harbor, the ocean and a BEAUTIFUL hotel right next door. We had a very leisurely dinner, ordered a nice bottle of wine, had tantalizing appetizers and entrees and really just enjoyed our time together. Merrick kept mentioning the hotel next door and joked about how “when we’re married and rich we’ll stay at that hotel blah blah blah.” I didn’t really pay much attention to it, I just noted to put that hotel on our bucket list, for some day. After dinner he suggested going back to his place to open our anniversary presents and hang out. So we get into his car but he said, “But first I’m going to blindfold you” So he put the blind fold on me and drove around for about 10 min, stops, finally took me out of the car, led me into a building and up an elevator then into a room, still blindfolded. (It was about the time in the elevator I thought we might be in the hotel…)
As soon as we entered a room, he took off my blindfold and I realized we were in the top penthouse suite of the hotel… HUGE balcony overlooking the harbor and ocean, fire lit in the fireplace, rose petals all over the floor and our song playing on the iPod. (Merrick’s roommate had set everything up while we were at dinner). Once I’d fully taken in everything around me, Merrick said, “lets open our anniversary presents.” which just so happened to be placed by the fire. The first present I opened was a huge 18×24 empty picture frame and I thought, “how sweet, we can have a picture of us blown up and framed!” The next present was a puzzle – a picture puzzle. We’ve done puzzles before, and I had made him a picture puzzle in the past, and puzzles have kind of been representative of US because our thing had always been, “You’re the final piece to my puzzle…” So he said “Lets do the puzzle then we can frame it!” … I still had no idea what was coming at this point…
So we sat by the fireplace and started putting the puzzle together. It was about 200 pieces and I realized a) I’m not very good at puzzles and b) I’m not very patient. I kept trying to put pieces together in the middle that just were NOT fitting and it was getting so annoying! But we finally had almost finished, and the border was about 20 2×2 pictures of he and I, and in the center was one beach picture of us. In the top left hand corner it said “Catherine Anne, I love you” and the bottom right hand corner it said “Yours forever, Merrick Joel” But there were still a number of pieces missing in the middle, but we didn’t have any extra pieces left over. Merrick was a little bummed and said, “Shoot, maybe I lost them when I was transferred the puzzle here” but we looked around us and somehow he “found” them next to him (aka pulled the other pieces out of his suit jacket), so we started putting the whole middle chunk together until it was completed and said “Will you marry me?”
When it was finally all put together (which I really ONLY knew what was going on those very last moments when I could read the middle part before it was completely put together) I just stared at the puzzle and at him, then he brought out the ring and smiled and asked, “So will you marry me?” Of course I cried and said YES YES YES!!!! Then he popped some champagne that had already been chilling and we watched the stars and had a wonderful night with my FIANCE!
The following morning, Merrick had taken off of work and we checked out of the hotel and drove the 3o minutes back to his place. He had told me we were going to meet 2 of his coworkers for lunch, which we did most weeks I was in town. However, when we get there, it wasn’t just Travis and Sara. ALL of our friends were there for a surprise engagement lunch!!! It was so fun and so nice to see everyone (and show off my beautiful ring!) After lunch we went back to his place for a while to prepare for the final event of our engagement weekend. For my anniversary present to him, I had gotten us a ride on a hot air balloon over San Diego at sunset, complete with a “Happy Anniversary” sign and champagne. With a quick change of plans, the sign was changed to “Congratulations!” and we rode in the hot air balloon, soaking in each glorious moment of our new-found love, fantasized about our dream wedding and our life together and ended with a champagne toast back on the ground – toasting to our new beginnings and the best day of our lives, not realizing that the best was yet to come…
Je T’aime Mon Amour.
