The Proposal
Where do you even start when you realize you are with the man you want to spend the rest of your life with? Because “uffda” that’s a huge decision you get to make in life if you are lucky & intentional. It’s a huge decision that I have been curious about for the last 15 years or so when I had my first boyfriend and first kiss at Sweet 16 (which was completely not so sweet with the most awkward first kiss and a boy that cheated on me with multiple other girls at the time). Not what you imagine for your first boyfriend? Yeah, me neither. But not going down that route…
All of that to share that I’ve been through a ton of UPs and HUGE DOWNS since I started dating when I was 16. Every man I dated was not right for me until now. Did all those 15+ men I dated teach me valuable lessons? Absolutely. Did dating all those men teach me valuable lessons about myself and relationships? 1,000% – YES. Did all of those experiences have good moments and yet monumentally suck all at the same time in some ways? Oh yeah! You betcha they did.
Here’s the thing, if I wouldn’t have gone through all those lows, all those setbacks, and all that heartache, I would have never realized how truly incredible and life giving my relationship is with my fiancé, Kurt. He is my everything in so many ways.
Got some time? Grab a cuppa coffee and let’s facetime because I could talk for days about all the ways he is perfectly imperfect for me. He’s my kind of wonderful.
Kurt is one of those guys that I had a really good feeling about from the moment we started talking on the dating app, Hinge, but I never knew right away that God meant him to be for me for FOREVER.
We had a fun first date grabbing drinks at a tavern perfectly in the middle of both of our homes with healthy parking which Kurt suggested. (We actually just went back there recently to celebrate our 1 year anniversary of our first date!) But let me tell you, our relationship has definitely not been anything fairy tale style like since the beginning. Did I get beautiful flowers monthly? ABSOLUTELY. Did we get in tear jerking hard conversations with me ugly crying and Kurt questioning everything? YOU BETCHA. Did we grow more closely and deeper in love through every single bit of it? YES. YES. YES. It’s an Undeniable YES!
(That’s my honest way of telling you that we didn’t have the most falling in love perfect fairytale, but instead we had exactly what we needed and what God knew we needed to fall deeply in love in a way we have never experienced before and in a way that would last all those silly, but real dating tests you put your partner through. Trust me, I know you know what I’m talkin about!)
So fast forward into our relationship, oh about 1.5 months in Kurt told me he loved me for the first time as I was dropping him off at the airport. I responded with the most zero heartfelt response of “K, bye!”. (To my defense I have a hard time hearing and I take forever to process things so as I was in the car driving away back to St.Paul, I realized what just happened and I said, “No way! Are you kidding me? I love him too, but I all I responded with was, “K, Bye!”? I just want him to know I love him too!” So my master plan the next day was to call him while he was away on his trip and staying at his sister, Kristen’s apartment to double check if he really said those infamous words “I Love You”. I asked him about his day and then abruptly said, you know what you said to me at the airport? I couldn’t quite hear it, what was it you said as we hugged and you walked into the airport? He says, “I told you I love you.” And then I squeakishly said, “I thought that’s what you said, but I wasn’t sure. I love you too & I’ve really been wanting to tell you that!” And the rest is history!
Well, not really. Ha! A lot has happened from the moment we said I love you to the moment that led us to be engaged today while being so excited about spending our lives together forever.
So let’s get to it. The actual engagement story! The Friday evening in September that changed my life forever…. in the best way possible.
It all started one day at the end of August when Kurt told me that his cousin had recently gone through a breakup and that he wanted to go hiking at Afton State Park with both Kurt & I the following week to get his mind off of things. (If you aren’t familiar with Afton, it’s in Minnesota and has beautiful trails along the river.) So we made plans to get together the following Friday for an evening hike when his cousin was done with work.
Fast forward to that Friday morning and I was being my typical “Manda self” who over analyzes so much when it comes to relationships and creating connections with people. I thought it would actually be much better if Kurt & his cousin went without me so that they could get some good bonding time in. I also thought that his cousin might feel more comfortable opening up and talking to Kurt about his break up instead of having me there too.
Kurt told me later that he was sweating that morning as he was urgently trying to come up with an excuse of why I still needed to be there too when I texted him that they should go without me. He succeeded by telling me a believable excuse and I was back on board with going on this hike. (After all, I do love a good hike with some beautiful scenery! Doesn’t everybody?)
Later that afternoon, I’m driving home talking to my good friend, Megan (who also happens to be my old college roommate) and right before we get off the phone she asks me what I was going to do that night. I responded with our hiking plans at Afton and she replies with a big question, “Are you getting engaged tonight?!” I instantly said, “No Way! Let me tell you all the reasons why that isn’t going to happen tonight.” I proceeded to tell her how Kurt is horrible at keeping secrets from me and that he definitely would have let it spill in some way if it was happening that night. I also told her that he always tells me about his day and with how busy he has been there is no way he has had time to pick up an engagement ring. I also told her that he was probably going to propose the following week since he had planned a special date night for our 1 year anniversary of our first date. So all of that to say, I assured Megan there was no way I was getting a big shiny ring on my finger that Friday night because believe me, I had definitely thought about it a lot and analyzed exactly when it would happen. Did any of you do that too when you got engaged?
Once I got home that afternoon, Kurt came over later and I again told him that I thought it would just be better if he and his cousin went and then I would hang out with him when they were done with the hike. I was just so convinced that it would be good bonding time for Kurt & his cousin to hang out. Kurt, once again goes into panic mode of “What do I do? How can I convince her she needs to come?!” He keeps his cool and genuinely says, “It would really mean a lot to me if you came.” That is one statement Kurt has never had to use on me before because I’m normally always game to do most things so when he said that I knew I better go. Although at that time, I just said, “Okay, I’ll go, but how much of a hike are we going on? Do I really have to change into hiking clothes and shoes or can I just where what I’m wearing now?” Kurt said I better change for the hike and I got a little mopey about having to change so I said, “Can I at least bring a small canister of wine with if I have to change and go on this hike that I’m too tired to go on?” He said, “Yes absolutely! Bring whatever wine you want!” I think he just said that so I would go instead of all the excuses I was using to try and not go!
Now I know what you are thinking, “Gee whiz Manda, you really made the poor guy jump through all the hoops to go on that hike!” And you know what? I totally agree. I definitely put up quite a few road blocks to try to stay home instead. Little did I know what was about to happen that night.
We were ready to go and as we were walking to the car, do you know what I did? I totally took a good look at all of Kurt’s pockets just to see if there was the outline of a ring box or anything since Megs put that thought in my head from earlier in the day. But after a thorough look at Kurt’s shorts while checking out my cute fiancé, I didn’t notice any trace of a ring box.
Off to the car we went and we started making our way to Afton state park! About 3 minutes into our drive, Kurt suggests that I put on some Andy Grammar music. (He knows me so well! Andy Grammar’s music soothes my soul.) I put some on and before long; I was singing along and thinking to myself how happy I was that I ended up coming instead of staying at home. It was one of those nights where you didn’t feel like going to do whatever your plan was, but then as soon as you were on your way you were excited about doing the experience even though it was hard to get going in the beginning.
We got to Afton and it was a beautiful September evening and the park itself was fairly quiet with barely any people there. Kurt’s cousin shows up and we begin our hike with Kurt leading us. Little did I know that Kurt had actually gone out to Afton two weeks prior to pick out just the right spot for where he wanted to propose.
We were on a lovely casual hike and then we got to a hill. Goodness gracious was that quite the big hill. It definitely wasn’t what I envisioned after our lovely walk through the woods. So we were all being troopers going up this hill and by the time we got to the top, I was full on sweating! I barely sweat and Kurt sweats twice as much as me so when we got to the top of the hill and Kurt put on his zip up sweatshirt I instantly asked him, “What are you doing? Aren’t you sweating?” Kurt shrugged it off and just said he wanted to wear it. I thought to myself, He’s nuts, but he can do whatever he wants.
Now we were just minutes away from the proposal. At the top of the hill we walked over to this gorgeous overlook spot that Kurt had previously picked out. It was a beautiful view of the river and trees and God’s beautiful earth. Kurt told me this is where he started to get really nervous because he didn’t know how to smoothly transition into asking me to marry him. So he asked his cousin to take a picture of us and while he took the picture Kurt started to say, “There’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you for a long time now…” He then got down on one knee, pulled out a tiny ring box from his pocket and popped the question with “Amanda, will you marry me?” I said an excited, “Well yeah! Of course! Uffda…this is really happening…oh geez” and then the overwhelmed and happy tears started rolling down my face.
That night Kurt asked me to spend the rest of my life with him and I couldn’t have been happier! I am still crying right now as I write this and think about that special moment that changed our lives forever.
Remember that cousin on the hike with us? Well, Kurt planned that too. He had his cousin there to take pictures of the whole moment with action shots and all! Those pictures are so precious to both of us and we couldn’t be more thankful to Kurt’s cousin for being there to do that!
On the way back we had a much more relaxed hike and as soon as we got to the car Kurt and I made three very special phone calls to share our exciting news. We called my parents, Kurt’s parents, and my sweet grandma Anna Mae. They all were incredibly happy for us and I think both of our moms cried that weekend with happy tears too.
We got home late that night and celebrated by getting some of our favorite specialty pizza from Tono’s pizza right near White Bear Lake and soaked up everything about that incredibly special moment we just had experienced.
There have been many engagement celebrations since then and our family and friends are all so excited for us. Now Kurt and I are in the middle of wedding planning and we are so excited for our very special day to get here when we get to say “I DO!”
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