As promised, the engagement story!
On a lovely Sunday evening, the love of my life asked me to spend the rest of my life with him, as his wife. Hehe.
Leading up to that point was definitely not poetic and I am so proud of Josh that he stayed the course no matter how many times I butted up against him and the wonderfulness that was about to take place.
Two weeks before our wonderful day, that will mark history for us, Josh reminded me of the plans we had of going to the beach the first Sunday in June. Now, I'm sure a few weeks before, after I had told him I would be working that morning, he asked if we could go to the beach. Without much thought I probably answered "sure" - going to the beach is quite normal for me, it is an event but it's a weekly experience. Based on that, Josh began to skillfully plan his proposal. He had already asked my Dad about 2 months before, I had no clue. The night he asked, our church was having a joint small group and Josh ended up being 2 hours late. I was rather frusterated with him when he told me he had been "sleeping"...which is not unusual for Josh, so I believed him. Little did I know.
About a week before the big day, Josh & I were discussing our weekend plans as usual and I mentioned to him I was going to a "bride's maid's barbeque" that two of the women of our church were throwing that night, the night he had been planning to go to the beach. Josh reminded me of our beach plans that I had definitely forgotten about and didn't realize how much he had put into planning for that day. I argued a little bit, telling him we could do it another day, but he told me that we had to go to the beach that day. I reluctantly agreed, I let the hosts of the party know I wasn't going to make it.
While I was processing this, I realized Josh doesn't usually plan anything, so why this day? A couple days later he suggested I wear something cute to the beach. More thoughts.
Mind you, almost exactly the week before I basically swore off looking at anything related to weddings, I loved reading stuff and finding bargains online, but I always felt like I was being until I had a ring pushy. So now with him saying these curious things, my brain went into high speed mode. I tried my hardest to put it out of my head, to let it go. I knew it was still there the day before though.
The day before, Josh and I were at one of my friends graduation party and he told me that his roommate, Evan and his girlfriend, Lauren had asked what we were doing the next day, he told them and invited them to come with us. Being that we see them often, I was immiediately crushed. The special day that I was anticipating, even if there wasn't a proposal involved, wasn't going to happen. (Don't take this the wrong way, I love Evan & Lauren, but Josh made it seem like we were just going to hang out with them and it will be like just a normal fun day with the 4 of us.)
I didn't intially verbalize my disapointment, but I knew that it was building all day. I had gone to a bridal shower earlier, where a good amount of the people were engaged and I was just so frusterated because I had decided to try not to think about being engaged or weddings, but all I wanted was to be in on the wedding planning like the rest of those engaged people (lol).
Later that evening, I got very upset with myself for feeling sad. I shared with Josh that I thought he was going to propose and that we would at least have a special day and now we weren't. After I told him that I felt so ungrateful and I apologized perfusely for being so controlling and pushy. I cried and cried.
And Josh, oh my sweet Josh, he took it like a pro. He told me later that it took everything in him to not die of laughter, however he never faultered. He held me, prayed that God would give me peace and he assured me that he loved me, and, that he was cooler than proposing on the beach. (lol)
All that being said, I was able to put all of it out of my mind, trusting that God had such great plans for us, and I felt free from any pressure about getting married. I knew a proposal was coming, and it didn't matter when, because I knew it was coming.
I worked 8 hours of day shift the next day, never thought to much about going to the beach later. After work, Josh came and got me, we had an incredible day with Evan and Lauren, making hot dogs, taking pictures, going in the lake. It was lovely.
Right as the sun was starting to set, Lauren & I left the guys on the beach to use the bathroom and get ice cream. We were gone for probably 20 minutes. Meanwhile, this was all part of the plan. Josh & Evan were searching for the perfect spot on the beach. Lauren's job was to get my camera away from me once we got back down the beach. We took pictures of the sunset, she took a picture of me in the sunset and wala! she got it. On approaching the beach, I noticed Josh talking to a group of teenage girls, odd. He's very friendly, but not usually so direct with people he doesn't know, and he was pointing and waving them away. Needless to say I was confused, I asked him if he knew them and he said no. (lol) He actually was telling them not to step in his writing, and he also told them he was proposing. And that's all it takes to set off a bunch of girls. Hence the waving them away.
Those same girls were still hovering around once we had gotten back to our spot with our blankets and such. One of the girls in the group, much younger than the others, looked at me full in the face. I will never forget how her eyes danced. It startled me because I have never seen someone look that excited, and she was looking at me. I was so confused. Confusion passed quickly when Lauren directed my attention at the heart Josh had drew in the sand with our intials in it. I thought it was a very precious gesture, what a cutie I have, I thought. We took a few pictures, had that "awwh" moment. Seconds later, Josh took me over to what he had written. The only part that I fully read was the MARRY. In my mind, believing him that he wasn't proposing anytime soon, I let it go. I assumed he was simply make a pre-curser type thing to our engagement, saying that he wanted to marry me. However, he then turned infront of me and began to start kneeling. Still, I thought he was teasing me. I couldn't believe that he would tease me that much, especially since I had been crying my little eyes out less than 24 hours before. I shouted some "no's" out of pure embarrasement.
Then, he went for his pocket.
And the real shock set in.
He pulled out the little black box and I drew a very strong breath.
This was real.
He said my name and had me look at him full in the face.
Then without hesitation, but a little bit of nervousness he told me he loved me.
He wanted to spend the rest of his life with me.
He opened the box, and asked me to marry him.
My hands flew over my face, almost as if I were in complete disbelief.
About 30 seconds past, Josh reminded me I had to say something in order for me to get it on my finger.
I replied that I knew and to hold on.
I finally said yes. :]
The beach erupted with cheers and clapping.
Strangers took our pictures and came up to see the ring.
So precious.
And that friends, is the tale of my engagement :]
...it's real!!!!!
We are so excited!!
June 23, 2011
June 9, 2011
how it came to be.
hello all,
so, with exciting news in the air about my relationship with a special man, I wanted to take some time and not only write a blog about our engagement, but also about us.
I have been waiting to be engaged to write this particular blog, although I've written it out to myself. I hope you are humored by our story, we have had a lot of fun living it out!
Josh & I have known of each other since we were about 17, because of mutual friends and church situations. I have often visited Cornerstone Chapel for their youth groups/young adult groups. Our first official conversation was at a Charlie Hall concert at Worldview (aka River aka Journey) in 2007, our senior year.
Everyone was waiting in line to be let in and me in my spunky 18-year-old stuff decided I wanted to be the first person in. I made a big deal about it, and no one seemed to care and let me go in front of 5 people in line. Josh was one of those people, he gave me a look with his gorgeous blue eyes that told me he was amused and knew who I was, even though it had been a little while. My best friend Erin pulled me aside during our waiting time and said "that's Josh Warner".
At that time of our lives, Josh had an interesting reputation of being a quiet guy who liked to be around girls, lol. Erin warned me to keep my distance lol.
Two 1/2 years past, every once in awhile Josh would be mentioned in conversation with Sarah or Erin. And then Josh showed up at the Vineyard in Parma, and I remember us having one or two interactions originally where we were both like "I know who you are...but I can't remember why" .
Still remembering to keep my distance, I wouldn't actually have many conversations with Josh, but he was around. He came to the house of prayer in Cleveland on Saturday nights, saw him at church stuff, especially a lot more after we both became members.
In October or November we had a brief convo over facebook chat because I heard about a girl he was starting to like, and I just told him to be careful and patient, not to just go for any girl. lol.
During that time frame, my cousin Ally became a Christian. It was so exciting and she wanted to meet as many Christian people as possible. So she came and visited me and met a bunch of people from church and C-HOP. Including one of my guy friends, Aaron and Josh.
Somehow, the four of us were slung into a party of planning a cedar point trip in the summer.
During this time, Josh and I were natrually becoming better friends, he drove me home from C-HOP one time. I scoffed at his golf clubs in the back of his car and the country music he knew every word too. I knew my Dad would like him, and I got scared (lol). We exchanged phone numbers one day because he told me how he would fall asleep while driving (at the time he had a 45 minute drive home) quite often, it scared me and I didn't want him to die. Seeing that I worked 3-11 most days, I told him if he was every getting sleepy he could call me.
Turns out I ended up calling him more. Our first conversation on the phone started off by me saying that he wasn't allowed to like me. That I had enough complicated relationships with guys and I really just wanted to be his friend. He told me he wouldn't like me, it wouldn't be a problem.
We text fairly often, mostly when we were watching Glee on TV or on Thursday nights right before I would start my set at C-HOP. He came to our Spring Kingslove outreach and gave me a decent hard time, just for fun. My favorite convo probably was when he was teasing and said "make me a sandwhich", I told him he had to build me a kitchen, and he said he could.
As our friendship grew, I firmly believe that it was the Cedar Point trip that made it very obvious that we were definitely friends. Best Cedar Point day ever, we all had so much fun. And from that day I really started to trust Josh. Still no feelings. Promise :]
Throughout the summer, we had a lunch a few times, still were talking, hanging out, seeing each other at small group, really being friends.
I still had this view of him that he was a laid back, push over, nice guy who would just like any girl who liked him.
That opinion started being put to rest in August when we took a girl he liked out on a date, after some wrestling with him, he finally told me about her the day before. I was happy for him, but something inside of me was sad, because I knew I would lose a friend.
After their date I text him how it went, he proceeded to call me and rant for a good 45 minutes about how rude she was...lol it was the most spirited I had ever seen him be, and it was hilarious!
That conversation led to several about what kind of people we wanted to date, which continued into our 6 hour car ride to Michigan for the camping trip Aaron and my cousin Ally planned for us to go on at the end of August.
However, the week before the trip, at church, Josh sent me a text that simply said "hey you looked cute today". I flipped, I called him later that evening saying "you can't go around telling girls you think they look cute, they'll start thinking you like them!" He assured me he didn't like me and he wasn't going too.
I did a lot of kicking and whining before this trip, I had to do major adjustments at work, I was missing an outreach at church I've always wanted to do, we hadn't gotten anyone else to want to go with us, we were leaving after I got off of work on Thursday at like 12 am, I was nervous about Josh falling asleep at the wheel...the list goes on.
Regardless, that Thursday evening while I was at work, Josh began to smooth my worries by simply asking me if I could trust him, to drive there and that we would have a good time. It took some convincing but when I came out at 11:30 and he gave me a hug, my worried melted and I was determined to have a good time. 3 1/2 hours later, we arrived at our half-way point, Ally's house. We had a wonderful time eating sugar to stay away and playing "would you rather" and talking about the kind of people we wanted to date.
The next day was an assortment of shopping for food for the weekend and a lot of driving. Once we got the campsite I watched Josh get frustrated with setting up camp, for some reason, I liked that? The only side I ever saw of him was at church...and people are usually pretty nice at church lol. Almost without realizing it, my attraction to him was growing, and I wanted to see how the water was on his end. I winked at him during his frustrated moments, his entire expression changed to surprise lol.
The playfulness between us grew from that point on. I knew for sure there was something going through his head when we went to the lake the last day we were there and he splashed me relentlessly. I was glad he wasn't afraid of me, but I was also a little on my guard. As the evening went on, I became more comfortable with him, more trusting. He was giving me back rubs and I was rubbing his head. We ended up staying up all night talking, being totally open with each other about all different parts of our lives. About Jesus, our families, his new move to 12 minutes away from me, everything.
The best thing he said that night was that he saw that I wasn't as tough as I let on most of the time, that I'm actually quite fragile and need to be kept safe. My heart was won right then and there.
On two hours of sleep, we trekked back to Ohio the following day. Josh held my hand the whole way home. I slept while he held my hand :]
Once we got back, I promptly left for work and proceeded to work a 12-hour night shift. Which I only got tired a couple times. The new energy that I had found, the new excitement that I got when he sent me a text whenever he woke up during the night warmed my body and soul.
I slept for about 6 hours the next day, and than after work Josh came and picked me up to go on our first date. We went to Starbucks and gotten frozen drinks and then went down to Hunnington Beach to just talk.
We covered all the basics, how many relationships we had been in, how we were feeling about each other, etc. It was so natural and so normal to have him hug me and look at me in a caring way.
At the end of the night, we were sitting in his car, my legs were on top of his lap and all I wanted to know if he was going to kiss me. I asked him quietly and he gave me that stubborn look that I now know all to well and said "yes, when I'm ready".
At the end of the night he gave me the best first kiss I had ever had and asked me to be his girlfriend.
The amount of joy that was born in my heart, has only doubled since than. I thank God for all the time of waiting that was before this phase, I love seeings the way He works in our lives more perfectly than we could ever imagine. I would've never chosen Josh for myself, but God had him picked out from the beginning.
This is my testimony of how God fulfills our heart's desires in His own way and timing.
I guess in a way to follow up to my last blog is to simply say, I still stand firmly that God has to make you a whole somebody, with a vision and a foundation before He could bring someone into your life. And I heard someone say once that if your relationship brings glory to Jesus than He wants you to be in it. That's the only reason we should be in relationships, so that we can bring honor to the name of Jesus. By His grace, I attempt to that with my relationship with Josh every day.
Josh - I love you sweetheart, I am so excited to spend the rest of my life with you and I couldn't ask for anything better. You are incredible man and you make my heart dance & mouth sing!!
so, with exciting news in the air about my relationship with a special man, I wanted to take some time and not only write a blog about our engagement, but also about us.
I have been waiting to be engaged to write this particular blog, although I've written it out to myself. I hope you are humored by our story, we have had a lot of fun living it out!
Josh & I have known of each other since we were about 17, because of mutual friends and church situations. I have often visited Cornerstone Chapel for their youth groups/young adult groups. Our first official conversation was at a Charlie Hall concert at Worldview (aka River aka Journey) in 2007, our senior year.
Everyone was waiting in line to be let in and me in my spunky 18-year-old stuff decided I wanted to be the first person in. I made a big deal about it, and no one seemed to care and let me go in front of 5 people in line. Josh was one of those people, he gave me a look with his gorgeous blue eyes that told me he was amused and knew who I was, even though it had been a little while. My best friend Erin pulled me aside during our waiting time and said "that's Josh Warner".
At that time of our lives, Josh had an interesting reputation of being a quiet guy who liked to be around girls, lol. Erin warned me to keep my distance lol.
Two 1/2 years past, every once in awhile Josh would be mentioned in conversation with Sarah or Erin. And then Josh showed up at the Vineyard in Parma, and I remember us having one or two interactions originally where we were both like "I know who you are...but I can't remember why" .
Still remembering to keep my distance, I wouldn't actually have many conversations with Josh, but he was around. He came to the house of prayer in Cleveland on Saturday nights, saw him at church stuff, especially a lot more after we both became members.
In October or November we had a brief convo over facebook chat because I heard about a girl he was starting to like, and I just told him to be careful and patient, not to just go for any girl. lol.
During that time frame, my cousin Ally became a Christian. It was so exciting and she wanted to meet as many Christian people as possible. So she came and visited me and met a bunch of people from church and C-HOP. Including one of my guy friends, Aaron and Josh.
Somehow, the four of us were slung into a party of planning a cedar point trip in the summer.
During this time, Josh and I were natrually becoming better friends, he drove me home from C-HOP one time. I scoffed at his golf clubs in the back of his car and the country music he knew every word too. I knew my Dad would like him, and I got scared (lol). We exchanged phone numbers one day because he told me how he would fall asleep while driving (at the time he had a 45 minute drive home) quite often, it scared me and I didn't want him to die. Seeing that I worked 3-11 most days, I told him if he was every getting sleepy he could call me.
Turns out I ended up calling him more. Our first conversation on the phone started off by me saying that he wasn't allowed to like me. That I had enough complicated relationships with guys and I really just wanted to be his friend. He told me he wouldn't like me, it wouldn't be a problem.
We text fairly often, mostly when we were watching Glee on TV or on Thursday nights right before I would start my set at C-HOP. He came to our Spring Kingslove outreach and gave me a decent hard time, just for fun. My favorite convo probably was when he was teasing and said "make me a sandwhich", I told him he had to build me a kitchen, and he said he could.
As our friendship grew, I firmly believe that it was the Cedar Point trip that made it very obvious that we were definitely friends. Best Cedar Point day ever, we all had so much fun. And from that day I really started to trust Josh. Still no feelings. Promise :]
Throughout the summer, we had a lunch a few times, still were talking, hanging out, seeing each other at small group, really being friends.
I still had this view of him that he was a laid back, push over, nice guy who would just like any girl who liked him.
That opinion started being put to rest in August when we took a girl he liked out on a date, after some wrestling with him, he finally told me about her the day before. I was happy for him, but something inside of me was sad, because I knew I would lose a friend.
After their date I text him how it went, he proceeded to call me and rant for a good 45 minutes about how rude she was...lol it was the most spirited I had ever seen him be, and it was hilarious!
That conversation led to several about what kind of people we wanted to date, which continued into our 6 hour car ride to Michigan for the camping trip Aaron and my cousin Ally planned for us to go on at the end of August.
However, the week before the trip, at church, Josh sent me a text that simply said "hey you looked cute today". I flipped, I called him later that evening saying "you can't go around telling girls you think they look cute, they'll start thinking you like them!" He assured me he didn't like me and he wasn't going too.
I did a lot of kicking and whining before this trip, I had to do major adjustments at work, I was missing an outreach at church I've always wanted to do, we hadn't gotten anyone else to want to go with us, we were leaving after I got off of work on Thursday at like 12 am, I was nervous about Josh falling asleep at the wheel...the list goes on.
Regardless, that Thursday evening while I was at work, Josh began to smooth my worries by simply asking me if I could trust him, to drive there and that we would have a good time. It took some convincing but when I came out at 11:30 and he gave me a hug, my worried melted and I was determined to have a good time. 3 1/2 hours later, we arrived at our half-way point, Ally's house. We had a wonderful time eating sugar to stay away and playing "would you rather" and talking about the kind of people we wanted to date.
The next day was an assortment of shopping for food for the weekend and a lot of driving. Once we got the campsite I watched Josh get frustrated with setting up camp, for some reason, I liked that? The only side I ever saw of him was at church...and people are usually pretty nice at church lol. Almost without realizing it, my attraction to him was growing, and I wanted to see how the water was on his end. I winked at him during his frustrated moments, his entire expression changed to surprise lol.
The playfulness between us grew from that point on. I knew for sure there was something going through his head when we went to the lake the last day we were there and he splashed me relentlessly. I was glad he wasn't afraid of me, but I was also a little on my guard. As the evening went on, I became more comfortable with him, more trusting. He was giving me back rubs and I was rubbing his head. We ended up staying up all night talking, being totally open with each other about all different parts of our lives. About Jesus, our families, his new move to 12 minutes away from me, everything.
The best thing he said that night was that he saw that I wasn't as tough as I let on most of the time, that I'm actually quite fragile and need to be kept safe. My heart was won right then and there.
On two hours of sleep, we trekked back to Ohio the following day. Josh held my hand the whole way home. I slept while he held my hand :]
Once we got back, I promptly left for work and proceeded to work a 12-hour night shift. Which I only got tired a couple times. The new energy that I had found, the new excitement that I got when he sent me a text whenever he woke up during the night warmed my body and soul.
I slept for about 6 hours the next day, and than after work Josh came and picked me up to go on our first date. We went to Starbucks and gotten frozen drinks and then went down to Hunnington Beach to just talk.
We covered all the basics, how many relationships we had been in, how we were feeling about each other, etc. It was so natural and so normal to have him hug me and look at me in a caring way.
At the end of the night, we were sitting in his car, my legs were on top of his lap and all I wanted to know if he was going to kiss me. I asked him quietly and he gave me that stubborn look that I now know all to well and said "yes, when I'm ready".
At the end of the night he gave me the best first kiss I had ever had and asked me to be his girlfriend.
The amount of joy that was born in my heart, has only doubled since than. I thank God for all the time of waiting that was before this phase, I love seeings the way He works in our lives more perfectly than we could ever imagine. I would've never chosen Josh for myself, but God had him picked out from the beginning.
This is my testimony of how God fulfills our heart's desires in His own way and timing.
I guess in a way to follow up to my last blog is to simply say, I still stand firmly that God has to make you a whole somebody, with a vision and a foundation before He could bring someone into your life. And I heard someone say once that if your relationship brings glory to Jesus than He wants you to be in it. That's the only reason we should be in relationships, so that we can bring honor to the name of Jesus. By His grace, I attempt to that with my relationship with Josh every day.
Josh - I love you sweetheart, I am so excited to spend the rest of my life with you and I couldn't ask for anything better. You are incredible man and you make my heart dance & mouth sing!!
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