The Proposal

I (Kristy) had brunch with Kim (my sister) & 3 friends in Dallas that morning. I was supposed to go over to Anthony's parent's house in Hurst, TX and then head to a soccer tournament for Anya & Tanya (Anthony's 2 younger sisters). I pulled up to the house & noticed Chrissy's (Anthony's other sister) truck in front of the house. I walked in & Anthony stepped out of the kitchen & said "We're having Thanksgiving!" 

Phyllis (Anthony's mom) & Chrissy were at a baby shower, Tanya was at a friend's house & Anya was up stairs. Anthony & Mark (Anthony's dad) had decided at breakfast that they would whip up a Thanksgiving dinner for that evening. The went to the grocery store around noon & bought all the groceries, including a fresh turkey, & started cooking.

I sat in the kitchen chatting with Anthony & Mark a while & then with Anya after she came down. Anthony called his mom & I heard "I don't mean to be rude but we need to get this show on the road." I thought that was a little rude but didn't dwell on it. 

When Phyllis, Chrissy, & Tanya arrived, I saw Tanya for a couple of seconds & then she took off. Anthony walked in & threw his hands in the air & said, "I'm done with cooking. You guys take over." I thought, "Now how is that going to work out when we have a restaurant?" But I didn't say anything. 

Phylilis told Anthony & me to go find Tanya. We walked out of the house & she road by on her bike but Anthony didn't say anything...he was too busy texting her to go to the park. I wondered why he didn't say anything but I was too busy texting a co-worker to really think anything odd about the moment. We walked back into the house & Anya said she was going to go with Tanya & she took off. Then Phyllis told Anthony & me to go get both of them. We walked out of the house & Anthony says, "Wait! My shirt!" & went back in to get his button up shirt. I thought this was a little odd since he had just been complaining about how hot the kitchen had been.

We drove to the park down the street. I was wondering if we were really going to traipse all over the entire park looking for the girls but...whatever. We got out of the car & Anthony suggested we do a little geocaching while we were looking for the girls. He asked me if I had added the geocaching app to my phone like he had asked me too a couple of weeks ago & I said yes & handed him my phone. He pulled up a cache & handed my phone back to me. I guessed I was supposed to be the guide at that point.

We walked across the bridge to the path. The path split & the path to the right went straight up a super steep hill. That was the direction the compass was pointing. I have no idea what came over me or what gave me the urge to scale this ridiculous mountain, but I directed us up the hill. Anthony pointed out the photographer taking pics of some quy a little further down the left path. We made it to the top & the path curved to the right but the compass was directing us to the left. Anthony said, "It must be down there."

I said there was no way I would be going down there. It was pretty much a straight drop off with the only thing slowing you down are a bunch of thorn bushes. I told him I was not going down there but he told me that there was another path that went around that way. So we headed back down the mountain.

When we got back to the original path we took the path we didn't take. The photographer was still there, taking some guy's photo, about 3 feet in front of her with a telephoto lens. This did not strike me as odd...clearly, I am not CIA material. Anthony said, "Hey! Let's photo-bomb them." I laughed at the suggestion of something completely unlikely of me doing & I tried to walk quickly through their background. At this point I knew the photographer had just taken several pics with us in the background & I thought, "She is a terrible photographer."

We finally made it to the geocache spot but were having a hard time locating it exactly. Anthony pointed out two thin, path-like areas & said he would look down one & I could look down the other. I walked just to the edge of the path & saw the cache. I called him over & he climbed into the woods to retrieve it, making a comment as to how I wasn't exactly dressed for geocaching that day. (Funny side story: I had actually planned on wearing a t-shirt that day but figured since I hadn't seen Kim in several months, I would dress a little nicer.) We opened the cache & pulled out a couple of ring pops (still, I'm not catching on to what is going on) & some other typical cache stuff. Anthony pulls out one of the rings & said she would give it to Tanya later. He then said he didn't have a pen. I said, "You don't have a pen in the bag?" & he looked again & pulled one out. I filled out the log & then asked if he had put one of our trademark markers (a tiny domino) in the cache. He said no & pulls one out. At this point, I briefly wonder if it has really been so long that we had geocached that he has forgotten what you do with them. 

He then asked me to put the cache back. I said sure but thought it was a little funny since he had just commented on how I wasn't dressed for it. I turned around & pulled myself out of the tree branch I had gotten hung up in. I made it the 10 feet back to the path & Anthony said, "Well, I have an anterior motive." & for a split second I wondered. Then he pulls out a little white box & he got down on one knee. With his voice cracking a little, showing his nerves for the first time, he asks, "Will you marry me?"

Like a seal, I flap my hands, very unattractively, I'm sure, then with hardly any sound, said, "Yes." and grabbed his head & kissed him.

My necklace bumped the box & he thought he had dropped the ring. I leaned back, saw it still sitting in the box & snatched it out & put it on my finger in one movement so we wouldn't risk that. Anthony later said that he had never seen anyone snatch something up so quickly.  

Anthony then said, "And that is our photographer." I kind of laughed a "yeah-right" laugh & then looked down the path where we had come & there she was, waving. I felt a little more relaxed because I thought they would see what was going on & didn't really want the attention. (I'm not one for much attention from people I don't know.) 

Having the photographer there was amazing. The whole amazing moment was captured. Getting here was a gift from God. Anthony had called around trying to find a photographer & couldn't find anyone willing to do it. At the baby shower that morning that Phyllis & Chrissy had gone to, the photographer had also been there & had offered a 1 hr photo shoot to the expectant parents. Phyllis asked the girl if she would be willing to shoot the proposal that afternoon. She was & the pictures are great.