Finding my Inner Light

First of all, I want to apologize to those who read my blog, and become a tad disappointed with the lack of recent updates.  My life has changed quite a bit in the past few weeks, and I really should get to documenting the events! :D

First of all, I asked my longtime girlfriend of four years, Tamara Copeland, to marry me.  For those of you who are curious as to when I proposed, it was on September 13th, a Tuesday, at around 5:45 PM or so. 

The Story!

OK, as I'm sure you probably have guessed from Tamara's posting,  she was wondering when I was planning on proposing.  Little did she know, I had actually ordered her ring 3 weeks prior to asking her to marry me, but wasn't 100% certain on her size so I had to bring her into the jewelry store to get her proper ring size.  The ring I ordered was a simple Princess cut Solitaire ring, with a nice band and cathedral setting.  We went to Helzberg Diamonds at Barton Creek Mall in Austin, and Isidro (the salesman) recognized me from my prior visits (and my ordering the ring) and immediately came over to help me in my "deception."

Isidro sized Tamara's left ring finger, which was 4 3/4ths, not the original size 6 that I had initially thought she was.  We also brought out some antique style rings for her to look at so she wouldn't go about nosing around and happening on the ring I had ordered for her - I could tell she was a little disappointed in what I had "chosen" (not the Princess cut ring) but I didn't want her to discover the other ring I had in mind.  We eventually settled that Tamara's ring size was a size 5, so once that was done, I privately instructed Isidro to go ahead and get the ring resized, and have it dipped in Rhodium and cleaned - the ring would be ready in 2 weeks!

Fast forward to Thursday when I went to TSD to pick her up from work.  I told her that I was running late (picking up the ring, duh) that day, and would be there as quickly as possible.  She looked to be in a bit of a bad mood, and I was kind of pondering whether it would be a good idea to wait or go ahead and propose today.  My initial plan was to ask her if she would like to go out to eat, and take her to the vegetarian restaurant where we first had our "date" here in Austin, but she kind of shot a hole in that idea - she wanted Sonic fast food. -.-;;;; Oy.. sonic. There goes that romantic plan, lol. So we get take out, drive back home, and I go to plan "B."

I asked her to help me with a project, sort of disguising it for school as I'm currently studying photographic technology at ACC, and she sits down on the couch and peruses through the photo album I made for the two of us - which has photos of us since we were dating.  She looks at me and goes, "This is pretty good, you don't need my help," and I direct her to the end of the album, which had a label that looked like a food nutrition label, filled with the nutritional content of marriage.

"WHAT?! Only 17% respect? There's something wrong with this," is what Tamara said, when she started to nitpick the label. "ONLY 78% love? >.>;;;;" Around that moment, I took the ring box out from behind me where I had hidden it behind a pillow, and got down on one knee.  "That label is missing on thing, the ring hon. Tamara Lynn Copeland, will you marry me?"

O.O She looked at me kind of thunderstruck lol.  Then all of the sudden, I get a bunch of "NONONONONONO!" in rapid ASL and she's kind of bouncing on the couch looking upset.  And I'm thinking to myself, "She's been dropping hints as to when I'll propose, and I know she's been looking forward to this, and now she tells me no? >.>;" 

"OMG YES!" o.o;  "This is supposed to be really romantic and I ruined it all with my bad mood and didn't even recognize the album's purpose!"

"... do it again, please!" lol

So I do the proposal again, and slip the ring on her left hand and she texts her mom, sister, and pretty much the entire world lol.