The Relationship, The Decision and the Plan...

Now that Kelly has broke the news and supplied a link to the pictures from our "engagement weekend" I thought I would do my part and chime in our on our new joint blog. I thought it would be good to start to summarize my perspective on our the development of our relationship and the steps I took to prepare for the proposal.

Kelly and I had been dating for over a year and half. During this time I have gotten to know what a a beautiful person she is inside and out. She has a curious spirit, a quick wit and a love of the outdoors that I was drawn to right away. The funny thing was that just before our first date I had told a friend that I hoped that we wouldn't hit it off because we lived so far apart! :) We met through eHarmony (no we do not plan to make a commercial), :) and began communicating via email and phone calls fairly quickly. Those went so well that I had to meet this girl, even with the extended distance between us. After talking to my friend I made the hour long trek from Evanston to Lisle for our first date, and wouldn't you know it, we hit it off right away! From there one great date lead to another, and she was even patient with my work situation disrupting our time together. After a few months we made the decision to move in together in Evanston. We spent the next year really getting to know each other, cute habits to semi annoying quirks, but all along growing together. We celebrated good times together and helped each other through low times. We met each other's families and instantly clicked with both sides. This continued until going into this summer I realized I couldn't live without this woman and began taking the steps to pop the big question.

In July, I "snuck" out of the house on a Saturday afternoon, telling Kelly that I was going for a walk to "clear my head" and walked directly to a local jeweler a few blocks away. His name is Christopher Duquet and he was awesome to work with. I sat down with him and discussed some ideas I had based on some comments Kelly had made on what she liked in a ring and an hour later we had a design drawn out on paper. He did not have the diamonds that we would be working with on site so I made plans to come back a few days later to pick out the main stone for the ring. I left work a few hours early that day so I could stop by his store without Kelly knowing. We looked at several stones and I finally decided on the one that I felt would look best. From there he input the design information into a computer and a few days later he sent me pictures of what the ring would look like. From there he created a wax model of the ring so I could see it to scale and I again took off work a few hours early to look at the model. Once I saw the model I knew we were ready to create the final product so I gave him the go ahead and waited patiently.

During the ring design and creation process I started making plans for how, when and where I would pop the question. I wanted it to be something fun and unique for both of us that incorporated some of the things we both loved to do together. We had both always talked about how fun it would be to take one of the Carferries across Lake Michigan to Michigan. Since I knew our destination would be Michigan I started looking at the best place to spend the Labor Day weekend. Knowing that Kelly had never been to Traverse City on Grand Traverse Bay I decided this would be a great locale. It had a great mix of outdoor activities, romantic get aways and wineries. The latter we both had been wanting to tour for some time. I began researching the area to find the best place to stay. I looked at dozens and dozens of hotels, resorts and bed and breakfasts. I decided that a B&B would be best due to its intimacy. I settled on the Country Hermitage nestled in a cherry orchard just outside of Traverse City.

With the plans booked I picked up the ring a week and half before our trip and hid it away where I knew she would not find it. Finally Friday came and we packed up the Jeep and made our way north. Stay tuned for what happened next! :)