Live, Love and be Married: Our Engagement

Hello! I have been working through this "Our Love Story" series for a while now. If you have been following along this whole time, I sure do appreciate it! If you would like to look into the other parts of the story check out these links:

Part I - How I Met my Husband
Part II - My First Date With Brett
Part III - Becoming Brett's Girlfriend
Part IV - Learning the Truth About Dating a Farmer

As our one year dating anniversary approached I could not think of anything other than, when is he going to propose?? Some say that patience is a virtue. Well.... It is a virtue that I am not in possession of that's for sure. Brett maintained the same view on the subject the whole time: "It will happen, but I just think we should wait on it for a little while. Just be patient." I tell you what, if I had to hear the phrase "just be patient" one more time, I was going to lose it.

After about 2 months of the "just be patient" speech - and some serious obsessing over weddings on Pinterest - Brett and I were at the jewelry store buying Christmas gifts for our moms and my sister. I managed to convince him that we should just look at rings, just to get an idea of what was out there and the prices. I found one that I thought might be it - could have seen that coming - but Brett wasn't ready to commit to the ring. So out we left with the Christmas gifts, but no ring.

Brett and I had a serious conversation after this. Were we ready? Marriage wasn't just about a wedding to either of us - it is about a lifelong commitment, and not something to be taken lightly. We knew we were young, I was still in school and would be for another four and a half years. But we decided that our age really didn't matter - we loved each other as much now as we would in four and a half years (if we were to wait until I was done nursing school). And so, armed with Brett's budget, we went back to the jewelry store later that week.

When we arrived, they had just gotten in a new shipment of engagement rings with colored stones. I wasn't paying a whole lot of attention, just wanted to see the ring that I thought was the one. They pulled it out and I tried it on. Brett said that he thought we should just look around a bit more in the store before committing. I looked over to where the clerk was arranging the new rings and saw it. The most beautiful engagement ring I had seen so far. It looked a lot like the previous one I had picked out, but had a bigger sapphire center stone. That was the one. Shockingly, it was within Brett's budget, he loved it, and to make it even better, it fit me right out of the case. Not wanting someone else to buy it, Brett bought the ring right then and there. He made sure to let me know though, that I didn't get to have it yet. And I couldn't tell anyone - not even my best friends. He had a plan that I would just have to wait for. If I thought my patience had been tested so far, it was about to get a lot worse.

I didn't want to get my hopes up at Christmas time and risk being disappointed. So I kept telling myself that Brett wasn't going to propose, Christmas would be too obvious, he was still going to wait. But I couldn't help myself from hoping that he would.

We went home for the holidays, and when Brett dropped me off at my parent's farm he took my dad out for a drive in his car to show him the new exhaust system he'd put on. They are both car guys, so I didn't think anything of this. Little did I know, Brett was asking my dad for his permission to marry me.

On Christmas Eve, Brett came back to spend the day with my family (we were doing Christmas Eve with my parents and Christmas Day with his). I don't think I had been so excited to open gifts since I was a little kid. I just had to see whether my ring was in that gift bag or not. We had a wonderful day, visiting and playing board games and cards with my grandma, parents and sister. My mom made a great Christmas supper as always. But I couldn't help thinking about that gift under the tree...

Finally we were opening gifts and I noticed that Brett was acting a little strange - he kept looking at me out of the corner of his eye as I worked at opening the bag. Once I got into the bag I saw that there was a big box inside. So I opened that, then saw that there was a smaller box nested inside that. And then another smaller box inside of that. By this point I was pretty sure of where things were going. Finally I got into the middle and there it was: the ring box. I looked up to see Brett on one knee before me. My mom and sister started crying and grandma just kept saying "Oh my goodness!". Oh my goodness is right!

This is what he said to me: "Aubrey, I love you so much. Would you do me the honor of marrying me?" I started crying now too (happy tears of course) and told him "Yes, of course!"

Austin took this photo right after: