An Unexpected (and very welcome) Surprise!

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An unexpected addition to my trip!

I already thought going into this trip that it would be the best trip of my life...at least for a long time, and definitely thus far. I could not have imagined how great this trip would really be, and how special! A proposal in Italy is every girl's, or at least a lot of girls’, dream – and for me, it is a reality!

I could not have imagined how great this trip would really be, and how special!

Drew proposed on June 27^th and was very tricky about it! He’s been planning for months apparently, and created a situation in which I was not expecting it at all. Of course I hoped, or dreamed, that I would get proposed to in Italy, but he got rid of all those hopes when he told me earlier this year “I know you were hoping to get proposed to in Italy, but I really can’t afford it because of the expense of traveling” – to which I of course replied that I understood completely, and that it wasn’t important for him to propose in Italy, that it would be special whenever he did it. What little hope I did hold on to was extinguished after our weekend trip to Venice, where nothing happened! Not even on our romantic gondola ride, which of course I had expected to be the one place where I had the slightest chance of a proposal happening.

So on Wednesday evening, after our weekend in Venice, I was not expecting anything, when Drew suggested we go up to Fiesole for a fancy dinner. I, of course, was happy to go, as an occasional fancy dinner isn’t that unusual, and I love to get dressed up! Fiesole is also a very romantic spot, because from there you can see a gorgeous view overlooking the entire city of Florence. We got all dressed up and took the bus up to Fiesole, bringing along some wine and cheese to consume while we watched the sun set over the city. The weather was perfect and the sunset beautiful. We stayed a little while past the sunset and watched the lights turn on in the city below and the stars come out, and then when the last of the few meandering tourists were completely gone from our sight, Drew said to me “hey, let me see your ring (a ring he gave me a few years ago that is my birthstone)”. Sometimes, we do this silly game where I say to Drew, “hey, fake propose to me” and he’ll take my ring and put it on my finger and say something cheesy like “will you promise to one day promise to get engaged to me” or something...not serious at all. So when he said “let me see your ring, how about I fake propose to you” I was like...well, okay...not too strange. Then he got down on one knee...and I started thinking something was up. He put his hand behind his back...and instead of pulling out my old ring, he pulled out my engagement ring...a gorgeous diamond solitaire with my great grandmother’s diamond. He put the ring on my finger and gave a little speech that I only half remember, which of course ended in “Will you marry me?”. After hyperventilating a bit, the first word I managed to utter was “seriously?” ( as in, is this really happening?)...and that was soon followed by “yes, of course I will!”. After this very exciting surprise, we went down to a restaurant that overlooked the city and got a delicious dinner to celebrate our engagement...of course accompanied by some Prosecco (Italian champagne). We were, and still are, so excited! It was very surreal though, I didn’t believe what I was saying when I called my parents to say that I was engaged!

What a happy addition to my already amazing trip to Italy!