Gersh and I had been dating for 10 years before we got engaged. I was expectant and thought he'd propose in April when we went on our super romantic anniversary picnic. But no, nothing. We'd had our wedding venue booked at this point, so of course I was waiting, impatiently at times, might I add.
Months went by and on Saturday, 2 July 2016 it finally happened. We were house-sitting at that time and in retrospect Gersh was being super weird all day! When we woke up he got up swiftly, showered and put on a smart-casual outfit. I just put on my usual casual Saturday outfit. He said he just felt like dressing up! He usually loves jeans and a t-shirt, so I should've known.
He usually has band practice for the worship team on a Saturday, but it was cancelled, so we spent the afternoon cuddling as it was pretty cold. Another strange thing was that he just wouldn't eat. He seemed to have lost his usual appetite. He wouldn't even have a coffee with me when we went to Primi to get a takeaway lunch. I now know that he was probably just super nervous.
Fast-forward to that evening. We stop off at his parent's place because he claims he forgot his flash-drive at home (we needed to load the service onto the data projector at church), but he was actually picking up my ring. My mother-in-law had to distract me and she did a pretty good job. However, she was actually giving it away. She was super excitable! I thought she was just in a really good mood, and she was because of how excited she was about what was about to happen.
On our way to church Gersh plays "Ever Be" by Bethel. A song that is now an important part of our story. We arrive, set up at church and as we're about to leave he sits down in the first pew. I sit down next to him, thinking he's probably just clowning around and this man proceeds to look at me very seriously and said, "I know you wanted a photographer to capture this moment, but I feel like the only witness we really needed is God". That's when I realised what was happening. I was trying so hard not to cry that I can't remember his exact words after that bit. All I know is that he handed me a handmade book and told me to turn to certain pages. Each of those pages were dated and had something special about me or us on them and the last page he asked me to turn to was 2 July 2016 and on it he wrote, "...how long you waited for me to propose". When I turned to him he had the ring out and he asked me to marry him. My answer is pretty obvious, but my reaction is pretty laughable. I grabbed the ring and put it on my own finger! And then I proceeded to hug Gersh and I'm sure I gave him about 100 kisses!
We headed out to supper, updated our social media pages and spent the evening together, just quietly celebrating.
