As Promised, The Story of our Engagement

Andrew and I had been planning on a trip to Boston for almost a month now. My roommate from college, Amy, and her boyfriend are planning on running the Disney World Marathon in January and were hosting a fundraiser in Boston on October 22nd. We knew this might be one of the last times we got up to Boston before the deployment, so we were both really looking forward to the trip. A few weeks prior to the trip, Andrew had said that he wanted to take me out to a nice anniversary dinner (our three year anniversary was on the 19th) so he asked me to make reservations at a place I've always had my eye on, KO Prime.
  
We flew into Manchester (from Baltimore) on Friday morning and my dad picked us up at the airport. It was a VERY early morning flight so after he dropped us off at home I was ready for a nap and I think Andrew watched TV for a while. When we finally decided to get our acts together, we drove down to Boston (about a 50 minute drive) and parked at a T-station outside the city. We took the T to our friend Laura's apartment and left our overnight bags there before heading downtown for our dinner reservations. 
 
It was a brisk day, so we decided to get some coffee-- Dunkin' Donuts, our favorite) and walk around Boston Common for a while before we had to be at dinner. We were sitting on this bench:

overlooking the common and a fountain and we were talking about the future and the deployment and about the possibility of if we would ever get to live in Boston (if Andrew could get an ROTC gig at BU for a few years). 
  
Then Andrew said, "well you know, I was thinking, this is going to be a really long deployment and it's going to be tough on both of us" and I said I know, but I love him and he knows that and I'm not going anywhere. He said "I know, I was just thinking, maybe you need something to keep you busy." 
 
He got down on one knee and I immediately started crying and said "Oh my Gosh, are you SERIOUS!?!" and he said, "Yes, Kristina, will you marry me?!" I screamed and cried some more and hugged him and kissed him and said "YES, OF COURSE!" and "are you serious?" about a million times before holding out my left hand for him to place the ring on my finger. 

Finally, Andrew said "stop crying, girl" as he wiped away my tears, "it's too cold for tears!"

The ring was perfect, I told Andrew it is the exact ring I would have picked out for myself! He did such an amazing job- and it fit my finger perfectly (thanks mostly to Shannon being super sneaky!) I was so soaked up in the moment, it was unbelievable! 
  
Andrew said he saw some guy taking artsy pictures of that fountain and whenever he proposed he turned around and started taking pictures of us! He said he should have chased him down and asked him to email them to us, but we were too focused on each other! So instead of those pictures we had a random couple take this very first picture of us as an engaged couple. It's not great, and I look about 100 pounds heavier than I actually am, but I love it anyways because of how happy we look (and also how cold we were!) 

The next thing we did was call our Moms- because our dad's already knew (Andrew had sneakily asked my dad that morning- which meant the world to me!) and then we headed over to KO Prime. 

Within the first minute of sitting down the waitress complimented me on my ring and I said "thanks, he just proposed like 20 minutes ago!!!" so she went out of her way to make our evening SOOO special! Free champagne, appetizers, wine upgrade, the whole nine yards. On the dessert plate they wrote "congratulations" in chocolate and all the waiters and staff signed a card for us and gave us a $20 gift card! So nice of them! 

After dinner we went to see all the girls at Amy's fundraiser and we were the first ones there so I got to show her first (and asked her to be my MOH) and then waited with my hand in my pocket for another half hour for the rest of the girls to get there so that I could show them all together! Everyone was so excited and I was so thankful to be able to celebrate it with all of them! It was seriously a perfect night! 
  
Here are a few of my favorite shots from the rest of the night:

Showing all the girls at The Greatest Bar... LOVE their reaction!

Asking Ames to be my Maid of Honor!

Goin' to the Chapel. . .

And we're gonnnnnnnnaaaa get MARRIED!!!!!!


Andrew Proposed this weekend!!!! More details to come, but I had to put it out there for the whole world to know! I'm sooooooooooooo happy! And so very very in love!

Here is a little teaser:

YAYYYYYYYYYYYY :) :) :)