I had no idea what the year of the Ox had in store for me. Everyone’s been asking for details and for the complete story so I’ll try to retell it as best I can remember.
The setting of my condo; place where he proposed. I acquired these lanterns recently from my trip to Vietnam.
Sunday was new years eve which started off with a family lunch gathering at my paternal grandparents home. I had to leave early for a photo shoot at USC. Rob was curious as to what time I’d be done with the photo shoot. It’s not too unusual, but it was a little out of the ordinary for him to ask. Right after the shoot I called to tell him I was on my way home. He asked if I had a tall vase. Curious, I asked if he had bought flowers for his mom for the new year. He answered no so I knew they were for me–aww, I felt so loved that he got me flowers to decorate my home for the new year. He shows up at my place with cherry blossom branches and freesias–they smell so good.
cherry blossoms
While I was putting the flowers in the vases, Rob was using my printer for some reason; he does have his own. I didn’t think too much of it. Before leaving for dinner I asked if he wanted to call some of our friends out to dinner with us. He said he preferred that it was just the two of us. Not thinking much of that either, I finished up the flowers and we headed off for dinner at TGIF. We haven’t been there in ages and haven’t gone out to dinner impromptu style in a while; and I had the best meal ever. The simplest meal of bacon cheeseburger with fries and spinach dip was heaven! I finished almost every little bit of my meal. We then headed off to Best Buy and made it in right before closing. Rob had been wanting to go for a while and we finally got the chance to. After picking up some xbox 360 stuff we headed back to the condo for a nice evening watching the Oscar nominated movie: Benjamin Button. That was a really good movie–you have to see it! It’s a little long but well done by Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. The movie ended a little past midnight. Rob looked over at me and said ‘happy new year’ and gave me a kiss. I was ready to call it a night but he insisted on lying about on the couch for some conversation. This was very odd because he usually jumps at the first chance to leave home, especially on a late Sunday night. We talked for an hour about so many things: our top places we wanted to travel to, where we’d honeymoon if we got married, plans for the next few years, etc. All things we miss out on discussing in our busy lives. It was really nice to have that sort of conversation with him since they’re so few and far between. I admit I was yawning and nodding off at some parts of our conversation–I was so ready for bed. He finally said it was time for him to go home. I was walking him out to the door when I turned on the light to check out the cherry blossoms to see if any flowers had bloomed yet. We observed them for a bit when he reached into his pocket to pull out 4 new years envelopes. He said since he’s older than me that he’d give me an envelope for luck and told me to choose 1 of the 4. He spread them out in front of me, making sure not to let the light shine thru to give away what’s inside. It’s a small tradition where an envelope would contain more money than another. I chose one and proceeded to open the envelope hoping I chose one with the higher amount of money. I was confused to find a piece of paper. Before I could even finish reading what was on it, Rob was on his knees in front of me; confused I proceeded to finish reading the note.
The proposal note with envelopes. He designed it himself.
I was so shocked. I put my hands to my cheeks and groaned (almost saying “no”). He presented me with the opened box with the ring sitting inside and asked “thao vu, will you marry me?”. I said “yes” and hugged him and kissed him and cried in his arms. Once I composed myself he put the ring on my finger and we hugged again for a while. Luckily I had turned on the light earlier so I can actually read the message and see the ring. It is now 1:30am and I am far from sleepy. I wanted to upload a photo to Flickr immediately, but Rob had to stop me since we hadn’t told our parents yet. It took me over an hour of tossing and turning to fall asleep with a million questions and thoughts running thru my mind. I was smiling cheek to cheek falling asleep and waking up the same way. I agonizingly had to keep quiet all day Monday, not wearing the ring, until we told our parents that night. After that we publicly announced it to the world on Facebook and Flickr. The end. No date has been set.
I gave a lot of detail because it recaps just a very regular, wonderful day we spent together. We haven’t gotten a chance to do those small things, run to the store, have some dinner, and just relax to a movie. The night ended great and the new year started out even better. Love you babe!
My elephant ring holder that I got for Christmas from Secret Santa Hieu.
The ring itself. Oval cut 2.42 carats.
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