My now husband proposed in the most wonderful way! His sister was married the weekend before our engagement, and he told me later he waited so she could have the spotlight on her special day. Well, I didn’t expect a thing! Matt came down to my parent’s house to get me for a date. Since we grew up 3-1/2 hours apart, dates in the summertime were a big deal around our work schedules! On August 14th, Matt picked me up, and we headed down to East Lansing, where we were both students at MSU during the school year.
First of all, we went to a Saturday evening Mass at St. Thomas Aquinas. The reason this is a big deal is because Matthew chose to become Catholic so our children would be raised in a Catholic home, as I was. At church, Matt kept touching my hand and looking at my graduation ring that my family had given me. I couldn’t figure out what suddenly made him so interested in seeing my Black Hills Gold ring that he had seen a million times before, but ton! ight he asked to look at it. I handed it to him and he looked at it carefully. He told me how pretty is was and handed it back. (He was checking to make sure my engagement ring would fit!) I had told him before what a sacrifice my family had made to buy me this $100 ring for a high school graduation gift, and he seemed especially moved by it that day.
After Mass ended, we went to the Olive Garden (my favorite restaurant) for supper. During supper, Matt toasted our love and thanked God for giving us to one another. Keep in mind that nothing seemed unusual yet to me, because Matt’s always a romantic kind of guy. We finished supper and went to the mall to JoAnne’s fabric store. I was sort of surprised because Matt usually doesn’t like to hang around the fabric store while I look for quilt fabrics! (It turns out he was just killing time until it got a little darker)
We decided at 8:30 that we would head back to my Mom & Dad’s house, since it took about an hour to get home from MSU. But on the way, Matt suddenly asked, “Do you want to go look at the campus gardens?” Of course I said yes, because MSU has some of the most beautiful gardens in the world. When we got out of the car, Matt put on his Carhartt jacket, which I found funny since it was so warm, and he’s always hotter than I am. We took our camera, since one of my favorite hobbies (besides flower gardening) is taking pictures.
So on we went, taking pictures, holding hands, talking and looking at the beautiful flowers. When we came up to the rose gardens, Matt stopped to inspect each one. I thought that he was just enjoying the smell like I was, but he said he was so nervous that he had to breathe deeply to try and calm himself! In the center of the rose gardens, there is a beautiful arbor with a bench under it, covered in roses. We sat down there and Matt kept looking around at the other people who were in the gardens, and talking to me. He was telling me how much he loved me, and before I even knew what was happening, he said “I can never tell you how much I love you. I guess I can only think of four words that would tell you how I feel about you… those words are, will you marry me?”
He was now kneeling before me on the bench and holding out the most beautiful 1/3 carat ring you have ever seen. He had tears in his eyes and so did I. After I stopped crying enough to say yes, we sat crying and holding one another in joy. Then a couple came walking through the garden and asked “Did you just get engaged?” We told them yes, and they congratulated us and took our picture on the camera we were carrying around. It turns out the time in the fabric store was to make the diamond look more beautiful when the light inside the box hit on it!
It was the most beautiful night of my life, and I am so thankful to God for giving me such a wonderful man. I have always heard you will marry someone like your Dad. I never believed I could find someone who would treat me as well as my Dad treats my Mom until I met Matthew, and then I knew God truly makes someone for everyone!
Melanie Block,
Conklin, MI
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