Once Upon A Time, I Got Engaged

I have been trying to figure out how on earth I'm supposed to write this story, but it has almost already been a week since it happened and I want to share it with the world. I've decided that I'm going to write this story here for me, (while the events of last Friday afternoon/evening are still fresh on my mind) so I can come back and read this story over and over again. Am I the only one who does that?

Sooooo let me start this post by saying I AM ENGAGED!!

For the record, I am still completely shocked and excited and freaking out JUST A LITTLE BIT (in the best way possible). I've done my fair share of posting mushy lovey-dovey stuff about my relationship with Justin on the blog so I won't bother you with that stuff right now, because Lord knows I could probably start rambling about why Justin is so amazing. But, I won't. All that I'll say is that I've just kind of been in a dazed state of love for the past week. Oh, and also, every time I look at my left hand - I let out a little squeal. I may or may not get distracted while driving, typing this blog post, opening doors, or basically doing ANYTHING that involves my left hand - whoops. 

It all started on Friday afternoon. Justin was planning on leaving work early to come home and meet me for a nice relaxing night-in. We were planning on a hot date of walking along the seawall through Stanley Park and ending with binge-watching Netflix in bed. I had a feeling like something was going on because Justin was acting a little bit strange all week (although if you ask him, he will completely deny this). When I was about 5 minutes away from leaving the office, Justin texted me asking if I had left the office yet and to give him a heads up when I left work - weird, but nothing too crazy. As soon as I told Justin I had left the office and was on my way home- he went radio silent.I didn't hear another word from him until I saw him about 3 hours later.

When I walked through the front door, this was the very first thing that I saw sitting in our living room. If we're being honest here, I really had to pee. I saw the whiteboard - didn't even read it - and immediately headed into the washroom. Once I came out, I read the sign and basically knew what was happening right away. Before I opened the envelope that said #1 on it, I had to fix my nails. Side note, I had an incident that afternoon with my pinky nail (on my left hand) falling into the toilet and being flushed away. As soon as I knew what was happening, my first priority was fixing my nail. Yes, I am a little ashamed to admit this, but it's FINE GUYS. 

So once I finally had these things out of the way, I opened the envelope. Inside was a puzzle piece with a picture of Justin, my brother (Christian), his girlfriend (Ashley). Once I flipped it over there was a note that told me to turn on the laptop and press play. This was when everything got really interesting. The video popped up on the screen and began playing - but it wasn't Justin like I had anticipated, it was Ashley telling me she hoped I was having an amazing day. After a few seconds, Christian pops into the video pretending to 'open mail from Justin' and inside of it was a video from my Aunti Jay (who lives on the other side of the world) playing on Ashley's iPhone. She directed me to find the next clue hidden in our apartment.

Once I found the next clue, I was sent on a scavenger hunt all over the city. The next step was to leave the house and head to Amanda's office to meet up with her. After I read the clue I was beyond confused and kept trying to message Justin or call him to ask if I needed to actually head to Amanda's office or if I should start searching her room. After humming and hawing for what seemed like forever,  I finally got my butt out the door and walked to Amanda's office. 

Once I was at Amanda's office, I was given my next clue and we were about to head out. Amanda needed to head back to our apartment to grab the first two puzzle pieces (because I was supposed to bring them with me but didn't know this) and she graciously let my change into something a little nicer so I ran a brush through my hair, put a maxi dress on, and headed out the door to my next pit-stop: to see Justin's Aunt Tracy. 

When I got to Tracy's work she had me facetime with my mom and dad and after stalling for a few minutes, they sent me on my way to meet up with Justin's brother, Rob. I had to look for Rob outside of one of our large stadiums, and I was a little worried that I wasn't going to be able to find him - but I saw him as soon as we got there. He had me call Juliette for my next clue - and she was a total jerk and tried to convince me that in order to get my new clue, I needed to know when "President Grover Cleveland died", but I called BS on her question and she finally asked my real question and then I was on my way to meet Justin's best friend, Barry. I liked this stop because we got to sit and chill and have a beer (which helped to calm my quickly rising nerves). After we killed enough time there I was heading to Justin's spot - where he and all of his friends have gone for years - their favourite bar (which has also kind of become my spot as well).

We entered the side door and I instantly found one of Justin's best friends, Desiree, and she was waiting to give me my next clue - call my BFF Jennie (who moved away and couldn't be here for the engagement). While I was on the phone with her, she had me put together the whole puzzle so I could see all of the pieces. 

After I was done the puzzle, Jennie told me to turn around. That is when I saw him for the first time in what seemed like forever. Sure, I had seen him only 12 hours beforehand when I kissed him goodbye on my way to work - but it felt like an eternity since I had seen him. The moment Justin smiled at me, my heart melted and everything kind of became a blur - it was as if the world around us stopped for just a few minutes. I think Jennie might have been talking to me but I dropped my phone onto the table and took a step towards Justin - who, might I add, had tears streaming down his cheeks at this point. As soon as he started to cry, I started to cry, and we were both a mess. He wrapped me in his arms and whispered a few super sweet things in my ear and then attempted to choke down the tears so he could spit out the proposal:

Baby, I love you more than anything else in this world. 

I wouldn't be the man I am today without you.

I feel like I've known you my whole life even though I've only know you for just over a year. 

Faith Alexandra Bowyer, will you marry me?

(I had to ask Justin what he said while I was typing this because I couldn't remember a word of what he said, it was all such a blur)

Obviously I immediately said yes and we hugged and kissed and laughed and it was the best moment of my life. Every single time I think about the moment he proposed, I can't help but smile. As soon as he slid the ring on my finger and we kissed again, the table next to us cheered and clapped and the guy sitting there yells to the whole bar 'SHE SAID YES, EVERYBODY!' and then the whole bar erupted into clapping and cheering and within 2 minutes our area was flooded with his family and our friends who had all been hiding on the other end of the bar, waiting to celebrate with us. Along with a round of shots!

We got to facetime with my family, and spend the night celebrating with the people we love. It was an incredible night and I can't stop reliving it over and over in my head. Also, I've probably taken about 500 pictures of my ring in the past week... here are a few pictures that I've loved.

I am embarrassingly bad at ring selfies. Juliette said I'll get better - I say she's full of lies.

I am kind of obsessed with this ring.

I was feeling slightly artistic, or something.

And there you have it, folks, we are officially engaged - and yes, I'm still surprised that this poor man has agreed to spend eternity with me. Call my optimistic, but I'm actually excited about wedding planning (for now... ask me how I feel about it all in a week or two), and I can't wait to marry this man. Is it October 17th, 2016 yet?