Today is one of my very favorite days of the entire year. Today is our second engage-versary and third annual sunrise breakfast. We’re celebrating with rooftop pancakes at 6:15am! Few things are more fun than looking back through these photos and remembering the crazy-giddy emotional joy we felt that morning. It was April 27, 2014, and our lives were about to change forever.
If you’ve heard this story 60 times, I’m really sorry, please feel free to move on with your life. One of the main catalysts for the birth of this blog was the need for a home for all of our never-before-seen wedding photos, so I am starting at the very beginning. I’ve had a plan to chronicle the whole saga slowly with Wedding Wednesdays, so when I realized our engage-versary was on a Wednesday, I knew it was meant to be. I introduce you to Wedding Wednesdays with Our Proposal Story!
I can’t tell you how exciting and happy this morning was, and thanks to my friend Ellen Kilgore, we have that one precise moment bottled up into this little pink-and-orange sorbet bubble. This is the only real-deal, on-one-knee, putting-the-ring-on photo we have, and it’s the only one we need. To me, it’s complete perfection. 
It was the beginning of spring (but already warm in Nashville), Will was about to graduate, and we knew we were on the brink of a whole lot of exciting changes. The air was full of that feeling you get when the seasons change, you’re so close to finishing finals, sundresses and celebrations await, and you know longer, warmer, more laid-back evenings are ahead. I had told Will months before that we should go watch the sunrise from Love Circle sometime. When he suggested we go this Sunday morning (in the middle of finals), I thought it would be the perfect break.
Of course, when he called to change the time he would pick me up by five minutes (apparently he had gotten the sunrise time wrong) I was a little suspicious. But I was trying not to get my hopes up and had convinced myself it wouldn’t be a proposal that soon.
Will was so casual and normal on the short hike over from my apartment. That is, until we got to the crest of the hill and he rushed ahead of me without helping me up or anything. I would have been annoyed if I hadn’t immediately caught a glimpse of the picnic he had made for us. This is the funny part. I was so nervous all of a sudden that I didn’t know what to do! I kind of awkwardly turned to look at the sunrise, and Will had to awkwardly start with “Hey what is this? Catherine, can you please come over here?” There’s a reason why men are supposed to do the proposing!
Ah the perks of being in work-out clothes for your proposal.
That’s when we got to that classic proposal moment where he starts talking and she blacks out, only to regain memory after the ring is successfully on the finger. All I remember at that point was Will saying lots of nice things, me crying, and then “Catherine Elizabeth Moreton, will you marry me?” “Of course!” (and more crying and teary laughter).
Once that nerve-wracking bit had passed and the surreal feeling of being engaged started to set in, everything comes back into sharper focus in my memory. Then, of course, it was time to check out that ring! I LOVE SPARKLY THINGS.
Big thanks to Ellen! These turned out incredibly!
At some point, Will told me my friend Ellen was there getting photos (to which I replied, “Thank God! You would have been in so much trouble later if there wasn’t a camera here!”) and we waved her over.
This is one of my favorite photos of the day. It’s framed in our apartment and was also our engagement party invitation image.
Ellen snapped a few of these for us and then made her discrete exit so we could enjoy our breakfast (lox and cream cheese with chives on English muffins) and soak in the moment before anyone else knew.
And obviously, take a selfie. Duh.
This is the sweet man I said yes to!
Eventually we called our parents and my brother (who had no service because he was hunting), packed up our stuff, and headed home to get ready for church! There were so many great things about getting engaged on a Sunday. One was that we got to go immediately celebrate with our church family, and the other was that it’s the best day of the week to call family and friends to share big news!
Squinting into the sunlight of love.
Our friends Sam and Laura took a few photos of us after church.
We miss Covenant!
We ended our celebration out to brunch at the delicious Urban Grub, where we ran into my friend Maggie, and I took lots and lots of photos of my new ring. I’ll never forget how exciting it was to stare at the sparkliness when it was brand new. After brunch, Will got back to studying like the responsible adult he is, and I took the afternoon off to call and text everyone. It was so much fun to tell people and hear all of their reactions!
