Lots of people have been asking how he asked... and I am kind of disappointed in some of you that you didn't think I was going to dedicate an entire blog post to this haha (shout out to Lauren for immediately saying she couldn't wait for the blog post). But regardless I am happy you guys want to know how he asked because it's pretty stinking cute. But first like with any how he asked stories, you have to start with the back story (but I will give you the Sparknotes version).
Fall 2010 (literally the best semester of my life because I met two of the most important people in my life, Zach and Sadie). Zach and I were in the same seminary class. Brother Blair's 6th hour seminary class. Zach was this cute freshman with long hair that he had to whip across his face every 20 seconds, and I was this know-it-all and loud sophomore girl who thought she ran the place. I am not going to lie in church settings I was 10x more obnoxious than I was at school or in the world. Anyway, I thought he was super cute so I did what any 14 year old girl would do and ask him to write me a story. I believe that he wrote me one solid story that I loved at the time and since then have not been able to find the story. And when you write me a good story and I think you are cute but we don't really have a lot to talk about, of course I am going to ask for another story. This was pretty much the only thing connecting me and Zach together for the next few years since Zach transferred out of my seminary class in the spring semester, and the only time I ever saw him for the next couple years was right in front of the office where all the mormons would hang out before they walked over to the seminary building. I kid you not, every time I saw him for the next two years I asked him where my next story was.
Fall 2012. I joined student council alongside my best friend Sadie (unlike Zach, Sadie and I were pretty much inseparable after fall 2010 hahaha). Also in student council was pretty much all of Zach's mormon friends, and most importantly his best friends Logan and Alec. You see, STUCO kids are rather strange and they like to sit in the STUCO classroom to eat lunch (not all of them... but the brodahood (my awesome friend group at the time) was definitely part of that crowd). Also sitting in the classroom for lunch occasionally was Alec, and with Alec came Zach (at this point his hair was now shorter, but he still brushed his hair back a lot). So we started hanging out at lunch, I still bugged him to write me stories, then we would sometimes hang out after football games when everyone went out to eat... and we actually became great friends. BUT MAN DID I STILL HAVE A CRUSH ON THIS GUY, and I could feel he liked me too the night of the homecoming carnival. Sadie and I were in charge of a booth at the homecoming carnival and Zach and Sammi Lee helped me out while Sadie was doing her homecoming court duties. The game changer that night was that Zach stayed there all afternoon and night helping me with the booth and taking it down and cleaning up the rest of the carnival. I had to be there, I was in STUCO.... Zach really had no reason to be there at all and he stayed very late to help with the madness. So yeah I was hooked.
Not long after that I was on vacation with Sadie in California when I got a text message from Zach who was about to go on a cruise admitting that he liked me... it was SUCH a cute text and I wish I had it memorized but had things like "you're the high fructose corn syrup to my soda" written in it. I was on cloud 9.
From that point I guess Zach and I were a thing, but we never really made it official. That's what we call mormon dating.
But we never kissed (but not without me trying to set it up multiple times) or held hands, we did hug a few times (I remember Alec's excitement when we hugged the first time), so we were pretty much friends who really liked each other and really liked Mountain Dew.
Here is Zach and I on our first official date to the winter formal:
By the end of my senior year I knew I was going to UA the next fall and Zach didn't really know what was going to happen so we broke up in April.
Crushed my heart to pieces, and I spent pretty much the entire summer leading up to me leaving wishing we hadn't, but what 17 year old talks about her feelings? But since we never did anything physical (lol) we somehow managed to stay friends, and we even became like the best of friends. Him and Sadie were my go to people for everything.
Fall 2013. I am at UA, I come home for the first time since moving and Zach admits that he likes me and always has and that he feels terrible about breaking up. I felt the exact same way, and I was dying for him to say that to me... but I went back to Tucson a couple days after and we didn't really do anything about our feelings.
Fast forward to December, I am texting Zach like all the time, and he admits to me that if he was given the chance he would kiss me. Yeah, I still wasn't over him at this point... but I did have something going on with a guy in Tucson around the same time. I was so excited about that text message and so hopeful that he would actually do it, that I figured it was best to cut things with the other guy and come home for winter break ready for that kiss.
New Years Eve 2013/2014. Sadie being the great best friend that she is got Zach to tell her that he wanted to kiss me on New Years Eve, so I was PUMPED. The Fam (the new friend group... I have a thing for naming friend groups if you didn't already know that about me) was all getting together for a great NYE party. Midnight rolls around and my heart is literally beating out of my chest... no kiss. I run inside pretending I need to get some fireworks or something in order to play it cool... I was pretty devastated. But just because it didn't happen at midnight, didn't mean it wasn't going to happen at all right? So I stuck around at the Walton household. I watched each one of my friends leave until it was just me and Zach on his couch. The point came that I needed to go pick up McKenzie from her party... and I was just dying for this kiss... so like any woman who wants something I laid down on the couch with my legs on Zach for a few minutes then I shot up sat on him and KISSED him. I believe my words after the kiss was "See? That wasn't so bad" and MAN was his heart beating hard. Then we kissed again at the door and that was that.
Spring 2014. Zach and I kissed, but we didn't define anything because it was complicated that I was living in Tucson, But on January 15, we said screw it and became boyfriend and girlfriend officially and we would make long distance work.
I am really sorry that this is the sparknotes version that is actually really long....
So we were dating. I would come and visit him and he would come and visit me.
It's now 2015 and I am doing my crazy 91AZ15 adventure that took me to all the municipalities in Arizona. There was one trip in August in particular that was a real game changer for me. I remember driving home from our 7 city trip and thinking about how crazy our life had been so far and and how crazy it would have sounded to our 14 year old selves in our seminary class. I looked over at him while he was driving me home and I just felt so much pure happiness. I knew in that moment as were exiting the 60 driving towards QT that Zach was the one I was going to marry. I didn't really care when or where, I just knew that I was going to.
At this point Zach didn't know if he wanted to go on a mission. One night (a year or so before the knowing I was going to marry him) we were sitting in the bed of my dads truck and I told him that it wasn't going to be a deal breaker for me if he didn't go on a mission, but it would if he wasn't strong in the church. So he started working on his relationship with the church, and eventually (a whole year later) he decided he wanted to go on a mission and I was thriiillleeeddd.
Zach left on his mission in June 2016 and we kind of left it at that I loved Zach and I wanted to be with him but I also was going to go on dates if people asked.
He came home from his mission in October 2016.
and just in case I have some new readers here, this is the best explanation of why he came home:
I was so excited that he was coming home but also like so freaked out because I had just planned my life around him coming home in another two years... and now all of a sudden he was back and a very important factor in my life. All I knew was that I was not ready to get married.
But you know how the Lord really works on the most stubborn people... for the next few months the idea of getting married sounded sweeter and sweeter... so I finally asked Zach in December when he would want to get married. At this point we have always talked about marrying each other, it was just a known thing, so I didn't really need to ask if he wanted to marry me. He said August, I said too hot and that I could do September. I also said that I needed at least a 6 month engagement (I know that's either way long or way short depending on who is reading this)... so he said he would propose by the end of February.
Well the end of February rolls around and we weren't engaged. I wish I could say that I was totally calm, cool and collected about this... but I wasn't.... and Zach is very sweet for putting up with me haha.
Okay that's enough of a back story.
I wanted the proposal to be a surprise for me, so I didn't pick out with ring and I didn't want to know all the details... but I HATE not knowing things and I am the world pushiest person, so the day before it happened I knew it was going to happen the next day, because I pushed it out of Zach.
So Zach picks me up from my house and starts driving towards Joe's Farm Grill (this is our go to date night spot... I can't even count on two hands how many times we have gone here on a date). In my mind I was thinking we would have dinner and then the proposal would be happening after, but I had no idea where. So we park at Joe's and we start walking towards the entrance. Zach holds my hand... but he holds the hand on the side that we never hold hands on so I quickly switch to the other side... not knowing the RING was in that pocket hahaha so he kept trying to pull my body away from his pocket, which was so weird to me haha until I realized the ring was in there. I was weirded out when we walked past the line and headed for the lawn, until I saw a couch (the very couch that I kissed him on in 2014) on the lawn and McKenzie and Derrick trying to hide in a bush.
IT WAS HAPPENING NOW!!! AHHHHHHHH! I was freaking the freak out, especially when I saw this sign:
^^this is why the back story was important ^^
I later found out that the diamond on the ring is from his moms engagement ring way back when, and that made me love it even more.
After taking some pictures the owners of Joes Farm Grill came and congratulated us, McKenzie and Derrick left, and then this guy comes out in a cute little tux outfit with our favorite Joe's dinners and black cherry sodas. It was absolutely perfect. I was too excited to actually eat more than two slices of my pizza, Zach on the other hand hadn't eaten in days because he was so nervous so he downed his meal.
Then Zach's parents came outside and congratulated us and took even more pictures (honestly the second most important part of the proposal).
of course my cyst is on my left hand...
I just couldn't stop smiling and looking at Zach and looking at my ring. I was finally engaged to that cute freshman boy with the long hair he had to whip out of his face... and I couldn't be happier.
And if you made it this far then that means you can be blessed with the video Derrick recorded:
IM NOTCRYING YOURE CRYING. IM DEAD. THIS VIDEO WAS SO CUTE. AND YOU TWO ARE SOCUTE. AND I JUST LOVE LOVE ��
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