Love Story Part 3: Engagement

Okay so I started our Love Story part 1 and part 2 forever ago, and realized I never got around to part 3. Since it was the 7 year anniversary of our engagement this last week I decided it was probably time to share the story!

The middle of March in 2010 was cold and snowy. Jordan was on spring break, but it was not very spring-like outside. We had made plans to have a little date on that Saturday. We were going to take a picnic up to Provo Falls (one of my favorite spots.) We sat in the cozy sandwich shop waiting for our sandwiches to be made, and we waited and waited some more. I could tell Jordan was a little antsy, but he seemed a bit more antsy than normal. I decided to brush it off and mentioned that maybe they forgot about our sandwiches. Jordan went up and asked about it, sure enough they forgot. After we finally had our sandwiches, we started driving up the canyon. About half way up, we noticed the road was still closed for winter. So, we turned around and ended up in the same spot where we first said I love you. Read that story here. 

All bundled up as the snow was blowing around us, we found a dry patch under a tall pine tree. Laid out my picnic blanket and started to eat. Jordan ate half of his sandwich and then started pulling some puzzle pieces out of his pocket. My first thought was "hmm he didn't finish his sandwich, that's unusual." Again I just brushed it off as he asked if I wanted to put together this puzzle he made. I put it all together and it was a cute heart shaped photo of us from when we first started dating. Then he pulled out another puzzle and I put that one together. A heart shaped photo of us standing out front of the temple, from just a few days ago. I asked him how he made these puzzles and he mentioned finding a cool machine at the store that did it for him. He then starts pulling some pieces of a blank puzzle out of his pocket. He said nonchalantly "you can put that one together if you want." So I start putting it together and then tell him that it's missing a few pieces. He looks around and we find one of the pieces then he says maybe I'm sitting on the other one, so I move slightly to look for it. As I look up to tell him that it's not there, I see him kneeling in front of me on one knee. He then says "the only missing piece of the puzzle is you," and he gives me the last piece on which he had written YOU. Then he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small brown box. Opens it to show the most dazzling diamond ring I had ever seen. Maybe it was the snow that reflected on it, but it was extra sparkly. It was the exact ring that I had been wanting, I had shown him a picture a few weeks before, but I thought it would be too expensive. He surprised me with it and not only could I not believe my eyes, but I couldn't believe my ears when he said "Tessi Ruth, will you marry me?" The butterflies flew in my stomach as I said "yes!" and jumped up to give him a hug and a kiss or two or three.

Love Story Part 2: Those Three Little Words

I was determined. I had made up my mind. That night I was going to say it no matter what. We had been dating now for almost 8 months. I had known for the last two months that I loved this boy. I was pretty sure that he loved me too, after all he was still sticking around. We were planning to go on a date that evening so I knew we would at least see each other face to face. Dating long distance was hard but we saw each other at least once a week.

I don't recall where he picked me up. I'm sure it was at my parents house. I don't even remember what we did that evening. But I do remember where we ended up. We went for a drive, as we did often, and we pulled off of the road on Mirror Lake highway. It was February so we stayed in the car to avoid the frigid cold and snow. We started talking but I felt like he was avoiding something. But then I knew he wasn't avoiding something, he was just very hesitant. He was trying to tell me something but the words just weren't coming like he wanted them to. Then he stopped talking completely. I figured out what was going on. He was on the same page as me. I started to feel impatient. He started talking again and fumbling over words about "when you do something for the first time." I almost blurted it out but then let him go first. As I was looking into those deep blue eyes he finally nervously said "I love you." Heat rose through me and with a huge smile across my face I said "I love you too!" The tension he was holding lifted and we kissed. I knew that he meant it and I could feel that he knew I was telling the truth as well. Such a simple and short phrase but so meaningful.

What took us so long? Why did we wait forever to say it? Who knows, but it almost meant more because of the time we waited. The location was nothing super special, but it becomes a very special place once again in part three of our love story. Stay tuned :)

Pictures from when we were dating :)

Love Story: How We Met

Our Love Story Part 1

Jordan and I are often asked how we met. Him being from southern Utah and me from a small town near Park City. So I thought I would document the story here. 

Jordan was attending Snow College and decided to do some summer sales between his two years at Snow. He moved to Orem with some friends who were also selling. I was living at home at the time and working in Park City as a Nail Technician. On the weekends I would drive to Orem to visit a friend who just happened to live in the same apartment complex as Jordan. I would attend church with my friend and to be honest... I was looking for boys :)

One Sunday in June of 2009 I noticed a cute boy in church. I pointed him out to my friend and said "he's cute." So my friend went to work. Word got around and a mutual friend told Jordan a bit about me. The next weekend I-- of course-- drove back to Orem, to hopefully meet this boy.

Our church meetings just ended and I happened to notice Jordan, I smiled at him, which was way out of my comfort zone. I mean hello... he was a cute boy! A cute boy, that I thought was way out of my league. So... I smiled at him and--womp, womp, wommmmp... he turned the other way. (Which to this day he will still argue that he smiled back, but I did not see any sort of smile from the back of his head :)) I thought to myself, well I guess there isn't a chance there! 

We went back to my friends apartment and watched a bit of the NBA Finals. As I tried not to think about this cute boy too much. My brother ended up joining us at some point, I can't quite remember when. Then we all decided to go toss around my brother, Izach's, football outside since it was a nice day! Not too long after we got outside do I notice Jordan and our mutual friend Mark on the other side of the green (which was maybe 30 yards long) tossing a baseball back and forth. I tried not to think too much about it, since I thought my chance was shot anyway. 

A few--maybe more-- minutes went by and Jordan "accidentally" tossed the baseball over towards us. So Jordan "had" to run over near us and started chatting with us. He began tossing the football with me and two of the other guys and then stopped to introduce himself. He stuck out his right hand and said "I should probably introduce myself. I'm Jordan." *cue butterflies* I then said "I'm Tessi" and we began chatting. You probably could have guessed that part :) He asked where I was from and we found that he knew a friend that I graduated with. This was followed by some other small talk.

Then came time for Izach and I to head home. I went back inside to get my things. As I came back down the stairs outside I saw Jordan standing at the bottom of them. He smiled that beautiful smile of his and asked if I would be coming back this way some time soon. I said that I wasn't sure, possibly the next weekend. He then asked me if I had seen Mad TV. I replied yes and he followed with "Can I have yo numba?" To which I replied yes as we both laughed. (I'm curious what he would have said if I would have told him that I had not seen Mad TV... lucky for him I had!)

I was surprised and giddy to receive a text from him that night, I forget what it said, but we continued texting back and forth over the next few days. On Tuesday I think it was, he called me and asked if I would go on a date with him on Friday. To which I replied, "how about Saturday?" ... Although if you ask Jordan, he will say that I told him no. For some reason I was not able to get to Orem on Friday. But that didn't hold me back from wanting to see him on Friday. I asked if he would come to my house for what we called a bonfire... I later learned that I should have referred to this fire as a campfire, because a bonfire is much bigger. Anyway, I was surprised to hear that Jordan did want to come to my so called bonfire. This was new-- no boy had ever wanted to drive 'all the way' to my small town before. I actually had not been planning to have a bonfire. I just pretended to be having one to see if he might want to come to it! So last minute I called all of my friends and begged them to come... "Come to my house!" "Bring your friends" "bring wood!" Luckily my friends did come with wood and we had a fire going before Jordan and his friends arrived. Thank goodness! 

We ended up sitting by each other around the fire and he kept asking me little questions. He would turn to just me, so only I could hear, and ask "what's your favorite...." My heart was melting next to the fire. I could not wait for our date the following day.

He picked me up at 7:33 that night (from my friend's apartment.) I remember because he specifically asked if he could pick me up at 7:33. Which I thought was random and cute. He was wearing jeans and a white and salmon colored striped polo shirt (the one in the picture above... That picture is not from our first date however.) When we got into his truck he turned on some music. A song came on that I recognized and as he drove us to Goodwood BBQ I realized many of these songs were songs that we had talked about earlier that week through our text messages. He had asked what my favorite songs were, 5 current and 5 all-time. All of which were on this playlist, along with his 10 favorites as well. I was impressed by this Mr. Wood. We sat and talked so long that the waitress had to come back three times before we were even ready to order our food. It was delicious, but the company was better. 

After dinner he drove up towards the Y and we sat in his truck as he pulled out a list he had made. He started asking me "would you rather" questions, and I must say, he came up with some pretty creative questions. For the second time I told him "you are impressing me Mr Wood."

After we played this "would you rather" game, we drove back to his apartment. Earlier that week, in one of our many text messages, he had asked what some of my favorite movies were. I had mentioned that I liked The Holiday. He had not seen that movie, so guess what we ended up watching that night... You guessed it! We sat on the couch and ended up cuddling under a blanket together. He held my hand and again the butterflies flew. The night could not have gone better. As we parted ways that night, there was not a kiss. But I was actually happy about that. I felt that maybe he wanted to take things a little slower, and that made me happy. Don't worry though, there was a kiss on the next date... Just three days later.

That summer flew by. We were together any chance we could get. Usually all weekend, and at least once during the week. Obviously Mr Wood impressed me quite a lot and it seemed that he liked me too :) 

Jordan headed back to Snow College for his second year and I started the cosmetology program as Salt Lake Community College. We dated long distance for about a year which was very difficult, but definitely worth it! I was smitten with him.

Stay tuned for Our Love Story Part 2