Day 11 - Best Day of Your Life

I've had a lot of Best Days.  I've had a lot of Worst Days too, but this post is about Best Days.  Or rather, THE Best Day.

I have four that vy for the top spot, but the one I want to tell you today is The Day My Husband Proposed.

First, a bit of background.  Hubby (aka M) and I met on Canada Day 2008 and moved in together 5 months later.  We knew we wanted children and we knew we wanted to get married, but we weren't in a huge hurry.  (My 'deadline' was that I at least wanted to be pregnant with our first baby by the time I turned 30).  Okay, enough background.

Two years ago, hubby and I were working in shops down the street from each other.  I dealt in produce, he was driving for a butcher shop.  We were planning our summer vacation; four blissful days at his mom's-side-of-the-family cottage in (kind-of) Northern Ontario.  No cell phone service, no internet, no hot water even!  I couldn't wait...  I, being quite organized (but don't look at my house, okay?), had been packing and getting ready to go for several days.  M and I had a system; I would pack our stuff, and he would pack the car.  It worked pretty well. 

Okay, back to the story.  So M had slowly been getting more and more stressed as the week leading up to our vacation progressed.  Finally 6pm on Saturday arrived, we whipped home on our bikes, threw the last bit of stuff into the car, and hightailed it out of Dodge.  5 hours later, we got to the cottage.  M's mom had arrived a couple hours prior, so she was there to help us haul everything in, and then we all went to bed, exhausted.

I woke up around 6am.  To this...

I have a thing for foggy mornings....

It was one of the most beautiful 6ams I can remember.  And what a way to start a vacation!!  I woke up M and we went for a canoe ride.  We were the only beings stirring; it felt like we were the only living things in the world!  Then we were joined by a pair of loons, who came over to check us out, and came within 6 feet of our canoe!  I thought, it can't get any better than this...

After we got back, we had breakfast with Mom and then proceeded with our vacation.  For me, that meant swimming, coolers, watermelon, reading, repeat.  And I thought, it can't get any better than this...

After lunchtime, I noticed M putting stuff in the motorboat (read: rowboat with a motor on the back) and asked him what he was doing.  He said, "Nothing", so I went back to my book and coolers. 

A while later, he said, "Come on, let's go".

"Go where?"

"To the island"

"Why??"

"Because we're camping there tonight."

"We don't have a tent"

"Yes we do."

"Where the heck did we get a tent?"

"From your mom"

I put my book down.  I remembered a couple weeks ago my Mom had come for a visit and brought the tent.  I asked why at the time, and she said that we'd mentioned we might like to go camping this summer and they weren't using it, so we might as well keep it at our place.  "We didn't bring it."

"Yes, we did.  I put it in the car when I was packing up."

I figured, it's vacation, why not, it'd be fun to camp on the island overnight.

So we went to Blueberry Island.

It's the further one.

We set up our tent and M started a fire and was puttering around.  And I thought, it can't get any better than this....

Mom had given us a woven picnic basket, and I love picnic baskets, so I opened it to poke through and look at everything (yes, I'm weird).  I said, "Oh look, honey, your mom put a bottle of wine in here!"

He ran up to me and practically grabbed it out of my hands. "Whatareyoudoing?Don'tlookinthere!!!!"

....weird....

"I was just gonna look at it and set out the stuff for supper."

"Later"

Okay, fine...I got out my book.

He got out some marinated duck kabobs. And corn on the cob.

When they had been cooking for a little bit, he brought the cooler and the basket over.  He gave it to me and said, now you can get everything out.  So I put it on the ground to use the top of the cooler as a table, and he went on one knee beside the cooler, and started handing me things out of the basket. 

"We'll need these" as he handed me plates and cutlery

"We'll need these" as he handed me the salt and pepper

"And we'll need these" as he handed me a handful of sugar packets and creamer substitute.

I said, "I don't think we need these for supper, honey"



"Well I think we'll need this..."
And he handed me a ring box.

And I started laughing-crying, and he said, "Will you marry me?"
And of course I laughed and said, "Yes"
And he said, "Put it on!"
...and it was too big for my finger!
And he said, "S**t"

And somewhere in there, I thought, it can't get any better than this :)

After a bit more laughing/crying/kissing, we ate dinner, and then went back to the cottage to tell his Mom and to phone mine.

Which is when I found out that everyone, EVERYONE! knew about the proposal.  Even the mailman!!!

M had ordered the ring and it was going to be delivered to his store and the entire week before vacation they were waiting and waiting for the ring to come (and M was getting more and more stressed), and finally on Friday morning they decided that if it didn't come, M and a couple others would leave the store on Saturday and go ring-shopping, because he was proposing while we were on vacation, and he had to have a ring, dammit.  Friday afternoon, the ring arrived.

Another bit of the story: when we got back, the mailman came into my store to deliver the mail, and was looking at my hand.  I laughed when I realized what he was looking for, and said that it was too big and we had to send it back to get resized.  When it came back to us, he went into M's store and they signed for it, but then he said that he'd deliver it to me :)  So he brought it into my store and then waited to make sure it fit!

And that's one of my Best Days Ever.  I hope you enjoyed reading!