So, the past two Sundays Cooper and I have splurged. We’ve gone out for donuts one weekend and cinnamon rolls the next. These weekends of indulgences spawned from 1.) seeing this store front:
and 2.) A groupon. Little did we know both the donut place and the cinnamon roll spot, Cinnaholic, were 100% VEGAN. Not bashing vegan eating but I totally thought we were splurging (but also secretly happy that it wasn’t the full deal). Both were great…think salted caramel donuts and cinnamon rolls with maple frosting…but the one thing they were lacking was a good cup of cows milk to wash it all down. Silk just didn’t do it for me.
Ok, I know people don’t really care about donuts or cinnamon rolls…what you really want to know are the other juicy details. The one bit of news Cooper and I have kept semi quiet is that we are engaged. We’ve actually have been engaged for a good month and a half now but it wasn’t until yesterday that I said to Cooper “Are you going to change your Facebook status, ha ha ha?” His reply: “I don’t know, are you?” My reply: “Not until after you do it.” Then I got an e-mail asking me to accept an engagement invitation. Oh, Facebook. Yes, we’ve told our families…we’ve just been enjoying the world of engagementhood in slow and simple steps. But now it is out there and I know many of our close friends and family they are thinking: It is about damn time. We’ve actually been talking about “making it official” or as we like to say “having a special celebration” for about a year…but with our 10 year anniversary approaching in April we thought around then would be appropriate. I’ve told several folks over the many years that I’ve either dreamt or read about a culture where the couple celebrates after years of being together (i.e. waits until they are bald and wrinkly) before they make it “official.” I have kind of liked this notion and am really glad we’ll get to celebrate after hitting our 10 years milestone and Cooper will still have some hair and our wrinkles are not too deep yet. Whoo hoo! Win win all around. We plan to do something suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuper small (like just immediate family) and suuuuuuper low key. We hope to take some of our own wedding portraits after all is said and done (as well succumb to the challenge of hiring a wedding photographer for the day of stuff) so I’ll be sure to share a photo or two.
The engagement story (since people have asked!) is simple and sweet (and perfect). Before daylight savings began in November the bay area had some of the most amazing sunsets known to man. Throughout all of our years in the east bay one of our favorite things to do on warm summer nights is to go to an overlook in the Berkeley hills and have dinner as the sun sets. The view from up here is awesome. So, on November 4th, Cooper said “Hey, woman…why don’t we have dinner at the overlook tonight?” My response was “Absolutely, Sir!” (ok, he didn’t say “Hey, woman” and I didn’t call him Sir… I added that in there for the effect). So we did. And it was a beautiful night:
Once we finished our meal and all the other spectators left Cooper popped the question.
And it was an awesome moment. And we couldn’t be happier. And our dog was there. And as we lived in the moment Oslo (the dog) started chewing through his leash and almost ran away from us because we were so mushy gushy (seriously, we caught him just in time). And life is really good and has been for a long time and I genuinely feel really really lucky.
So, that is the story. Simple and sweet and just right. We are not really a traditional couple and if he had bent down on one knee or dished out a big fancy ring I probably would have felt a little ill. Instead I felt just great.