Congratulations, Vince!

[korme]

Our own Vince (aka Vince, Pt. II) got engaged last night. As somewhat of a contemporary, I want to extend my congratulations to a great member of this forum.

[Suicane75]

I told him he had nothing to worry about, I was sure you would say yes.

[korme]

I told him after all these years I knew you'd never commit, so I was ready for whatevz.

[Chief Rum]

Congrats Vince!

[Kodos]

Congratulations, Vince!

[PilotMan]

Congrats! That's great news!

[Vince, Pt. II]

Thanks guys! Been a whirlwind few days, and I haven't had a chance to put anything together here to announce it. I have some pretty great pictures (had a pretty elaborate surprise planned and hired a photographer to capture the moment), so hopefully this evening when I get home from work I can share them.

[Logan]

Congrats man!

Back when I took the plunge I started a thread on here in advance, updated it afterwards, and kept on updating it...right through when our daughter was born about 6 months ago.

Just a reminder of what's likely coming

[Thomkal]

congrats Vince

[chesapeake]

Congratulations!

[MizzouRah]

Congratulations Vince!

[PackerFanatic]

Congrats!

[MIJB#19]

Sweet! Congrats, Vince!

[JPhillips]

Congrats.

[BYU 14]

Congrats Vince

[dawgfan]

Gratz Vince!

[tarcone]

Congrats. Vince.

[AnalBumCover]

Congrats!

[Arles]

Congrats, saw the pictures on Facebook Very cool!

[MrBug708]

Congrats! Kiss the weekend golf games goodbye!

[Ramzavail]

Congrats!

[SunDevil]

Congrats

[digamma]

Congrats!

[Vince, Pt. II]

Ok, The Story - Jenn and I celebrated the one-year anniversary of our first date this past weekend. In 2016 we met up at a local Market - it's a cluster of different restaurants indoors that serve you their food over a counter and you take the meal either into the bar area or out into the back patio area to eat it. Once we finished our dinner, we wandered around downtown a little and ended up at a small diner, where we shared a milkshake - with two straws and everything! Conveniently, the two locations - the Market and the Diner - were both on the same block, about 500 or so feet apart. Last year, we were both out of town over the weekend and had flown in that morning - her from a wedding in San Diego, me from a meetup with a bunch of friends in Utah.

Anyhow, this year, we were both out of town again for the weekend - so we planned to re-live the entire date, nice and casual since we had both been out of town. Jenn was under the impression that we were going to get to the restaurant at 7 PM, which would allow us enough time to make it home to meet my best friend Matt to watch the Game of Thrones Season Premiere at 9 PM. Little did she know what I had in store...

...for the past few months, I have been scheming - getting in touch with 5 of her best friends, my two best friends, my three siblings, her brother, my parents, and her mother (her father passed away many years ago). Because of how important our friends and family are to us, I thought the very best way to propose would be to include all those who are closest to us, and to surprise her with them. Conspiring with everyone and swearing them to secrecy, the plan was for this outside group to meet up in secret at ANOTHER nearby restaurant at 7:30 PM. What was perfect was that this third restaurant was both between the Diner and the Market and was completely cut off from the outside world once you were inside - so there was no threat of anyone being seen unless they were not already there.

The plan was that Jenn's best friend Maggie, who had a list of all the attendees, would text message me once everyone was present and accounted for, and I would do everything in my power to make sure that Jenn and I stayed at the Market until I got that text. This way, everyone would be safely ensconced inside the restaurant and we would not run the risk of running into anyone while we walked down to the Diner. Then, once we were at the Diner and had ordered our milkshake, I would text Maggie back, letting her know that it was time to start the festivities.

Knowing how much fun this would be if I could pull it off and wanting those people who were there to fully enjoy the moment (and not through a camera lens), I hired a professional photographer to capture the event. I told her that it would be an interesting event, in that I wanted some candid photos of us at the Market first, but that a professional photographer hovering around us would totally ruin the surprise. I suggested she arrive beforehand and act like she was taking photos for the venue, and she agreed. Once she had gotten a few pictures, she would head over to the third restaurant and meet up with the group of family and friends, take some photos of them, and wait for the proceedings to really get underway so she could try to get a shot of Jenn's reaction as she realized what was going on.

I worked with the owner of the diner to make sure that we had champagne on hand for once we finished, and I also had two dozen roses ready at the third restaurant with the hidden group. Once Maggie got the green light, the group was to start walking over in six distinct groups:

1. Her friends
2. My friends
3. My siblings
4. Her brother
5. My parents
6. Her mother

Each person (or couple) would be carrying a single living rose, and would give it to Jenn as they arrived and said hi. Since I knew the surprise was over as soon as she saw ANYONE, I told them to keep the space between the groups small - 15 to 30 seconds at most.

As a side note, there were two very special guests within this group of people. The first was on my side - my half-sister Jennifer. She is my father's daughter from his first marriage, and she is a drug addict and convicted criminal. She has been in and out of rehab several times, and I have personally held a pretty hard line stance on her because she has taken advantage of my dad's generosity again and again. She has been clean and sober for several months currently, and I reached out to her because I knew it would mean the absolute world to my dad to have her there. What was wonderful to find out was that it actually meant a lot to me to have her there as well. Unfortunately I was unable to see his surprise when she showed up, but I have been told it was a pretty touching moment.

Secondly, Jenn's brother Tommy had flown in from Seattle. Jenn only gets to see him once or twice a year, and he has some difficulty traveling; the fact that he flew in for one day to be a part of this was a huge deal.

In any case, the plan was set: everyone knew their role, the photographer had been hired, I bought the ring, had it re-sized, and it was in the care of Jenn's other good friend Karri, my mom was handling the roses, I had opened a tab at the third restaurant so people could have something to drink or eat while waiting for everyone to arrive, I had supplied the diner with plastic champagne flutes and champagne for afterwards...the only thing left was to actually DO IT.

While we were both getting ready to leave the house, I told her that I was sad that we did not have more pictures of us. We have a board we keep in our room for pictures of us, and it is very sparsely populated with only three pictures. So I snapped a picture of her while she was doing her hair. Once she left the back room, I took a selfie in the mirror while brushing my teeth, and quickly sent both photos to the photographer - we had never met, and she needed a way to identify us so she knew who to take pictures of that night!

Jenn and I arrived just barely ahead of schedule at 6:50 PM. We wandered through the market, trying to pick out what type of food we wanted. There was a live band playing music out on the patio, so we checked it out prior to ordering. Once on the patio, I saw that the photographer was already out there "taking pictures" of the band. We made eye contact and I smiled - when she smiled back I knew we were set. Jenn and I ordered food and a couple of beers, and headed back out onto the patio. Randomly, we ran into one of my dad's best friends (who lives 4 hours away up in Tahoe) - apparently he was down to check out his sister's new apartment, right around the corner. I tried to come up with a way to let him in on the plan surreptitiously, but I couldn't make it happen without making Jenn suspicious, so we went our separate ways. We sat down and started eating.

After a couple minutes of chatting and enjoying the music, the photographers made their way over to the table next to us. They explained that they were taking photos of the band and the venue, and asked the table if they minded being in some of the pictures. They quickly agreed, and the photographers then asked us if we minded. Jenn quickly said it was ok, and we went on eating. The photographers took several pictures, then hightailed it out of there.

At 7:50 or so, Jenn suggested I text my friend Matt to make sure that he was still in for Game of Thrones that night. I agreed that was a good idea, and pulled out my phone - just in time for Maggie to text me that everyone was ready! I sent Matt a dummy text (he was actually in the restaurant a few doors down himself, waiting to be a part of the surprise), and then suggested that we head over to the Diner.

We got there to find that the place was completely empty! Now, it's a small diner, and this was around 8 PM on a Sunday night...but it was still pretty cool, especially since I had just arranged for the restaurant to keep a few tables to one side of the restaurant open. We ordered our milkshake, sat down, and I texted Maggie back to tell her that it was time to get started.

I had my back to the door (intentionally), while Jenn was facing the door. The videographer was the first one in, and I could tell that Jenn noticed her because she got a slightly confused look on her face...until she noticed her friend Karri right behind, rose in hand:

1 - Jaw Drop by Vince Cressio, on Flickr

She was absolutely stunned, and could do nothing more than sit there, accepting the roses as our friends and family started dropping them off in her arms. Her friends, my friends, my siblings...then her brother Tommy came in. She shouted, started crying, and ran to his arms. It was a pretty touching moment - we had to wait a few minutes until she let him go. While this was going on, I snuck around behind and said hi to my parents, but the focus was to get to Jenn's mom, Ann. Ann not only had a living rose, but also a rose made of Waterford Crystal that I had purchased specifically for this moment. I took the crystal rose from her, then went back over as my parents gave Jenn their rose, and then Ann did the same. With the crystal rose behind my back, I told her that I loved her more than anything. I took my hand from behind my back, and while handing it to her I told her "I will love you until the last rose dies."

I then turned to her friend Karri, and said "Karri, can you help me out?" She handed me the ring, and then:

4 - Will You Marry Me by Vince Cressio, on Flickr
5 - Happy by Vince Cressio, on Flickr
6 - I Just Wanted to Hug You by Vince Cressio, on Flickr
7 - Yes by Vince Cressio, on Flickr
She said yes!

It's going to be a few weeks until we get all of the photos from the photographer, but even this small preview we got from her is phenomenal. Just a really spectacular night, and it was so much fun to have everyone involved and know how much it meant to not only Jenn and I, but all our friends and family.

[jaygr]

Awesome job! Congrats!

[Butter]

Holy shit. Making us all look bad.

Just kidding man, congratulations. An awesome moment you'll never forget.

[Logan]

TL;dr - you guys have engagement sex or what?

[Logan]

Obviously read it all Agreed you put me wayyyyy to shame. Well done.

[Thomkal]

man glad I'm not planning on getting married any time soon if that is the preparation you have to go through Great story and pictures.

[Chief Rum]

New standard of engagement set up. Now I KNOW I will never get married--I can't top this!

This is wonderful, Vince. I'm really happy for you both. Even if you're a Warriors fan