Hello again! Things are getting exciting around these parts, this past week our ideas seem to have started coming together, and we’ve narrowed down some of the details we really want. For the first time I can really see our day when I close my eyes, and Andy’s getting really into planning which is fantastic. But, before we get into the juicy wedding planning details, I’m going to go backwards a little bit and tell you a story; a story about a proposal and a ring. A story that takes place in Russia, about 900 miles from Moscow…
It was a freezing snowy day last November; I don’t think the temperature got above minus 15 all day. We’d spent the morning exploring beautiful onion-domed churches and sliding around on icy roads, bundled up in six layers in an attempt not to freeze. It only took me until lunch time to have had about enough of the feeling I was about to lose my fingers to the cold, and I’d started dropping hints about heading back to the hostel and hiding out in the warm.
Instead, in a move that seemed a little cruel at the time, Andy insisted we got in a taxi and drove out of town to the border between Asia and Europe. It was a remote place, edged by forest and just a few miles from the Ural Mountains, and on such a cold day, we were the only people there, a line on the snowy ground marking the place where continents meet.
We stood together on the Asian side of the border, getting ready to jump across into Europe. Then, taking me completely by surprise, Andy got down on one knee in the snow, said some beautiful words, and pulled out a little red box.
With the most enormous, ridiculous grin on my face, I said yes.
Of course, I’m sure you’ll be wanting to know about the ring! I was never the type of girl who knew exactly what engagement ring she’d want. I’d always had strong ideas about rings I didn’t like, but I found it very hard to pick upon any I actually did like. In fact, the only ring I’d ever seen I would confidently say I’d be happy to have on my finger cost about the same as a small country manor! I have to give Andy full marks for bravery for picking out the ring himself, and I’m so glad he did. I know this is terribly gushy and cheesy, but somehow he managed to find the perfect ring for me, when even I didn’t know what my perfect ring was!
The ring itself is a beautiful delicate diamond covered band, with a single diamond in the center. I have no idea how he managed to find it in Hong Kong, where the engagement ring style follows the principle of more being most definitely more. It’s delicate, dainty and so, so pretty. At first I was worried about it. Surely dainty, elegant rings are for dainty elegant ladies? I would never have thought that was me. I had fears of fat fingers highlighted against its slim band of white gold, and I was absolutely terrified I was going to break it! Now (sorry, soppiness again!) I can’t imagine anything else.
Post proposal, photo-ooth happiness.
How he managed to get the ring and keep it a secret for over two months of traveling is beyond me! Our luggage was shared between us in two, rather grubby, dusty, held-together-with-safety-pins backpacks that had seen better days. To this day I have absolutely no idea where Andy was hiding it, or how he managed to smuggle it half way around South East Asia, right around China and the length of Russia. I’d seen those bags unpacked and repacked so many times yet never caught sight of this little red velvet box.
I guess sometimes its just best not to ask!
Jennie x
