Proposal Story #3

My brother is a creative writing major at SFSU and I just recently went up to see his first debut as a theatrical writer at the Fringe Festival by the theater department at SFSU where his words came to life. It got me thinking how jealous I am of people who have an amazing way with words and can make moments come to life by bringing pen to paper. Enter this amazingly awesome proposal. Joel Kimmel has a way with words and decided that when proposing, he wanted to do something creative and meaningful. Read the amazing story of how Joel asked Chantal to be his wife!

After over 5 years together, I proposed to my girlfriend Chantal on New Year’s day, 2010. It was a long time coming, and a long time in the making. The hardest part about proposing to her wasn’t making the decision that I wanted to marry her, it was coming up with a way to do it! I wanted to do something creative and also have something  we can look back on to remember how it happened.

 

Collier's Cyclopedia, circa 1883

I had a lot of different ideas but in the end I decided to write and illustrate a magical little  story for her that revolved around a story of the ring. So of course I had to find the ring first, and I found an incredible 100 year old brass ring with an art nouveau design carved into a piece of red coral, a great ring to write a story about. I make it sound simple, but I searched for the perfect ring for about 8 months.

I wrote a few drafts of the story and come up with the title  A Coral Arrangement.  After I sketched out which images would go with which pages I illustrated 22 drawings to go with the story. I worked secretly over about 2 weeks to get the book done before heading to Ottawa for New Year’s Eve. I had decided I wanted to propose in the New Year and get 2010 off to a great start.

It’s tricky to work on a project like this when you work side by side with someone all day long (our drafting tables are right next to each other).  Thankfully even if she did sneak a peak or catch a glance she didn’t know exactly what I was working on and I pretended it was a Christmas present I was making for her.

Red Coral

Finding coral on the beach

A glossy ibis promises a great gift

Foxes appear on the beach

Caribou also come to the beach

Sunken treasure

A ring is hidden inside a book within a turtle shell

The brass ring is made from sunken ships

The last page reveals a flap

Instead of binding a book myself I found a beautiful old book called Collier’s Cyclopedia of Social and Commercial Information. The book was perfect. It was printed in 1883 and was filled with amazing illustrations. I scanned my illustrations and designed the layout in InDesign before printing the pages and gluing them into the Collier’s book. I felt terrible doing this to such an incredible book but it was really the perfect book for the job.For the final touch to the book I decided to cut a hole inside to hide the ring. When the story ends there is one final illustration with a fold up flap that opens to reveal the ring hidden inside (that’s my cue to propose). I cut down about an inch into the book after gluing the pages together with an acrylic painting medium. It worked perfectly and from the side you’d never know there was a ring hidden inside.

The coral ring revealed within the book

On January 1st of this year after taking the dog for a snowy walk I presented Chantal with the book. As she read through the story and looked at my drawings I tried to guess if she knew how it was going to end. She flipped through slowly and I prepared my words when she got to the final page with the flap. I wish I could remember exactly what she said when she saw the ring and I proposed but I all I can remember is a very happy face and an excited reaction, and that her answer was something similar to “yes.”

A Proposal Story #3

Light Writing Proposal from Derick Childress on Vimeo.

I. 

love.

this.

Proposal Story...NEW on TLC 2

I thought a great new thing to do on my blog would be to share proposal stories because let's face it...they make us ladies swoon! I also figured for those boys out there...I can give you some ideas.  Here is one that I found hailing all the way from Toledo, Ohio. 

What I love about this one is that Corey had to add the "signature" just in case Michelle was thinking there might be someone else popping the question!

Michelle See thought she might spot her name on a billboard when her boyfriend told her that he was planning something big for a marriage proposal.

She was even prepared to read it on a water tower when he told her "some people might see it."
"I hope it's nothing corny," she teased Corey Cook.

Cook   Zoom | Photo Reprints

So when from her seat by the window of a small plane she saw "Michelle will you marry me?" surrounded by a heart, all hoed into seven acres of corn much like the popular corn mazes, she could only laugh - after she said yes.
"She just started giggling like a little girl on Christmas morning," said Mr. Cook, who presented her with a ring in the air above his cornfield message just west of Napoleon.
That was late last month.But ever since June, people flying over Napoleon have known Corey loves Michelle. That's when Mr. Cook, a self-employed hotel market researcher, found Leaders Family Farms on the Internet and contracted to have his proposal cut in their cornfield.

The Leaders raise crops in the flight path between the Columbus area where Mr. Cook and Ms. See live and a Cook family cabin by Lake James in the northeast corner of Indiana.

See   Zoom | Photo Reprints

The Leaders also have eight years experience creating corn mazes that are linked to their farm markets.
For Mr. Cook's proposal, the Leaders drew a heart and his message on grid paper and used that as a guide in June to remove - by hand - corn plants to make the design he wanted in the field.
"We hoped it looked right," Brad Leaders said. "You don't know until you see it from the air."
The width of each letter in the proposal is about 5 feet of bare ground. To keep that ground free of weeds, the Leaders hoed - again by hand - in July the outline of the heart and words.
Mr. Cook paid them hundreds of dollars for their efforts. The price wasn't higher, Mr. Leaders said, because his family hoped it would create publicity for their farm markets in Napoleon and Defiance.
The message in corn, which is not visible from the ground, has drawn much attention from the air. Several times a day, Mr. Leaders said, he sees planes circle the heart for a better look.
As for Mr. Cook, 30, and Ms. See, 26, a January wedding is planned.
And they expect others to copycat the proposal idea. Mr. Cook already knows of one in the works.
Evie Leaders, of the Henry County farm, said Mr. Cook's creativity might raise the bar for what it takes to get a woman to say yes.
"I told Corey, you're putting a lot of pressure on our local boys," she said.

Proposal Story...NEW on TLC

At least it should be! While reading one of my favorite blogs recently (oh,hello friend), I stumbled upon the authors ADORABLE proposal story and just felt compelled to share. So here it is. It takes a little to get through...but if you don't get goosebumps by the end...well then I can't help you! ENJOY!

i arrived home thursday night ready to get errands finished during the weekend when he told me "pack a bag, we're going on a trip!" i thought.. a trip? hm. i have a surprise baby shower this weekend, 6 parking tickets i need to take care of, desperately needing to clean my apartment: the last thing on my mind was a trip. but i packed my bag wondering what was going on. he was so secretive. friday morning, he handed me my boarding pass and said "surprise! we're going to seattle!" seattle. my favorite place. mainly because, i love the rain. yes yes, i know some (if not many) of you are thinking "how can you love the rain?? it's so depressing" but i just love it.

goodbye oc.

so here we are. on the plane on our way to seattle! i jokingly asking him "are we getting engaged this weekend?" to which he replied, "no. of course not." haha.

we arrived in seattle. it's not raining, go figure. apparently we just missed the huge storm the night before. but it's still cool to be in the city. it's so urban and artsy. i love it.

we immediately went to the ferrie and purchased the 1:00 ticket to bainbridge. bainbridge? i've never heard of it. where is he taking me? on the ferry, i notice these 2 girls taking photographs of each other. they were really hilarious cause the wind was blowing so hard but they were having so much fun. i kind of glanced at one of them and thought "did they just take our picture?" but i didn't want to be paranoid so i didn't think anything more of it.

we get a taxi and arrive at the bloedel reserve. it's a really beautiful property where you can walk through the forest and gardens. it was so serene and peaceful. and no one was around!

i think i was glad it wasn't raining because it would have been really muddy. ;) actually, it rained before we got on the ferrie and then the sun came out. we both thought if it was rainy and gloomy, maybe it would have been all scary walking through the woods (twilight style!) hehe. so we walked for about 15 minutes..through the bridges and everything. we saw a swan. it was really nice!

so we're walking around and arrive at these steps, with a waterfall. i see the 2 girls from the ferrie! one of the girls, darrah, busts out her acting skills and says "oh we saw you on the ferrie! you know, i hope you don't mind but i kind of took some pictures of you guys.. do you want to see?" -- since at this point i sort of knew what was happening, I said "sure!" instead of thinking "why did this random stranger take pictures of us on the ferrie, creeepy!!" ;) so she starts flipping through some pictures she took and then we come to these 4 images, she flips through them one at a time:

i turn around and nicholas is on one knee with a ring. :) awwwwwwwwwwww.

ps: i think it's funny that he is on one knee and still about as tall as me :)

it all happened so fast and i felt so calm about it, lol. it was so amazing and sweet.

it turns out he had done a bunch of research for photographers and found laurel mcconnell. he wanted to be sure we had memories and have the proposal captured in photos :) he had been emailing laurel for a month figuring out the plan. (she's also blogged about our story here!) darrah and laurel were amazing and so sweet. he wanted to take me to seattle to propose in the rain and have it be really special and memorable.

then laurel and darrah stayed with us for a while longer, having a mini shoot. i was so unprepared but it was so much fun!

since i didn't want a diamond ring, he had no idea what to get me so he made the ring himself in a 3D program he works in for his job and had it made through a rapid pro typing place. the ring turned out to be so thin because he didn't realize the scale he was working in so it actually broke but i loved it... and i'm going to try to glue it back together.

taken by helen at our friends surprise baby shower..
that is a story i will save for another day.

AND he also made a back up ring (the ring i am wearing now) out of a block of wood. he hand carved it and sanded it down himself. it was the sweetest thing ever and i think it was meant to be because it totally fit perfectly as well. (i was very impressed by his craft skills, since he has never taken a woodworking class!) he is totally a crafter at heart i bet ;) we did end up finding this fabulous custom ring shop in seattle: green lake jewelry. so we'll probably just design our rings there. (if you need a custom ring, this is your place!)