December 11th

This post was supposed to have been posted last month on the 11th. I went to post it that morning and the computer would not turn on. Well last night we got all our stuff off of our old computer hard drive onto our new computer. Here is that post.
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Andre and Janelle memories continue... If you missed the others you can go to May 7th 2007 or November 8th 2009. 11 years ago on December 11th was the big proposal day. So to get there I should talk about the year between the first date and the proposal.

We went out a couple of times in December and January. There was another guy that was asking me out at the same time. In fact he lived up near Ogden somewhere. So a few times I would leave work and drive to my Aunt and Uncles house which is in Farmington. Then Andre and other dude didn’t have to drive so far to pick me up. And I stayed over night at her house so the dropping me off was easier too.

So by February I had made my decision that I didn’t want to see that other guy again. But it was his birthday so I didn’t want to break up with him then. Then it was Valentines Day and I thought that was a lame time to break things off. Then I just had to tell him and it was hard. But I really didn’t like even being with him. Funny story- I broke up with him and I could tell it was a surprise to him. He dropped me off and left. I was in the middle of telling Cathryn and Ken the sad story (they knew it was going to happen) when someone knocked on the door. It was him! I was worried he wanted to talk me out of it or something. No, he was wondering if he could use the bathroom. After he left we were all talking about how weird that was. Ken mentioned that if he was in the same situation, he would have never knocked on the door again for any reason even if someone had paid him. But this guy acted like nothing had happened.

So I had moved home in August after graduating and was planning on moving out soon after I found a job. I had only been working about 1 ½ months when I had my car accident. So that slowed things down. I was working in down town Salt Lake. I thought about moving kind of up near the U because there would be a lot of singles wards and cheaper apartments. Then I started thinking that maybe I could find a place in Bountiful. I looked around and found an apartment about a 7 minute drive from my work. I moved to North Salt Lake. I have to admit that it crossed my mind (a little :) ) that it was more convenient to date Andre but I didn’t want him to think that I was chasing him. (He did anyway. When I moved, he thought- whoa this might be getting serious).

About the end of February - beginning of March was when I started seeing Andre a lot more. I moved in my apartment sometime in March which made it easier to see more of each other. Now we lived about 20 minutes away from each other instead of 45 minutes to an hour. We both worked in Salt Lake. My new commute was fabulous. I had so much extra time because it literally took 10 minutes max to get there or home.

We were seeing a lot of each other and doing a lot of fun things. Then in May Andre decided that he wanted to move out of his parent’s home and he wanted to buy a house. So that became a fun activity for us. We looked for houses a lot. Our realtor didn’t know what our relationship was so he kept asking me what I was looking for in a house. I just turned it over to Andre because I didn’t know if I was going to be involved in that house. But watching him look at houses helped me see a lot about his personality and made me feel secure in our relationship. The realtor would have a list of houses that he would take us to in an area. If Andre didn’t like the house, he didn’t like it. He wouldn’t waste time looking at every room or spend a lot of time thinking about it. We would leave. It made me feel good because I knew if he didn’t like me, he would not keep calling me. In September he found the house and he moved in on September 26th 1998. There was a time that we looked at a house right across from Andre’s sisters house (Monette). We went to say hi. I don’t think I had met them before. Andre’s brother in law Todd, asked us straight out if we were getting married. This is an easy question to ask when we explained that we were out looking at houses together. We all laughed uncomfortably but Andre said something like “Not yet”. Good answer!

We pretty much saw each other 3-4 times a week. The summer was full of hiking and movies, and hanging with family and friends. Then in the fall Andre started his Masters degree. So he was doing the school thing in the evenings as well as a full time job. For one of his classes they asked all the students to bring a spouse, girl/boy friend, or significant other to the class. So I got to go. I don’t remember what it was about but I enjoyed it because I got to see the campus and stuff. So Andre was busy with school and work. I think we talked most days but we saw each other mostly on weekends.

My job was weird. In August (I think) my company American Stores got taken over by Albertsons so no one knew if we would have jobs. It was a weird time for everyone. There was a lot less work and everyone’s morale was down. My job ended up lasting for another year but it was kind of a bummer year. It was great for me because a lady left the company and they gave me her job. It was a great pay raise for the next year.

Remember Jeremy that was in my first date blog? (See November 8th 2009 blog) Well he and Kelly got married in October. He met Kelly after Andre and I started dating. Andre and I still did not talk about marriage (with each other). We just were funny about it. We did (and still do) talk about everything. Some people were worried that Andre was wasting my time and that he would not make a commitment. But I knew him and he was not like that. I knew it would work out. My roommates were both moving and I decided to move home because I didn’t want to sign any long term lease. So the most I ever talked to Andre about getting married was this… “So, should I move home with my parents in December or sign a lease for another apartment?” Andre answered, “I think you should move home.” So I took that as a sign- and it was meant as a sign.

I kind of thought we would get engaged sometime over the holidays- either Christmas or New Years. He knew I was thinking that and he wanted to surprise me so he wanted to do it earlier. I had a friend from England call me and wanted to meet me at Temple Square because she was in town. I was with Andre when she telephoned. I asked Andre if we had anything going on and if he wanted to go with me to meet up with her. He looked really weird and paused, but said that that would be fine. I think that was the first weekend in December. The reason he looked weird was that he was planning to propose to me on Temple Square the next weekend. He didn’t know how he would get me to go there again without getting me suspicious. But I was oblivious and we went and met up with her and it was fun to see her.

The next weekend we went to Thanksgiving Point. It was December 11th and a Friday night. Back then, they had lots of Christmas lights that you could wander around and see. I saw that they had carriage rides and I think I brought it up that we should go on one. Andre thought that sounded fun. (Little did I know that that was the whole plan.) He was going to propose to me at Temple Square after going on a carriage ride. When I spoiled that for him- he scrambled and found out that they had carriage rides at Thanksgiving Point too. The carriage ride was fun. It was a really cold night and made for some good snuggling under the provided blankets. I made some comment about how the ride was a lot longer than I thought it would be. I only meant that as a good thing because I expected just a short ride- this was impressive. He mumbled something in agreement. I didn’t know, but he was so nervous the whole ride. It seemed super fast to him.

When the carriage stopped, he jumped out of the carriage. He had to climb over me to get out the door first so that surprised me. He reached up to help me out. That struck me as fun. Then he was on his knee. OK, I was super surprised. He asked the question and I don’t really remember how he worded it, but I said yes! I know there were people everywhere. I think some people clapped. Then we went off to a more secluded area. The ring was beautiful, the guy was sweet, and the night was perfect.