Here is my story.

Getting engaged was one of the most wonderful moments I have had thus far in my life. I cannot think of any moment quite like it, where you have so many different emotions all at once – excitement, anticipation, joy, love, nervousness, even a little fear as you make yourself vulnerable to heartbreak. Thankfully for me, the story had a very happy ending.

I had been planning the weekend for weeks, and was very eager to make it a surprise. I had returned from a month long work related trip to South Africa on February 14, and thus I missed Valentine’s Day. Considering my long absence, missing this “key” day of romance was probably not the best idea. Ultimately though it provided a nice excuse to have a romantic weekend get away a couple weeks later. With most of the plans in place, the one remaining and somewhat essential piece was securing the engagement ring. While in South Africa, I had hoped to find the perfect diamond, but I came back empty handed. As time was running out, I needed help, and thankfully I found Jana from Abazias Diamonds who came through in the clutch. Armed with the ring, I felt confident as the weekend of March 3rd approached.

On Saturday, March 4th, I picked Muriel up from her certification exam that she had to take that morning. We planned on going straight from Boston to the small town of Weston, Vermont. As I had been out of town so much, the “excuse” for the weekend was a delayed Valentine’s Day celebration. Upon arrival at the inn where we stayed, the first surprise of the weekend was an hour long in room massage. As we relaxed in the room before going down to dinner, I brought up the idea of going ring shopping in two weeks when we had a free weekend. I was pleased (and relieved) when this idea was met with exuberance, but little did she know that the ring would be forthcoming very shortly. We then went downstairs for a nice romantic dinner for two by candlelight. Towards the end of the meal, I excused myself to go to the restroom, but instead I hurried to the car and took all the stuff out of the trunk that I had packed prior to picking her up that morning. I then went up to our! room and made all the preparations for the next surprise of the weekend.

When I returned to the table (after a somewhat conspicuously long absence), I told Muriel that I had brought a special cake up from Boston and so we would have dessert in the room. We left the restaurant and returned to the room. When she opened the door, the room was aglow in numerous candles, with a fire blazing, and Frank Sinatra playing in the background. The bed was covered in rose petals and a cake with some champagne was on a table by the fire. As we entered the room, I exclaimed – “Happy Valentine’s Day.” Muriel – knowing that I had never really celebrated Valentine’s Day in the past – was mildly perplexed, but nonetheless pleased by the rather extensive preparations I had made. Quite happy to go with the flow, she moved into the room and made herself comfortable by the fire. My attention immediately went to the cake and I declared that it was now dessert time and that she was in charge of the cake cutting. She obliged, but upon cutting into the c! ake, she found the center of it rather hard, and could only remove a partial piece of cake. What remained in the center of the cake was a wooden box. With her mind still on the belated Valentine’s Day theme, she assumed that a nice pair of earrings was forthcoming. I removed the box from the cake and then getting down on one knee I opened the box to expose a different kind of ring. It all finally clicked in Muriel’s mind as she saw me going down on one knee. I asked her to marry me and happily, my question was greeted with a “Yes”. The element of surprise had been attained, and the objective had been reached and I was (and am) a happy man.

Murray

Dear Abazias,

I have decided to tell you the long version; it is such a beautiful story I think it is worth it. This happened just over 1 year ago on the 23rd of December 2005.

We were on holidays at Noosa beach in Queensland Australia. I was back for Christmas from the UK where I was studying at the time. Emmanuel and I had been apart for 3 months, as he had stayed in Australian to work while I was at Oxford studying.

On the day Emmanuel proposed I decided that I would get my nails done (something I had never done before, so it was a real treat). We had been surfing in the morning (Emmanuel is an avid surfer) and he had dropped me at the beauticians in the afternoon about 2 km from where we were staying. At about 4 pm I rang him to come pick me up, but instead he announced that he was going surfing and that I would have to walk home. Mad as can be (as deserting me for the surf is not like Emmanuel at all) I hung up the phone and started storming home. The thing was my parents were coming to visit that evening and I needed to go food shopping so I could have dinner ready. We had agreed that after I had finished getting my nails done we would shop together and prepare dinner for when they arrived around 6:30pm.

Around 6:15pm Emmanuel finally walked in the door. I was furious, but after his comment that the surf was great and that he didn’t do things like that very often I settled down and together we bustled into the car to get food for dinner.

We had a lovely dinner with my parents, and afterwards we went out for a walk and to get ice cream for desert. Strolling around with a huge ice cream each we started chatting and the boys (Emmanuel and my father) slowly fell behind. Mum and I decided to return to the apartment after a while, and by about 11pm I decided to got to bed as Emmanuel and dad had still not returned and I had know idea where they where or how long they would be.

A little after midnight Emmanuel woke my up and announced that he wanted to show me something. Bleary eyed I stumbled out of bed and was quickly told to close my eyes. He led me outside and onto the beach. As I was being lead bear foot though the sand on a beautifully warm summers night I wondered what was happening. When Emmanuel stopped he asked me to open my eyes and in front of me was 700 long steamed red roses in a giant heart with the words “Marry Me” inside. All this was done using the rose heads with the steams stuck in the sand. Emmanuel himself got down on one knee and asked me to marry him, which I of course accepted with tears in my eyes. The beach was softly lit by moonlight and you could make out the roses perfectly. Together we sat, Emmanuel with his arms around me on the deserted beach, completely surrounded by red roses. Under the stars, the waves gently lapped the shore and like that we sipped on Champagne until dawn broke.

There is nothing that could possibly make that night more special – And thank you to Erin and Abazias for the amazing diamond.

The reason why I told you the long story is that Emmanuel didn’t actually go surfing that day, he was driving 100 miles to pick up the 700 roses he had ordered. No wonder he was a little late getting back!!!

I have attached a few photos of the amazing night - please have a look. The night was just perfect and full of stars, you really could not dream of a more romantic proposal, I’m so lucky

Kindest Regards

Malia Chappel

The beginning of our engagement started 800 miles apart. Our son's introduced us through long distance e-mail as my husband and Charley's wife had both passed away with Alzheimer's disease. Charley came to visit me over the 4th of July last year and instantly the fireworks went off. We knew we were meant for each other. Since then, we have been traveling back and forth between Oklahoma and Indiana and decided to become engaged. We researched web sites for engagement rings and found Abazias' web site was the one where we could build a ring from scratch, selecting the color, style and design of the ring and then have it shipped to us within three days. When we received the ring it was everything we hoped it would be plus we were able to call our sales person David back and tell him how pleased we were. Since that time we have selected our wedding rings and will be calling Abazias soon. Thank you so much for helping to make our dre am come true. Warmest Regards, Nina Kessler and Charley Clair.
PS: Charley is 72 and I'm 68. Isn't love grand! (:-)

My boyfriend asked me to go on a drive one day with no particular destination in mind. We drove through all sorts of small-town Kansas scenery, stopping at antique shops and flea markets. I was getting cranky because we hadn't eaten anything and the only place in the little town we had stopped in was a convenience store with a pizza counter. We ordered a pizza to go, figuring we could find someplace with more ambience than the picnic table in the store parking lot to eat at. After circling the entire town, we realized that the only place that fit the bill was the football field behind the local high school. I was surprised that Bob had actually brought a blanket for us to sit on, but we sat down for our picnic. Halfway through the first slice, he got sort of weird and fidgety and told me that he wanted to ask me something. I sort of thought he was going to break up with me! But he pulled out a ring box and asked me to marry him, right there on the football field in some no-name town. It was very sweet. We've been married for five years now.

Please enter me to win a pair of diamond earrings.

Thanks,

Naomi Shapiro

The story of Greg and Caitelen, February 7th, 2007 as told by the lovely Caitelen herself:

Things were not as they seemed for me on the day Greg proposed. He surprised me first by scheming with my best friend Tamra to have her show up at the restaurant where we were having lunch. Greg left us with instructions via an adorable rhyming card to have dessert and pedicures in the afternoon. Later, card number two left me with instructions for a shopping spree with Mom to find a nice outfit for the dinner I was tricked into thinking was with my mom and dad that night. Instead, Greg showed up and treated me to a lovely Italian dinner at Vivace's, all the while leading me to believe that this day and all it's cute greg-isms were just his way of saying "Sorry" for not being able to hang out with me on my first day back in town. We had a brief dinner, me under the impression that he was heading to the church to preach right after. Then, when the LIMO pulled up to the restaurant to pick us up, I finally got a clue and realized that there was no church obligation that night, nor had this been "just another cute date." This was it! In th limo we enjoyed some sweet wine Gregs parents had for us and Greg played me two songs he had written for me.
We drove into the mountains and he led me to a little clearing overlooking the whole city of Albuquerque. It was a beautiful night!
Perfect! With stars and city lights and mountains all around us. It was seriously like a movie scene! He spread out a blanket on the rock and we read, by flashlight, Romans 12:9 and following about "sincere love." Then he got down on one knee and, well, I was so flustered and happy I couldn't tell you exactly what he said except that it was beautiful and sincere and, of course, I said yes! The first thing we did as an engaged couple was pray together and give our engagement and soon-to-be marriage over to the Lord. We then headed back into town in the limo. Greg's card contained clues to one more surprise before the night was over. I was blind-folded and led me to the front door of his house which had a huge red bow on it! A new house! I new home together! Inside our families and several close friends who know us and love us and have mentored and invested in us as a couple were waiting. What a sweet, sweet surprise! I couldn't have imagined a more blessed way to end the night than to have those I love there to share in our joy! They prayed over us and made some toasts and we took pictures and ate cake and I showed off my beautiful new ring!!
Eventually, sweet Greg just about passed out from exhaustion after all of his scheming and planning and everything went so perfectly! He finally slept that night and I could hardly sleep for excitement!

Gregory Clifford Schneeberger III, Esquire