My freshman year of college I got a job at a Hibachi restaurant. Ryan was a regular customer at my job sophomore year. He would always come in on Friday and order the same thing every week.
One of these days were were so busy and there was a dog locked in a car outside the restaurant. It had been a few hours and we couldnt find the owner of the car, so I asked Ryan to call the non-emergency police for me. He did and gave me his phone number and asked me to give him an update on what happened.
I texted him that night to update him about the dog and he never stopped texting me back. After a few weeks we finally went on our first date. Five years later and he still isnt sick of Hibachi food.


PS. The police found the owners of the car and the dog ended up being okay.

The day of the proposal, we woke up and went shooting. Jade had just gotten a new Smith & Wesson .38 Special that she wanted to shoot for the first time. I brought my Sig.


After the shooting range we went home and got ready for a nice lunch on the beach at a restaurant called the Oceanic. This was the only place that would work for the plan I had for the proposal. The restaurant was about a 15 minute walk on the beach from where we had our first date.


After lunch I suggested that we take a walk on the beach. Jade did not want to because she was supposed to study. I talked her into it eventually saying we could collect sea shells for the house. She liked that idea, thank god.


As we started walking, I texted the photographer. I had her stationed on the top deck of the restaurant out of sight. She proceeded to follow us the whole walk on the beach getting pictures. The photographer had her husband acting like a tourist in front of us taking pictures. They did such an incredible job. Jade had no idea.


Towards the end of the walk, I have to come up with an excuse to walk us up the beach away from the water where I have a candle lit picnic set up. It had pillows, blankets, rosé, chocolate covered strawberries, cheesecake, cannolis, candles and a big sign that stated She Said Yes.


As we are walking up to the picnic, I let her go ahead of me to check it all out. Her back is turned, when she turns back around, I am on one knee with the ring in my hand. I said what I had planned to say and after I put the ring on her finger we hear a big applause from the people around us. I had bought this journal to give to her at the picnic, The Reasons I Want to Marry You. I filled up about half of the book with the reasons I love her and want her to be my wife. In the front of the book I wrote a letter to her vowing that I would add a few pages every year on our anniversary. Jade said that this was her favorite part of the whole day.


After I proposed, we had some time just to ourselves at the picnic. After about 35 minutes, I had the photographer come over and we took engagement photos. Again, they did an incredible job.


After the photos, we went back home. Jade was pretty tired, we had been going strong since about 7am. I told her we had one more surprise though. I had reserved the private room at her favorite restaurant in town, the Melting Pot. She didnt know where we were going and on the ride over, she mentioned how good fondue sounds right now. I said we might be able to go in the next couple of weeks. We roll up to the parking spot and get out and I pretend to walk to a different restaurant, but at the last second open the door to the Melting Pot. We walk back to our table where I had my mom decorate the whole table with flowers and decorations. She sits down at the table and I pretend to go the bathroom. Instead I go to the bar area where I had her and my parents waiting. I had both of my parents fly in from San Diego for the surprise. She thought her parents were at in the Outer Banks that weekend. I had them tell her that so they could surprise her, as they live two hours away and Jade was supposed to be at her parents house that weekend. This was also the first time my father was meeting her parents. She was so surprised and happy that they were there. It was a really special dinner.


We started our day at about 7am and didnt get back home until 11:30 that night. Everything went exactly how I envisioned it. Everything that was supposed to happen did. I couldnt have asked for a more perfect day. I couldnt have done it with out the support from my parents and hers. We will remember this for the rest of our lives.