MADIE: We were a few days into our month-long trip across Norway and were on our way to Gudvangen, a little Viking village that I had loved when I’d been to Norway with my family a few years earlier. We’d planned on just kind of relaxing on our first day in Gudvangen -

MICHAEL: (She was relaxed. I was terrified.)

MADIE: - then going for a hike on our second day there; but, when we looked at the weather forecasting rain the next day, Michael suggested that we could just go for a little hike after dinner.

MICHAEL: I was very casual. She had no idea.

MADIE: When we arrived, I mentioned that I should FaceTime my parents to show them Gudvangen, since they had also loved it there. “Why don’t you wait and we can FaceTime them after the hike tonight?” Michael suggested. I started to suspect that maybe he had something planned, but talked myself out of it - he knew I wanted a real proposal with a ring (since we’d already booked our wedding venue, but I still wanted a traditional proposal) and I thought there was no way he’d gotten a ring yet.

MICHAEL: That’s because I’d been pretending I was struggling to find a ring in order to throw her off the scent. In reality, I’d secretly been working with a jeweler for months on a one-of-a-kind handcrafted Madie ring. Unfortunately, the subterfuge was too good and by the time we’d gotten to Norway Madie was convinced I was a bumbling boyfriend with cold feet. Little did she know…

MADIE: After a lovely dinner right on the edge of the fjord, we chose a direction and set off on a hike. Michael kept checking in as we were walking, asking if this was a good place to stop, but I wanted to keep going until we got to the top of the hill we were climbing to see the view of the fjord from the top. When we finally reached the best viewpoint, probably in someone’s yard…

MICHAEL: Definitely somebody’s yard. Madie hopped the fence.

MADIE: We were standing near a barn and there were sheep hanging out all around, casually watching us. Michael started to go into what had been his ongoing fake proposal joke that he’d been doing for the past year; whenever we found a beautiful view, or an iconic site, or honestly just were in front of a bunch of people, he would grab my hand and say, “Well, now that we’re here…” and make like he was going to propose.

MICHAEL: I meant it every time. Madie just never took me seriously…

MADIE: So when, looking out over the Nærøyfjord, he grabbed my hand and said, “Well, now that we’re here…” I thought that my suspicions had been off and this was just another joke. But then he pulled a ring box out of his backpack and got down on one knee! I, of course, instantly started to cry. But I said yes, of course!

MICHAEL: I honestly don’t remember what I said, but whatever it was must’ve worked, because here we are.

MADIE: Here we are. We’ve had a pretty great adventure thus far, and I can’t wait to see where our story goes from here.

Travel

Travel coming soon!