Our Engagement in less than 30 seconds

or you can read here for the slightly longer version:

Steve was up for the weekend and we were getting ready to go out to eat to celebrate our 1 year anniversary. He told me after dinner we were going to Crystal Bridges Art Museum. We had already been here before and I thought to myself, "oh wow, it's free -- big spender for our 1 year Steve!"

While Steve was waiting on me to get ready I told him I was going to wear my Kobe Bryant jersey. The Lakers were playing that night and Kobe was returning from a several game leave from an injury. Anyone who knows me knows how passionate I am about the Lakers, so me doing this wouldn't be a big deal. Steve flipped --- he was SO against me wearing my Lakers jersey and insisted I change into something nicer. I was annoyed and had no clue why he cared; in the end I changed. Looking back now at our pictures I could only imagine how goofy I would look in my Lakers jersey as he proposed! ha ha

We had dinner at our favorite Mexican place and everything was perfectly normal. I had told myself a million times Steve was going to give away the proposal because I just knew he'd be a nervous wreck before he did it. But Steve played it cool and I had NO CLUE. The entire weekend he was up and especially the day of the proposal he was on his phone none stop. He was texting constantly and I was getting very upset about him being on his phone so much and not paying attention to me. I didn't know at the time that he had been texting one of my dearest friends, Caty Coleman, who was hiding at Crystal Bridges to take pictures of it all. {Check out Caty Coleman Photograpy}

Once we arrived at Crystal Bridges we practically RAN through the museum to the spot Steve wanted to propose. I still didn't think anything of it because we had seen all art before so I was ready to just go do something romantic afterwards. We finally got to the room where there are windows everywhere overlooking the water. I grabbed Steve's hand and walked right into it as I turned him to look at the water and asked if we could just stand there and enjoy the moment. After about a minute Steve turned to faced me and kissed me (like a, you wouldn't kiss like this in public kind of kiss). The he said, "Cassie Denise" -- as I interrupted shouting "Is this real? Is this real? Is this real?!?!" He laughed and said "This is real!" . He got down on one knee and asked me to marry him! After I said yes ( I couldn't really speak for a long time) we both shed a few tears. Me from excitement and Steve from being so dadgum nervous!! I turned around to see the beautiful Caty Coleman taking photos of us and it was a perfect surprise!!!

After we enjoyed the moment a little longer Steve told me we were meeting a bunch of his friends out on Dickson to celebrate! We went back to my house for me to get freshened up and then got back in his truck. He started to drive to my best friend Keli's house. I asked him why and he said that she wanted to go out with us so we were picking her and her husband up! When we got to Keli's I saw a million cars and absolutely everyone who I love was there for a surprise engagement party!!! It was so special to spend the moments after the proposal with all the people who mean the world to me! I was so thankful and felt so completely blessed and in love! Once the party ended we met a ton of our other friends out on Dickson and closed the street down celebrating!

What a perfect night!!!