Engaged at Disneyland

      As we already know, I am a HUGE Disney fan. So where else would I want to spend my birthday than at the happiest place on earth, Disneyland! 

      Calvin and I planned a trip to Disneyland for the weekend of my birthday. We had two of our good friends meeting us there as well, Jeremy and Cara. Little did I know that Calvin had been planning to propose to me during this trip.

     It was on December 2, 2010 that my life was about to change. We started the day off with a character breakfast at Storyteller’s Café at our hotel, the Grand Californian. I am not much of a breakfast foods fan, but was very excited to meet Meeko! I have only seen him one other time and that was in Walt Disney World, so I was very excited. He was the last character to be seen and even though we were done and paid our bill, I made Calvin wait for Meeko to make his round to us. When he finally came around, I gave him a big hug and told him how we named our cat after him since they had similar color tails. He loved it!

     Then it was off to meet our friends Jeremy and Cara in Disneyland. After meeting them, we headed over to "Captain EO" and then to "It’s A Small World". Upon exiting the ride, Calvin tells us that he has to go do something and he’ll be right back. He isn’t very slick so I knew something was going on. I kept asking him where’s he going and he said he had to get something and don’t worry about it. Our friends suggested we go ride another ride and headed over to "Big Thunder Mountain". Upon exiting that ride, Jeremy hands me a card that says "Disney Challenge". It turns out my sweetie bear had created a scavenger hunt for me based upon the many times we had visited Disneyland throughout our 5 years of dating. Now at that moment, I just thought this was something fun he had planned for my birthday. I did not think anything about getting engaged.

      He sent me on challenge after challenge. I'll let the pictures do the rest of the talking!

The first task was to go get a "Happy Birthday" button from City Hall 

     We love Disney churros and always have to get at least one when we visit. This challenge was to finish a churro in 30 seconds or less. Let's just say..... I failed!

     Because I failed this challenge, there was a consequence. Dun dun duuuuuun! Now, I am DEATHLY afraid of snakes and Calvin knows this. So what does he have me do? Go find the toy snakes by Indiana Jones and take a picture holding one. It seriously took me about 5 minutes to finally pick one up and this is the closest i got to holding it.

     Next up is Calvin's infamous water bottle. Calvin had this exact bottle before and had left it in New Orleans during one of our trips. We never did find it, but realized where we last were drinking out of it. He had bought a new one and left it with a cast member in New Orleans. So I was instructed to go to the place where he had lost it. There was his water bottle with the next clue in it. Ironic side story, Calvin lost that water bottle AGAIN on this trip. Needless to say, that brand of water bottles are not his friend. 
  

     The next clue had us going to the lockers on Main Street where one hot October, I was wearing a thermal shirt and had to buy a new t-shirt because I was dying in the heat. It was our first time using the lockers during that trip. As I made my way to the locker and inserted the code, I was greeted by a friendly face. It was Duffy the bear! I've been telling Calvin how much I wanted a Duffy and he remembered. What a sweetheart! So there Duffy sat holding my next clue. Where are we going to go now? Mind you, we are walking ALL OVER the park. I have such wonderful friends who basically gave their day up in Disneyland to follow me around on my scavenger hunt. Calvin later said how he regretted not being a little more organized with his clues. He didn't really account for how much walking and how long it would take us.

     Our next clue sent us over to Disney's California Adventure Park. We took a spontaneous trip to Disney for the weekend in the summer and I got a stomach bug that was going around on our last day. I ended up going to the first aid center and resting there for two hours. It was such a horrible feeling, but I did get something great out of it. There was no way I was going to sit in a car for 7 hrs to go home, so we got to stay an extra night! Yay! Soon we were off to our next location. 

 

     We were then instructed to all take a shot at the bar. Now anyone who knows Calvin, knows he is always down for a drink. A catch to this challenge is NO CHASERS. Now anyone who knows me, knows I DO NOT do shots without a chaser. The background to this story actually goes back to the day we shared our first kiss that started it all. We were at a friend's birthday party and he asked me to take a shot. I said no because there were no more chasers. He flirted his way into taking a shot with me without a chaser. At that point, we were inseparable. There's a whole lot more to the story but it was more of a "you had to be there" thing.

 

Anyways! Not only did I get a pretty World of Color shot glass to take my shot of Captain Morgan (the same alcohol we took 5 years ago) in, but I got a cute shirt that pretty much foreshadowed what was to come. 

We were down to my last and final challenge. I was to meet Cal at one of our favorite rides, Toy Story Mania, and try to beat his score. Well, the card also said that Buzz and Woody suggested that I go put on the shirt for good luck. Sure enough when I came out, there was my Calvin.

 

I seriously thought that was the end. I thought we were done. As we headed over to Toy Story Mania, Calvin was acting very funny and awkward. I later found out that he was super duper nervous. I started to get weird-ed out when I noticed he started walking behind me instead of next to me. He randomly stopped me shortly before entering the line to Toy Story Mania and made me face him. He started to tell me how much he loved me and at that moment I knew. This was it. My heart started to beat extra fast and before I knew it, he was down on bended knee asking me to marry him with a custom made Toy Story 3 ring box and a custom made Mickey Mouse diamond engagement ring. Oh.....My... Goodness... the waterworks immediately started and I was speechless. I don't even think I literally said "yes", I remember just nodding "yes" repeatedly and going in for a hug. He just held me as I cried my eyes out and he said something I will NEVER forget...

" Don't worry babe, I will take care of you"

Cue more tears!!! The next set of pictures show how it all went down.

Look how happy my love is!

We're engaged!!!

 
Below I have added some of our amazingly gorgeous engagement shoot pictures done by the very talented D. Park Photography. We revisited our happiest place on earth in September 2011 and took some beautiful pictures. 

My beautiful custom made Mickey Mouse engagement ring

 

My amazing custom made Toy Story 3 engagement ring box                                                                        

 So that was my engagement story! It was a day I will never forget and the start of such a happily ever after. Stay tuned for some images from our wedding! Where else do you think it would be? Disneyland of course!