"What are you doing for the rest of your life?"

Mark and I went out for a burgers & a shared bag of fries with chipotle aioli like we often did this past summer. After dinner, we had plans to go ice skating (a wintry tradition for us). Just a typical date night.

Side note: Since Christmas day, I had a sneaking suspicion that he would be proposing soon. I kept stringing tiny hints together, which resulted in my mom and Mark calling me Sherlock and gumshoe.

So we arrived at the ice skating rink, and as we were waiting in line, I noticed he was looking around quite a bit. I normally wouldn't have noticed, but I was being somewhat detective-ish. Once we picked up the skates, I whined that I did not want to leave my high heels sitting on the ground. I thought they might be safer in the tent. "No," Mark said, "Just leave them on the ground under the table. Hide them under mine." Ugh, I thought - but I did. When our skates were on, Mark said, "Let's go kiss in the middle." I slipped back into gumshoe mode. Why the middle?

We grabbed hands and skated to the middle as soon as we entered the rink. "Merritt, I love you," he said. I raised my eyebrows, too excited to stand there being sappy - I wanted to skate! "I love you, too," I said, "Let's skate!" And then Mark began lowering himself onto one knee. Holy crap, I thought.

"Merritt...what are you doing for the rest of your life?" As he is talking, I'm smiling and tearing up. "Will you marry me?"

Suddenly the entire skating rink has stopped. Everyone has lined up on the sides of the rink. I tell Mark "yes!" and hear lots of cheering. I look to my left and see people I don't know holding out their camera phones taking pictures. I hear a distinct voice cheering and look to my right.

It's my mom. And then there is my sister and my step-dad, and Mark's parents, and all of his brothers and their wives, and all of our friends who had traveled hundreds of miles. I skated over to my mom and embraced, sobbing. Mark had invited thirty people that we love and treasure to come watch his proposal. (They had all been hiding in the tent!)

After hugging everyone, Mark and I do one lap around the skate rink, but at this point I am too excited to skate - now I want to celebrate! As we lap around, dozens of people shout out their congratulations to us.

The best part - okay, one of the best parts - is that one of Mark's brothers recorded the entire thing. It is a gift I will be grateful for forever. Thank you so much to everyone who came to the loveliest evening of my life so far. We love each and every one of you!

You guys, I am still over the moon. I keep getting distracted by the absolutely gorgeous diamond on my left hand.

Mark, thank you for making me the luckiest girl in the world by creating a night of magic on our little ice skating rink.