A Very Special Christmas

Last night was ground breaking in the Colle home. My oldest child asked his girlfriend to marry him in front of over 30 family and friends. Before you view the video (below) it is worth a few minutes of back story...

Jul and William have been talking about getting married for a few months (and have even been looking at rings) but wanted to wait to get engaged until January or February to let the holidays pass and to keep the engagement short, hopefully around one year. William decided to jump the gun and surprise her so a ring was purchased. The only thing left was to plan the proposal. Jul's desire was to include all of their friends and family when they got engaged so that was all the opening we needed. (Okay, "we" is somewhat of a stretch. Let's be honest and say it was all the opening Hope needed. She and William dealt with the details and came up with a wonderful plan—wonderful because it worked!) The final plan was to have a big party on December 22 and include both families, friends and celebrate not only the season but also to welcome our daughter home from a semester in Italy. During the party we would conduct a gift exchange and make sure Jul got "the" gift in the midst of the proceedings. Everyone invited was let in on the real purpose of the night which was a little dangerous but ensured 100% participation. The one person not informed was Jul’s mom only because it would have put too much pressure on her to not insist that Jul get her nail’s done or question her outfit for the evening--subtle “mom clues” that may have planted a seed in Jul’s mind that something was up. All indications were that Jul had no idea what was afoot so everyone did their best job of acting the part of casual party guest all the while nervously waiting for the big moment.

As guests arrived, I handed them a number (and made sure Jul got #5), took their gifts and stacked them on the floor. When everyone had arrived I made a production out of randomly numbering the gifts and made sure “the gift” was labeled with a five. Then the gift exchange began. Numbers one through four went smoothly and then...