The Biggest Surprise of My Life!

Boy does good news travel fast! Even though most of you have heard the news, I figure I might as well post something to make the announcement a little more official. This past weekend, Meredith and I traveled to Lima (to Chaclacayo, a suburb just outside of Lima) to the house of our fellow missionaries, the Bruggers, to spend Thanksgiving with them and the ReachGlobal missionaries in Peru. I was excited to go mainly because it was going to be my last few vacation days of the year, and after the last short-term team I was ready to take a few days away from Tarma. Meredith and I arrived Thursday night and enjoyed all day Friday at the Brugger’s house, relaxing, and enjoying the quiet. Because Thanksgiving is not celebrated here in Peru (makes sense since the pilgrims didn’t land down here), the Bruggers had to work Thursday and Friday as usual (they are school teachers in Lima). So our official Thanksgiving celebration wasn’t planned until Saturday.

The entire morning was spent getting the turkey ready, making stuffing, guacamole, spinach and artichoke dip (thanks to my good friend Andi’s amazing recipe), pumpkin pies, pecan pies, cheesecakes, and other deserts. I was in charge of preparing the garlic mashed potatoes, and had just started mashing them in the giant pot on the stove (there were going to be 20 of us at dinner) when, out of the blue Denise Bruggers asks me to take a tablecloth up to the room where Meredith was setting the table for the kids. I will confess that I was confused and a bit annoyed that she asked me since there were 15 other people around not doing as much, but I took the table up to the roof anyway. Meredith was nowhere to be seen, which only frustrated me more, so I threw the tablecloth on the table and turned around to make my way back downstairs, only to come face to face with Jason! I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw him standing there with a huge grin on his face.

You have to understand that Jason and I had talked about the possibility of him coming down to visit me one more time this year around Thanksgiving, but in the end both of us decided that it would be wiser to just wait since I’d be coming home soon after. So he wasn’t supposed to be there, yet there he was! Overjoyed by the coolest surprise ever, I sounded like an idiot as I kept repeating my unbelief over and over again. Pretty soon we sat down and Jason started explaining all the reasons he had come. He wanted to see me, he wanted to help me move some of my things home, he wanted to spend Thanksgiving and his birthday with me, but the biggest reason was that he had a question to ask me – one that he had been wanting to ask me for over a year now.

That is when he got down on one knee and explained that Proverbs says that a man who has found a wife has found a good thing, and he had found a good thing in me. He asked me to marry him, and in my excitement I said yes before he could even get the ring out! I didn’t care, because his presence and his proposal was the best surprise of my life, and one of the happiest moments of my life.
It has been difficult to be apart from the person you love, especially for as long as we have been apart. But God has been so faithful to maintain us, to be our strength and our hope. And now we can celebrate in two joys: that I will soon be home and we will be together once again, and that we can now start planning our lives and future together. Thank you to all of you who have been supporting us through this season of separation, and who can now celebrate with us as we close this season and begin a new one.

We’re engaged!!!

Jason stayed the entire week with me here in Peru and we split our time between Lima and Tarma. Meredith organized a bit of an engagement/birthday party for Jason in Tarma, and we continued to celebrate with friends and contacts throughout the week. Now I'm down to my final two months in Peru, and am even more anxious to finish up and get home. I still have a lot of goodbye's ahead of me on this end, and I do want to finish up well. The time will go fast and I'll be home again before I know it, celebrating with all of you!