Tina Jay Photography | Philadelphia Wedding Photographer

That is my new name for Jay.  Because this past Thursday night, Jay proposed, and now we're engaged!!!!  I'M SO EXCITED ABOUT IT!  Jay and I went away to the Finger Lakes in New York this weekend, and I was definitely thinking in my head that it would happen during our trip - so I don't know why I was SO shocked at the proposal when it happened one day earlier than I was suspecting, but I totally was!  Now onto the engagement story:

Thursday was Jay's birthday, and he played it totally cool by mentioning on Monday that he was going out for drinks with some people from work on Thursday for his birthday, and asked me if I wanted to come.  Typically I wouldn't have gone because I'm an old woman and I go to bed at about 10pm on weeknights, but I felt bad because it was his birthday, so I said I was in.

Come Thursday, the weather is HORRIBLE.  I did NOT feel like going out at all because it was freezing cold and pouring rain, but again I felt bad because it was his birthday, so I drove into center city to meet up with him and his "work people".  He said we were going to meet up with his friends at a restaurant in Rittenhouse Square, so we walked through the square to get to the restaurant - except when we got to the edge of the square, he shocked me by getting down on one knee and asking me to marry him:)  I can't remember a word he said, or what I said in return....all I know is I said yes:)

THEN....as I am saying "yes", I notice flashing out of the corner of my eye....Jay even hired Kathleen of Firefly Photography to take pictures of the proposal!  I don't know where she was hiding because the square was empty and I saw no one, but she jumped out and took pictures of the whole thing.....Jay paid attention to every last detail....and hiring the photographer was incredibly special to me, because we all know how much I love photography:)  I'm so excited that I am going to have pictures to remember the best day of my life so far!

Next we were driven around the city and had a little night time photoshoot - we hit up Broad Street in front of City Hall, Logan Square, and this little look-out point where you can see all of boat house row.  I can NOT wait to see the pictures - I will post them as soon as I get them back!  At first Jay was a little bummed about the crappy weather on the day he proposed.....he said he had been tracking the weather for about a month before the date of the proposal, and the weather was supposed to be perfect....that is until the nor'easter blew through the country, and it ended up being freezing cold and raining.  I can honestly say I didn't even notice the weather at all because I was so distracted by everything that was going on, plus we realized that there was NO one outside because of the weather....so all of our pictures from our little photoshoot will be free of random people, and will just be us and the city:)

Next we went back to the hotel room that he rented for us to change for dinner.  He even brought a variety of my dresses and high heels to choose from to change into for our dinner:)  I was so shocked at the little things he remembered to bring for me - a cardigan in case I got cold with the dresses he brought, new pajamas, and eye makeup remover.  Eye makeup remover!  Hah that just floored me that he remember all of those little things:)  Anyway, after that we had an AMAZING dinner at The Fountain, which is my absolute favorite restaurant in the city.  Then we turned in at the hotel suite he rented for us right in Center City, and enjoyed a bottle of champagne to toast to our future.  We stayed at The Sofitel on 17th street....if anyone ever needs a hotel in the city, I highly recommend it - it was definitely the nicest hotel room I've ever stayed in.

So that sums up our engagement night!  We still went away to the Finger Lakes the next day, so it was so great to have a weekend away with just the two of us, to extend the celebration of our engagement.  Here are a few quick pictures from our weekend:

Our bed & breakfast:

The view from the top porch:

All you see are fields of these everywhere in the Finger Lakes, so pretty:

Of course we hit up many wineries....and came home with an unnecessary amount of bottles of wine:)

Seriously, the views up there are amazing:

I'll post more pictures from our trip later on, and of COURSE I'll be posting the proposal pictures as soon as I get them back:)

Thanks Jay, for paying attention to all of the tiniest details to make the proposal absolutely perfect and so "us".  I was SO happy that you ended up proposing in Philly, since it is not only where we met, but where our relationship has grown over the years.  I feel like Philly is just our thing:)  It was SO much fun, and definitely the best day of my life so far:)  I love you!