Bryanna & Kurt
Q: When did you first meet and how?
A: Bryanna - I met Kurt at my brother's house during a game night that wasn't supposed to happen, on a weekend I wasn't planning on visiting. Kurt almost stayed home, I almost didn't pick him as my opponent for a game that made us act out "Ballet" and "catching the bouquet" (foreshadowing?) But all of it did happen. He intrigued me, enough for me to make that 3.5 hour drive the next two weekends. On the third weekend, we went on our first date and after that date, I called my friend and told her "I think I just went on my first date with the guy I'm going to marry." To be honest, I didn't know for sure that he was the one, but I felt strongly enough that I realized if he was the one, I'd be kicking myself later for not telling someone!
Kurt - It was my first week in town and my future brother-in-law invited me over to join him and a few of the guys from my squadron for game night. When I got there, it was a blur of meeting people but I did remember the one girl with a lot of hair named Bry, "like the cheese, but spelled differently." We hung out the next day where she kicked my butt at some arcade games and then again 2 weeks later. We spent the day hiking and afterwards got pizza and ice cream - neither of us realized it was even a date until halfway through our dessert, it didn't help that we did all of this on Valentine's Day. After that she had me hooked and I knew I had found a special girl.
Q: What about the design made you choose this ring to be the one?
A: I had this design in my head for years: rose gold, oval stone, a loose halo and filigree….but I never actually saw it in the jewelry stores or on Pinterest. I had found something very similar to the ring I have now on Pinterest but it had a different stone in the center. My sister-in-law and I had a shared Pinterest board, so she knew what I liked, and Kurt knew exactly who to talk to when the time came to pick a ring. Armed with pictures, he reached out to Fire & Brilliance to see if they could help him create this ring that only existed in my head.
Q: In each your own words, can you describe what the days leading up to the proposal were like? Can you tell us about the proposal? (Feel free to be as detailed as possible!)
A: Bryanna - Over Labor Day weekend, we had decided to have a stay-cation with both of us planning a day for each other to make it more fun and exciting! The day I planned was awesome, I had meals and activities arranged from morning to night, I absolutely crushed it!...but his was better. Kurt made reservations at a couple of wineries. We took a property tour, barrel tasted, sampled their bottled wines and even joined their wine club. It was a relaxing and deceptively classy day for us. Before heading back home, we realized that we had yet to take a picture during the day and decided to get one in the vineyards. As we were getting ready to set the photo timer on my phone, a couple appeared on the edge of the vineyard and offered to take our picture asking if we could do the same for them. (They were celebrating their one year anniversary.) Kurt hands the fella my phone and asks him to "take a bunch." Then saunters back over to my side; I pose next to him, plaster a smile onto my face and look at the camera. Then I hear "I have one more surprise," then I sense him dropping to his knee. I look over at him and kind of stare thinking that he must be tying his shoe, then I remember that he's wearing flip flops. Everything else was a blur. I see my dream ring that never actually existed on Pinterest materialize, I remember asking "are you serious??" hearing a, "are you saying yes???" from Kurt and a, "oh crap!" from our volunteer photographer who is doing his darndest to "take a bunch." I managed to spit out a "yes!" Then I see the bling slip perfectly onto my finger, past my nails that I for some reason refused to get done when I took Kurt to get a pedicure the day before! (Definitely kicked myself for that.) Then...I'm a mess.
I'm standing in the middle of this vineyard with my jaw dropped, tears literally gushing out of my eyes and thus fogging up my sunglasses, hand still frozen in front of my face, mind spinning...and now I'm in the way of the couple who are trying to pose for their picture. I'm glad Kurt knew what he was doing...he seemed so calm and collected. He steered me out of the way, stepped back to snap some pictures of our impromptu engagement photographers, bid them goodbye, then put his arm around me to lead me out of the vineyard and over to the car. I still wasn't forming complete sentences, or even complete words for that matter. We had an hour and a half drive back home - enough time to process, let out a few "woop woooop!" exclamations, call and text our families, and gawk at my new ice piece. The day wasn't over! Kurt had made reservations for one of the nicest steakhouses. We arrived a little early so we could get cocktails like the classy folks we had been posing as for the last 8 hours. Then we were led to our table...there were rose petals sprinkled on it! I resisted my impulse to exclaim, "ROSES!!" and instead smiled and said something stupid like, "how lovely." We happily indulged and celebrated! We ate, we drank, and we talked about the day we'd marry. The staff congratulated us and brought out champagne and a fancy caramel flambe´ after our main course. We just about had to roll out of the restaurant. I hugged him as we stood on the sidewalk waiting for our uber to arrive, and I just smiled thinking about the next year we had ahead of us, and the lifetime together after that.
Kurt - I had been planning this day for the better part of a few months, slowly thinking over ideas and imagining how it would all come together. As the day itself drew closer, I began to get anxious and impatient wishing I could just get it over with and ask her but I knew she would love all the little details about my plan. Things got off to a good start: the vineyard was beautiful, the tour was fun, and the wine was tasty. Only one problem, there wasn’t a good time to stop and ask her...and I was starting to run out of time. We decided it was time to leave and in desperation I suggested we get at least one picture from our day in the vineyard. So we walked over and propped her phone up on a wall, it wasn’t ideal but it would have to do. Thankfully a couple arrived in time and offered to take the picture for us! As I walked back to Bry, I was so nervous and I kept playing with the ring in my pocket. It was finally time for the big moment and as I got down on one knee I could tell she was completely surprised by the turn of events just like I had hoped. The rest of the time there was a blur of emotions and the remainder of the day and dinner that night were filled with smiles.
Q: How was your overall experience with Fire & Brilliance? How did you first hear about us?
A: My experience with Fire & Brilliance was good! I was directed to them by my sister-in-law who had recently bought a new ring from them. I worked with Peter who was very accommodating with the design of my ring and answered any questions I had throughout the process.
Lastly, we wanted to ask something of each our clients to be featured a question that is unique to their story.
A: Bryanna - Kurt has a lot of cute quirks but the first quirk I stumbled across was how much this guy likes plants. It shouldn’t actually be that weird, but since I hadn’t been able to keep a single plant alive before and Kurt literally had five pretty big plants chillin' in various spots around his house, I was simultaneously amused and impressed. It’s rubbed off on me though! We garden together, and now I have 5 of my own plants scattered throughout my apartment and my desk at work. (They’re all still alive too!)
Kurt - I learned early on that Bry is a package deal with her dog Chief. I’ve always loved how caring she is and how well she takes care of and pampers Chief. She always said if Chief didn’t approve of me I wouldn’t be with her so I’m glad he took an early liking to me!
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