Big News!

Family,
Today at 7am I proposed to Ilona and, thankfully, she said yes! So officially, I'm now engaged and planning on getting married August 2010. It was a great day, and I'm really excited - I'll now turn it over to Ilona and get her impression about the proposal.

Hi everyone!!! I’m engaged and I’m SOOOOOOOO excited. I feel lucky to be engaged to Takaya and grateful to be joining such a wonderful family. I'm sure everyone wants to know how he proposed and I'm even more excited to keep reliving the moment. Today at 7:00 am, Takaya walked into my bedroom at my house holding a tray with roses and the best pancakes I've ever had. He was also carrying a present wrapped in green (my favorite color) that looked like a picture.

Today is our 3 and a half year anniversary so when I saw him this morning I started to suspect that he might propose, but was then unsure because I saw a present. We had some breakfast in bed together and then he asked me to open the present. I slowly opened the present and it was an original piece of artwork that outlined all the significant events we experienced during our relationship. It was a "walk down memory lane" starting with the first day we met and ended in a picture of a street sign that said, "Will you marry me?" As I read the sign, Takaya got down on one knee and opened the box holding the ring. I immediately started to cry and nodded and after about 10 seconds managed to say yes. I was crying for about an hour after that and had a very hard time composing myself. After I had some time to control my emotions, our families took us out to brunch to celebrate. I knew we were planning on going to brunch, but I thought it was a good-bye party for my sister. She’s moving to San Francisco next weekend for law school. Little did I know that we’d be celebrating our engagement!

I've always dreamed of this day, but I could have never imagined feeling the way I do. I'm so happy and excited to be engaged :) Oh and the ring is BEAUTIFUL!!! It's perfect and I'm going to have a hard time getting used to wearing such a shiny object on my finger. We've attached pictures of the ring and the two of us as an engaged couple.