Today’s engagement session features Scott and Shay, and they are just the cutest couple! Shay is a seamstress and nanny but plans on returning to school in the fall and pursue a degree in family counseling. Scott works in IT at a local hospital. They are so into each other and compliment each other very well. They are classy, DIY, and down to earth. They’re planning their wedding to take place in the redwoods in November and I can’t wait to document their special day!
Scott + Shay
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How did y’all meet? We first knew each other as housemates, interestingly enough. We didn’t know each other before that, it was all fate and circumstance. For three years we had a quiet, uneventful coexistence, but were always curious about one another. We hardly saw each other in our busy work schedules, and Scott was particularly shy. Never had we sat down for a meal together or had a chance to know one another. In passing in the kitchen, we might exchange small talk, or complained about neighbors, but kept to ourselves.
After three years, I (Shay) moved out and into my own apartment. In the packing shuffle, many of our possessions were mixed up, and we spent some time exchanging items. This led to real friendship and we started spending more time together. One day, Scott came over to my apartment on a weekend late morning to hang out. He had in his hand an ice chest full of eggs and other ingredients, and charged into my kitchen and made brunch for two. After we ate, Scott admitted his feelings, and asked if I would start dating him. His sweetness and romantic gesture swept me off my feet. Of course I said yes!
What is your proposal story? There are two parts to this story. We are both in the school of thought that an engagement and marriage should not be a surprise, but that a proposal should be. We had discussed it before, and we even went ring shopping together one day. I (Shay) had no idea what exactly I wanted in a ring. But would know when I saw it. We went to four different shops before we circled back to the jewelry store (Ten Window Williams) where Shay’s apartment and our second home together (but the first we shared as a couple) was once directly upstairs from. Of course knowing the amazing staff there helped, but that’s when I spotted it. I loved this ring, it was petite, low set and didn’t snag on everything, but also dainty and elegant and totally unique in the shape of a little quatrefoils. It sparkles like nothing I had seen before. I was hooked, and we found out it was the last of its kind as the maker stopped producing the design. We left understanding that it might sell before we could purchase it.
A couple weeks passed, then I asked Scott if I might return to the shop and take a picture of it, for reference. He agreed. I was crushed when they told me it had sold, and I spent hours and hours scouring the internet to find it, with no results. I accept that it wasn’t the one, and look for other styles, and I stop thinking about it as much. A few months passed, and I gave up the hope of finding it, and even stopped bringing up engagement so much, thinking perhaps we weren’t just ready anyways.
My best friends wedding came and went, as did Thanksgiving. On our way home from visiting family in November, we stop at his sisters for a night. I start to look through my clothes, because I will take some of it to the dry cleaner and for the rest I will just be doing some laundry, and he asks for me to add some of his clothes to the load, so I go into his suitcase while he’s in the living room. That’s when I accidentally discovered a little black and gold box. Panicked and flustered, I shove the shirt I had pulled from his suitcase back in, and hurriedly zip it shut. I didn’t dare linger, and felt bad that I had discovered it at all. Never in a million years would I have opened it. Thankfully his sister walked in after, though I was nervous she knew what had happened.
Christmas passes, and while I can feel our relationship and love maturing more, nothing happens. Scott acts a little funny at times, and takes up a new hobby of whittling suddenly, though he wasn’t sneaky about it, I could tell he was shaping a little heart that fit inside his palm. New Year’s Eve I thought would be it, but still nothing. I relax, thinking the time will come eventually. New Year’s Day is spent relaxing and that’s when he wakes me up from a short nap, asking if I would like to go watch the sunset with him. My heart flutters. This must be it. Could it be it? He was so nonchalant, and I had been wrong before. I hurriendly dab mascara on and don my favorite sweater. I chose the complete wrong shoes, but I didn’t care. We drove out to the dunes on the outside of the bay, at the very end of the road. We climbed out to the highest dunes, he was holding my hand steadying me on the loose sand as my shoes filled with it, until we were at a peak and we could see below us the smooth beach and the lights of our home town behind us. Listening to the waves crash on the shore, he held me. We stood there for a long time. He lets go of me, and I think… perhaps this isn’t it. Maybe he’s not ready. That’s ok. We can head home now, this was nice. He gets down on one knee, and suddenly everything is quiet in my head, as if I suddenly went deaf. He tells me beautiful things, and how he wants to move on and start our future. He’s so nervous saying my name that he started with my middle name, circling back to my first, trembling a little. The little heart is in his hands, clasped protectively in all his fingers. I worry for a millionth of a second that he isn’t ready, that I bullied him into this and that if he isn’t, we don’t have to do this yet. His face begins to fall, and my heart breaks for saying such a thing, and in that instant I knew. We were both ready! I say yes! Of course I’ll marry you! Holding both my hands, he pulls the ring, the perfect little ring, the one I had seen all those months ago, from the perfectly made box, and he begins to slide it onto my finger. I correct him “no no the left!” Giggling and smiling ear to ear. He’s positively vibrating with nerves at this point, and I pull him up off his knee and hold and kiss him, showering his whole face with little pecks, and he relaxes.
The amazing thing about that night is on one horizon the sun is beginning to submerge itself in the ocean. When I look to the other, and the hills covered in great redwoods, the moon had come up, perfectly round and full and completely brilliant. It was as if the universe was centered around us and our love for those few moments. We stood there as long as we could, until we worried of finding our way back across the dunes and to the car. I was so nervous about my new ring, I made him put it back in the box and into his pocket until we got to the car, for it’s a great deal of sand between us and safe ground. On the drive home, I was positively glowing. He told me the story of how he asked my parents blessing the summer before during a visit; and my heart flowed with pride at such a man. When we stopped and parked, I came clean about what had happened at Thanksgiving. He laughed, thankfully, but was a little embarrassed that he hadn’t thought of it when asking me to help do his laundry. We live in a downtown area where there are people out and about enjoying themselves, and I ran out to the empty intersection, yelling “Hey everybody! We just got engaged!” And everybody out on the street or in line near a business cheered for us. We ran home to call our family and to change for a romantic dinner. It was the most joyful night of my entire life.
Tell us about the ring/band. 18 K yellow gold quatrefoil with diamonds, purchased at Ten Window Williams Jewelers in Eureka, CA.
Tell us about your engagement shoot outfits and accessories. We wanted to be comfortable, but just a little dressed up. We had never really had proper pictures taken of us before, and we’re both a little shy of the camera, so our goal was to show who we really are. The hardest part was coordinating what shirts we would wear, to compliment one another but not detract from our faces. If I were to do it again, I would have looked harder for boots with a shorter heel, but to proved difficult already to find black booties in my size, I went to every store in the mall. My best friend helped me pick out the floral blouse and cardigan at Maurice’s, and then Scott and I shopped together for his button up at Kohl’s. Pretty sure everything else was from Target.
Photography: Elizabeth Borges Photography | Venue: Redwood Park | Venue: Morris Graves Museum of Art | Submitted via: Matchology
