Wow I am sorry to have checked out this post so late but just wanted to add my best wishes! I got officially engaged Sunday night and it was a great feeling. I hope all of your dreams and planning work out beautifully this weekend.

I also have to just say that the wonderful posters on here are what make this a great board. A wonderful idea to share this post with your girlfriend as well.

Yep jjah, not sure how the park police feel about champagne in the park but i'm sure it will work out.

I most definitely asked her father! I flew out there (oregon) over the holidays and asked him in person. I am very close with her family. Her brother is one of my best friends and I recently started working for me. I am very confident that her family and friends are happy this is coming. I'm sure she knows I asked her father, although who knows, maybe not? That is another reason why I waited a few months, for that to die down just a bit.

I will do my best to post Monday morning although my morning is pretty filled up with meetings. I have a huge new business meeting at 2pm today and then after that, I am ONLY focused on this trip! Maybe my future clients will cancel today and I can start focusing solely on this right now!

Jeremy

Weather report for NY/NJ this morning is predicting 68 & sunny on Friday. Sounds like a good sign!

Jeremy, you're doing a fantastic job! Wishing you two a wonderful weekend and a great life together!

People always bring wine to drink at outdoor concerts such as opera in the park so I think the Champagne is fine as long as you are not walking around swigging on the streets.

Agreed, while alcohol is technically illegal in the park, you'll find people there with bottles of wine and picnics every nice Sunday in the summer. As long as you are somewhat discreet, I would not worry about it.

Hey Jeremy,
If you're using that online map thing to scout out places, it's easy to find the "cross street" for a cab driver, for many of the shown locations.

On the map, click on the red arrow thing and it zooms in; then click on the place it says "Click for more info." For many of the locations it gives the street location. (Random example I just did was the carousel, towards the south end of the park... it opens an "attractions" page and says it's mid-park at 64th Street.) Just make sure you specify to the driver which side of the park you want to enter (west or east).

ok, so I'm guessing it's illegal to consume alcohol in public then? sorry to sound thick, its just that it isn't here and whilst I always presumed that this was the case in the States, I never really checked.

Okay, so I will definitely be bringing champagne for the picnic. It is 63 in DC right now and I wish I could spend the day outside so come on New York weather, do your part!!!!

Well, shall we decide on a place? Belvedere Castle, Bethesda Fountain or maybe even the great lawn. Impossible to not find some privacy but also be surrounded by others just enjoying the day. Actually scratch the castle, I think something more open and airy is more like us, especially for a picnic. The great lawn looks awesome.

Hi Jeremy! You may be able to actually have it both ways. The lower edge of the Great Lawn has views of Belvedere Castle over the pond.

I play softball in the fields there in the summer, and it's really awesome- you're in the middle of this beautiful city, and have views of everything all around you, yet you're in a completely tranquil surrounding.

This website has some great pictures taken from the Great Lawn. The first one is a shot of the castle from the area I was describing above. Hard to beat!
http://www.biking-in-manhattan.com/cp-belvedere.htm

Hey, all you romantics who have contributed to this thread, put out some good vibes for Jeremy -- today's the big day!
@};-

GOOD LUCK JEREMY!!!!

We'll all be thinking of you.

and it's a beautiful day for a picnic!

It's 3 o'clock and our buddy should be just about getting to the park. It is a beautiful day here, lots of sun and the temps are in the mid 70's they should have a wonderful little picnic.

We're all thinking of you, Jeremy have a great time while you are here.

I hope my BF puts as much thought into his proposal as you have done. Your fiancee is a very lucky girl!

Its now 5pm in NYC, I wonder if he's "done the deed". You know he just doesn't call anymore...... ;-)

it IS exciting but I'm sure Jeremy will let us all know how it went on Monday.

Yeah, I hope my BF puts that much effort when he asks...

Details coming soon....writeup is long and i have a big meeting in a bit, but I will fill in all of the details shortly.

(she said YES!)

Jeremy

Congratulations!! (but I'm not surprised, how could she possibly say no?) Looking forward to the report

Congratulations - thank you for sharing your wonderful news with us.

YAY!! Congratulations!

Congratulations!! Can't wait to hear the details.

Fantastic, we have all been hanging on by our toenails!! Now I can go on holidays - thanks. Congratulations. :-))

Congratulations, looking forward to the details.

Here are the details, I will fill in the gaps later. Basically, I decided to let her know that we would be spending a night away from my place in DC so she would need to pack an overnight bag. I think this was a good idea as she picked out her own clothes rather than her friend, and I can guarantee that she knew nothing about the overall plan. I told her I was working until 1:30 and then we could do lunch and I would take the afternoon off (remember she starts her new job today so she was off all of last week). Anyway…we went to bed fairly early on Thursday…i secretly set the alarm clock for 6:45 and we went to sleep. I woke up EVERY 30 minutes, I even went so far as to curse at my clock for going too slowly. But then 6:45 came! I woke her up and she said “Have a great day” thinking I was leaving. I told her there was a change of plans and she needed to be ready to leave in an hour. I could tell she was excited at this point. I let her know that we would be staying in Georgetown or on the Hill and that I was taking the day off.

So….at 7:45 a big, black, tinted-window SUV pulls up to my condo and picks us up. She honestly thought we were going to our hotel but we instead headed to Union Station to catch the train. At this point she knew we were going to New York and we were both very excited! We got a booth seat on the Acela train and headed on our journey. I brought along a surprise bottle of bubbly and some OJ so we had some mimosas on our way up. It was a great train ride, just reading the paper and watching her sit anxiously. She tried guessing a number of things, but I never let on once.

We get to New York and head to the W Union Square. AMAZING property. They upgraded our room to what seemed like a junior suite for New York and I made sure to seek out the concierge and front desk attendant who had been so helpful in my planning. Our room wasn’t yet ready so we hopped in a cab for central park (I snuck into the bathroom at the hotel to put the ring in an accessible place in my pocket).

So we get to Central Park and then walk around for awhile. We came across Bethesda fountain and a man on a bike approached us. Megan couldn’t figure out why he seemed to know us but I had surprised her and ordered us a picnic lunch that the gentleman delivered to us in the park. We found a nice area to eat near Belvedere Castle and had lunch…and then walked around more. It was GORGEOUS outside, probably 72 degrees. I went with the no-plan route and am happy I did as it allowed us to just enjoy our day. Besides, I clearly knew what I wanted to say. So we came across a place called Cedar Hill…we sat for a bit and just enjoyed the scenery...a great view of the city and people enjoying the park all around us. She commented that she loved this day and could get used to doing this. I got down on one knee and asked her if she could get used to this for the rest of her life. She said she could, and I asked the question. She said yes before I finished asking it! So I started to ask again and she said yes again before I got the words out. Needless to say, we were both very excited!

As great as that was, the rest of the trip was probably the greatest 48 hours of our lives. I will tell more later. We switched to Union Square Café from Daneil due to proximity and given that we were in a “fun” rather than “stuffy” mood. The hotel set up for champagne to be waiting for us and the dinner was amazing. We are both early risers, and we didn't want to waste a minute Saturday. We shopped all day (she did very well...let's just say she has a brand new Louis Vuitton bag to enjoy on her first day of work today!). We picked great spots for both breakfast and lunch. She had been to Norma just a couple months ago and the wait at Serendipity was way too long, so we found a couple of great spots. I forget the name of the breakfast place but for lunch we went to Serafina which is around 61st and Madison. We headed back to the hotel in the early evening and found in our room a bottle of wine from the hotel and a bottle of Dom Perignon from my boss. We just relaxed with some champagne and watched the NCAA Final Four games. Saturday night we headed to Buddakan (open three weeks and just an overall stunning restaurant. If you want hip and trendy in New York, this might be the current “it” place.) I had randomly spotted a friend of mine in New York earlier in the day and he invited us to join him, his wife and some friends at Pink Elephant which was also amazing (the weird part is that he is a friend from LA, so running into each other out front of the W was just a trip. And then, one of their friends meeting them at the club just turned out to be one of my best friends from my college days at the University of Arizona).
Just how random was our Saturday night? Lets just say that George Clooney approached me outside of the Pink Elephant and grabbed my hand and shook it for no apparent reason. 200 people standing around screaming when he comes running by and for some reason he approached me. Just another great story from the weekend.

I am telling maybe 15% of the story so I promise to write more later. Also, she knows about this thread and is excited to read it!!!!

Thank you all soooo much for your advice, but more importantly your kind words, best wishes and support! I'll have to post a picture at some point.

Jeremy

AWWWWWWW....I got big tears in my eyes when I got to "asked her if she could get used to this for the rest of her life."

I can "hear" the excitement in your post. What a truly magical weekend!!

I wish you both a lifetime of happiness.

I'm tearing up just reading this. Also, had to conceal a yell of 'she said yes!" from coworkers.

Congrats.

I got teary too. :)
Congratulations, sounds like a dream come true.

Congratulations to you both!

So glad everything went perfectly for you ....even the weather!

ditto on the tears. Wasn't part of the planning, just stumbled on the thread today, but it sounded just wonderful. Congrats! Enjoy the engagment. I'll be married 20 wonderful years this fall and I still remember my year of being engaged with such fondness!

I honestly think this is one of the BEST threads ever, and we're all in tears as we read this, lol.

Contratulations on your engagement, and I'm glad the city rolled out the red carpet for you.

Next time you are in the city, we have to have a party for you so you can meet all the people who gave you such great tips for your weekend.

Congrats and how wonderful!

I'm teary-eyed too!! Sounds like a perfect proposal and I know you two will be very happy. Now I'm off to call my hubby and tell him how much I love him!!

Megan keeps emailing me to tell me about each thing she is doing for "the first time as an engaged person." Needless to say, we are both thrilled with the way the weekend went. Honestly, it was such an amazing little vacation that the true effect of being engaged is just now starting to set in. So many things in my life have just become so much easier knowing that I will have this woman with me for the rest of my life.

Thanks again.....neither of us cried when the question was popped, but we both started to last night as we got to the train station in New York. Partly from our magical weekend being over and partly in anticipation of the great times ahead for us!!!

There really is something about New York...no other city (maybe Vegas in a different way) can just completely change the way you feel by just standing on a street corner.

I don't know how I am ever going to top this, but I do know that I have someone in my life that will make me want to try....every single day.

Jeremy

I have a tear too. It's been a great thread.

Congratulations! Hope you have a wonderful life together!

I just read this to a number of my co-workers. I wish you could have heard the chorus of "awwww..." when I got to the part where you're trying to get the words out and Megan's saying yes. A very wonderful memory for you both!

Congratulations and best wishes.

Dear Jeremy and soon to be Mrs Jeremy,
Congratulations, I hope you savour every single minute of this wonderful time - you both sound like you totally deserve it. Jeremy, just try to remember how incredibly thoughtful and wonderful you have been over these past few months/weeks and if you can be as amazing as that for the next 50 years you will have one very happy wife. :-)

That sounds like an absolutely perfect trip- and what a great engagement story! I'm sure she's repeated it a thousand times already, and will continue to do so for years.

Best of luck in your new journey...and enjoy planning your no-doubt fantastic wedding!

Terrific story. Look forward to any more details you care to share. In the meantime, the best of luck to both of you. May you share much happiness and a life together of good health and good fortune.

BTW, thanks so much for taking the time to come back and tell us how it went! Most people never bother!

It would be wrong for me to not give you all the scoop. I am absolutely dead right now....partially from being out late all weekend but also just the emotions taking a toll on me. I can't wait to see her in a couple of hours. I'm sure she will say "ready for our first walk to your place after work as an engaged couple?"

I'm going to print this out for her to read tonight. Almost everything planned actually occurred with hundreds of other little cool things sprinkled in. Just remembered some other places we had a drink at: Hotel Gansevort overlooking the city, Sugarcane, Barbounia (this place is 4 months old and VERY cool...about 19th and Park Ave South), Underbar, Olives, The Lounge at Buddakan, Mc Ann's (Little Irish Place we stopped at during our shopping so I could have a Guiness).

She said many a time that the trip was perfect and I really don't think that I would change a single thing. I certainly wouldn't change either dinner spot and definitely not the hotel as it fit what we were looking for to a T.

It's nice to plan something, then be able to come back here and read about it and see that it became a reality.

We talked about this thread multiple times during the weekend and when we did certain things I told her that it was here I learned about it.

Jeremy