♥ Liz's version of how Tony Proposed ♥

Being in Hawaii with the love of your life is such an amazing experience. Especially when you get to face many challenges together, such as illnesses, frustrating experiences of being lost or not finding parking lol, and weird stalker girls that are obsessed with your boyfriend. lol. Yes these things happened to us. However, that's really not the important part. The first couple days Tony and I were constantly proclaiming our love to each other expressing how badly we wanted to be married and to be with each other for eternity. I knew that eventually he would ask me to marry him for he had called my dad the week before and asked for my hand in marriage. I would have never thought that within the next seven days after asking he would've got my ring and put together his whole plan to propose to me. He even purposely set up little nets of deceit to throw me off by saying that when we get back to the mainland, we should go ring shopping. I told Tony that I didn't want to go ring shopping, and that I wanted my husband to pick my ring out all on his own. I wanted him to put a lot of thought into it, and make sure that it was special and symbolic. I could care less what the ring looked like. All I knew is that if he picked it out and it was a ring that he thought would represent me and our love, then I would LOVE it.

Sunday morning Tony woke me and and pretty much gave me 30 minutes to get ready for church. Low and behold I was still ready before him. We discovered that on this trip that he is a lot more high maintenance than i AM LOL.

We went to church and had to sit out in the lounge area because they were having ward conference. Tony started reading his patriarchal blessing during sacrament and showed me a paragraph here and there as he read. Then he just offered for me to read the whole thing.

As I read his blessing, I have never felt so appeased with my life. It's almost as if many things in his blessing were answers to the questions I had to how I was to accomplish the things the lord wanted me to do in my blessing. A peaceful confirmation came over me that Tony and I really are so perfect for each other and the the Lord really does need us to be together to help each other do his work. As I began to express these feeling to Tony his smile just grew and many different emotions were apparent through his countenance.

He all of the sudden suggested that we hurry and leave because he was very hungry. I didn't oppose because he had been sick the past 2 days and hardly ate anything, so I was all about him getting some food in his belly.

We went back to the Orme's house and sister Orme informed us that they usually have a pot luck after ward conference. Tony looked pretty excited about this and wanted to go. I wasn't really in the mood for a pot luck or being social. I just wanted to be with Tony, but he just seemed to excited about it, there was no way I could decline. So it was back into the car and off to the church.

Tony wanted to stop off at the temple first and check out this view that sister Orme had told him about. The temple grounds were just so gorgeous and peaceful. The sister missionaries talked to us for a minute and extended the offer for us to check out this amazing exhibit about Christ. I was pretty excited and as I started walking over to the exhibit, Tony grabbed my hand and pulled me towards the door. He told me we could check it out after the exhibit. Now that I think about it I guess you could tell he was stressed about something, but I was so oblivious at the time.

We drove up to the hill and the gates were closed. I thought to myself, " well that's that!"

but no. Tony sees a little part of the the fence that was about 4 feet off the ground.

"wanna hop that?"

I looked at him like, are you serious? I was wearing high heels and a skirt, but there he was again with that face. he just seemed like he really really wanted to see that view, and I wasn't about to be the party pooper. So yes I did hop the fence in my skirt.

We were joking around about how we broke into temple grounds and I started busting up laughing when Tony started to pant and act like he was gonna die from being out of shape. Little did I know that he was really trying to calm himself down cuz he tends to shake when he gets excited or nervous. He did a very good job at hiding his anxiety.

When we made it to the top, the view was absolutely breath taking. It over looked all of Laie and the ocean and the temple. There was a little overlook area and I walked over and sat down. Tony got a HUGE smile on his face and walked over towards me and grabbed my hands and told me how much he loved me. I smiled at him and told him I loved him too. Still 100% oblivious to what was happening. He started to tell me that he knew that when he got me my ring it had to be huge because you can measure someones love by the size of the ring. I shook my head and smiled and told him that wasn't true. But he got on his knee and pulled out a giant paper weight diamond ring. In fact it was even more humorous because the first day we met we went to San Diego and he saw that ring in a store and jokingly proposed to me. So when he pulled it out, I just started laughing and told him he was silly. he asked me, " Elizabeth Ann Luka Kapuanani Aloha Uda, will you marry me for time and all eternity?" I started to laugh and said Yes.

Then.... he started going for his other pocket and said, " Good cuz the real ring is right here."

My heart stopped and I felt like I couldn't breathe. He pulled out a red box and opened it and there was my ring. AMAZING! It was so perfect in every way. Green is my favorite color, and told me that is also represents eternity.

I said yes and grabbed him and hugged him and kissed him. I couldn't believe it. He was so sneaky, and I really had no idea. We just sat there and enjoyed the moment, until Tony had to shout from the hilltop that he was gonna marry me. Then some security guy came and told us congratulations but we weren't allowed to be there. we laughed and thought it was cool, because it's not fun sneaking on to property if you don't get caught.

We spent the next couple hours at the temple and saw the exhibit and watched some presentations on eternal families. The spirit was so strong and I felt like this was the most amazing Sunday ever. When we were in the temple I saw brother Eubank and was pretty frustrated because I knew I had seen him and felt like I had known him my whole life. Turns out it was true. He was my weather guy from Utah. Him and his wife congratulated Tony and I and we sat and chatted with them for awhile.

I am so grateful that the Lord has blessed me with having the opportunity to be in Tony's life. He is so dear to me and is my best friend. We can't seem to go more than 1 minute without smiling when we are together. We are so giddy around each other and we seriously can't take our eyes off one another. Tony makes me laugh and truly brings so much joy into my life. I am so excited to start my life with him and to be by his side for eternity.