Heather and Nick: Birmingham, Alabama Engagement Session

Heather:  “We met when I was interviewing at UAB for MD/PhD programs. He was recruiting students, and I was randomly assigned to have him take me to a group dinner at Silver Coin, this Indian restaurant that’s prob. 15-20 min. away from the school. Well, it POURED that day and I had a tornado siren go off during an interview, and traffic was horrible, so it ended up taking an hour to drive there. And that was how we met. But clearly we didn’t start dating until later.”

Nick:   “I have to say that on that drive, I was so embarrassed because every alternate route I tried had the same terrible traffic and that drive took so long.  We talked in the car and talked at the restaurant and I thought, “she’s really nice, but given my luck she probably wont come to UAB”.  Well, lucky for me, she did.”

Heather:  “How did he ask me on our first date? He’ll kill me for writing this, which makes it all the more fabulous. After about 3 months of me being in Birmingham, we both went to the 4H center for this retreat thing. We were at the 4H center swimming in the pool, and talking of all things French monarchies and the fantastic ways they all died, and he asked me to go out with him that upcoming week, and when I said, “Yes, sure,” he responded with “Really?!” and then swam off. We then went to a nice dinner later that week at this totally adorable French cafe named Chez Lulu, and a nice evening.”

Heather:  “One embarrassing dating story about me:  During maybe the first month or two we were dating, he offered to make dinner, and invited me over to his place. He lit some candles. Well, he has these great chairs for his kitchen table that swivel, roll and lean back. I was leaning back in the chair, and evidently leaned over too far, because it flipped over backwards. I was both laughing and dying of embarrassment all at the same time. As it fell, it bumped this  thing that had candles on it. One of the candles dripped wax all down the wall on this fabric thing, and we didn’t know how to get it off without ruining the fabric. So we cleaned all the dripped wax off of everything else. (I was fine; the only thing bruised was my pride.) His parents come to town a few weeks later for their yearly visit in October/Novemberish, and his mom thinks the reason wax had spilled is because Nick didn’t know how to blow out a candle properly, so for the next two years, she kept giving him candle snifters (the little bell shaped things) so that he didn’t spill wax everywhere, and we would LAUGH about it because he was kind enough not to tell my story to his parents.”

Nick:  “Another funny story about dating is this:  So we started dating somewhat discretely.  About 3 weeks in, we went to a party that a friend of mine was hosting.  We arrived separately.  All during the party, people came up to me and said things like “I think she really likes you”, and me, thinking this was hilarious, kept saying “oh, I don’t know”.  At the end, we made a big show of leaving together.  We were laughing the whole time, even as we looped around to get Heather to her car.”

Describe your proposal.

Heather:  “I knew that the official proposal was coming. A few months earlier we had talked about going ring shopping together. We finally went and picked out the lovely ring together. I don’t know why, but I was so nervous that I was shaking. I really liked the old pretty vintage rings that the shop had, so we picked one that had two little sapphires around a diamond, all encased in lovely pretty fine filigree work. *sigh of complete happiness* Okay. Done gushing over the ring. It needed to be resized, so I knew hed have to pick it up at some point in the future. A few weeks later on a Sunday, Nick asked if I wanted to get brunch at V. Richards, and then go to Railroad Park. I said “Sure”, knowing that this was an awfully precise plan for us in general, and it was kinda inconvenient since we had a concert that afternoon, and that he had likely picked up the ring that week, so needless to say I suspected something. When we got to Railroad Park, we walked around (I’m pretty sure he was scouting out the best place to do it). I had to go to the bathroom, so we walked down there, and I figured, what the heck, let me text my best friend Angelica while I was in the bathroom. So I texted, I’m pretty sure Im going to get engaged in the next 15 min. And sure enough, when I came back out, we walked to the place that had the fewest number of people in a corner of the park, and he proposed. Later that night, (after the concert), we came back and watched several episodes of Archer while drinking a bottle of champagne.”

Nick:   “Heather knew the proposal was coming.  I didn’t care.  I was afraid of losing the ring if I waited. She had such a gleeful look on her face as she plucked the ring out of the box.”

How would you describe your relationship?

Heather:  “He’s the best. He loves me when I’m being smart Heather and when I’m being grumpy Heather and when I’m being happy Heather and when I’m being clumsy Heather and everything in between. He loves me all the time. And I do too. How could you not love that face? Being with him is like being at home.”

Nick:  “Heather has made my life so much better in so many ways.  Importantly, our senses of humor are very compatible.  She is an insightful person and our serious conversations are as fun as when we goof off.  I am really looking forward to the life we will build together.”

Whats your wedding going to be like?

Heather:  “My hope for the wedding (and I think his too) is that it’s everyone we love in one place celebrating and having a good time with good food and good music, but most importantly good friends and family. I mean, it’s not every day that you get to have (almost) everyone you love in one room. ”

Nick:  “Many of our friends and family have never seen Birmingham so we want to make sure they have a good time.  That is also why we wanted to do engagement photos in Railroad Park, so they could see the city we have made our home over the past years.”