Written by Tiffany on November 20, 2013:

“For those of you who don’t know, I’ve been dating a wonderful man [Jon] for the past 7 months and could not have pictured myself with anyone as amazing as him.

God had a completely different plan for my life that is so much better than anything I could have ever thought up.

I would have to say that Jon and I are very alike in many ways such as: our morals, faith, creativity, goofiness [I’ve never felt more comfortable or thought someone MAY be a little crazier than I am!], taste in music, laid back/care-free personality. We both like traveling and taking spontaneous road trips, our love languages line up: quality time, words of affirmation and physical touch. His hugs are where I feel SO loved, and safe. One of my favorite things about Jon is his love for people. He has such a big heart and is extremely caring and thoughtful. Jon is that guy that everyone gets along with. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t like him. I feel very blessed to be his fiancé and I am overjoyed that he is the man God hand-picked, for me to spend my life with. 

Let’s see, I’m going to start right here.

We started talking on March 6th when Jon was about to get on a plane to visit his family in Washington for 10 days. He texted me everyday and called a few of them. He got back to Florida on the 16th.

We officially met on March 18, 2013. We went to the beach and spent 3 hours walking and taking, just getting to know each other. He gave me butterflies the entire night! The next day he asked me to hang out again, and after that, we started hanging out on a regular basis.

Jon and I started dating on April 14, 2013 after he took me on our first official date, [after meeting my parents] on top of a roof of a church, where he had a table for two set. Later that night he asked me to be his girlfriend. After 2 and a half weeks of dating, I knew that he was “the one” I’d been waiting for! The one God had planned for me to spend the rest of my life with. If I told you that story, you’d be reading a novel so I’ll save that for another blog post. 🙂

Jon told me he loved me on June 24, 2013 after we got out of a hot-air balloon in Orlando. Here’s a video he made after our trip.

We flew to Washington on August 12th and I met his family on August 13th. I felt like I fit in perfectly! After spending time with his niece and nephew they both mentioned a few times “I hope you’re going to be our Aunt!” “You and Jonathan need to get married!!” Warmed my heart. 🙂 It was such an amazing trip!!

Jon asked me to marry him on November 11th, 2013. Here is the proposal story, in detail. 🙂

I’ll rewind to almost 2 months ago.

Since I’m a photographer, I know the importance of having your proposal captured so you’ll have those memories to not just think about, but to look at for a lifetime! I’ve told him how I’ve always wanted my own to be photographed one day. I said, “When we get engaged, if there is a photographer taking pictures, you better figure out a way to make sure I look somewhat decent without giving it away!” Sooo…about 2 months ago, we were on our way to the movies and he randomly said, “By the way, from now until Christmas, you should probably wear a little bit of make-up every time we see each-other.”  I had a mini freak-out and thought, “AH!!! He’s going to propose before Christmas!!!!” I also realized that is a THREE MONTH TIME FRAME. Holy. Cow. I don’t want to look good that much! I enjoy not wearing make-up and having messy hair around him! But, I did my best to look pretty every time we saw each other. That was his way of telling me it was going to happen soon, without giving the proposal away. During the past 2 months, every-time we went out to do something, I kept thinking, “It could happen tonight! It could happen right this second! PLEASE NOT RIGHT NOW!” I probably came up with 200 different ways he could have proposed. Thanks for keeping me on my toes Jon! 😛

Fast forward to Thursday night, November 7th. This is when the craziness started. I hadn’t got to see Jon that day because he works till 5 and I started babysitting at 3. I got home around 11:30PM and when I walk in my room, there are some beautiful Fall colored flowers and a card on my bed. On the front of the card it said “My Love.” On the inside, Jon said some sweet things I’m not going to write out, but he did say that we have made some wonderful memories and he wanted to create another one right now and it said for me to look under my pillow. So I did. I found a coupon that he made and  it said that it was for a Christmas card shoot [with one of my wonderful friends who is also a photographer] and was Valid on Nov. 11, 2013 at 3PM. I was VERY excited and went to bed with a smile on my face.

Friday morning my sister told me there was something on my car, I walk out to find another card with a simple sentences, one of them being, “Thinking of you always” on the inside. Later that day I had a wedding to shoot in St. Pete. After Jon got off work, he came to the wedding and helped me carry all of my equipment and with my lighting! I was so happy to have him there with me. During the reception while everyone was dancing, I noticed another card in my camera bag. I just smiled at him and he told me I can open it now or later. I opened it a little later and he told me how much he enjoys watching me capture peoples memories and that he will always support, and encourage me not only in my photography business, but in all areas in life.

Saturday morning, my little brother came in my room at 7:30 and gave me another card and a bag of dove dark chocolates. [YUM!] The card had a few sentences that were in code! I put a clue on the back and I had to figure it out. Took me about an hour because I over thought the hint and figured, “No way, he wouldn’t make it that easy!” Typical me, over-thinking. That was his plan! Later that morning, one of my best friends, Alyssa took me to get my nails done and then we went to lunch at Chilies. After Chilies, Jon was coming over and we were going to head to the Annual Jamboree that is held at FBCIR every year. He got to my house and as he walked inside, he said “looks like there’s a ticket on your car!” So I went out there and another card was on my windshield! I figured he had just put it there and when I asked, he said the he had put it there while Alyssa and I were eating lunch!! So I drove all the way home not even realizing it was on my windshield! I’m thankful it didn’t fly off. 🙂 The card said something like “Hair done, nails did, make-up on.. It doesn’t matter to me! …a few more sweet nothings and at the end he told me he “can’t wait for tonight, another ferris wheel, this will be exciting.” My immediate thought was.. “It’s happening tonight!!” Before we left, my sister handed me another card and a CD. In the card it said that its a mixed cd he made with the help of my little sister! [I’ve gotta say, It’s an awesome mixed CD!]

We get to the jamboree, go on a few rides and then hit up the ferris wheel! While we’re on the ride, I kept looking down at the people because I felt like we were being watched, Dan Pigsley, Aaron and Jessica Lombardo and a few others kept looking at us as we’re going around. I’m guessing they thought it was going to happen on the ferris wheel too. 🙂 When we got off of the ferris wheel, a little boy who I didn’t know ran up to us handed me another card! [later I had found out that Jon gave my best friend Marissa the card and told her to find a little boy to hand it to me!] On the front it said, “to the prettiest” and as I’m reading it I feel people looking at us and Jon moves behind me. I only remember what the last part of the card that said “to hear me say…” As I turned around, my heart was being SO FAST!! It felt like everything around us was just blurred noise an I look at him and he has a little gold ring in his hand that he made. He said something like, “We are so close right now and I know you already have a promise/purity ring from your parents, but I also want to give you one from me so you know how serious I am about you.” At the time, I had no idea what was going on and when we walked away, I had to re-read the card and tell him to please repeat what he said because my heart was beating so loud and fast that I couldn’t hear what he said! haha! He completely threw me off his track! Later that night he left another card on the seat of my car. I’m not going to write out what he said in a lot of these last few because I want to keep that special between us. <3

Sunday morning my mom came into my room with another card and a locket necklace that had our picture in it. 🙂 We went to church that morning with my family and then my dad brought some yummy fried chicken home for lunch! He said ladies first, so I opened the box of chicken and there was another card. 🙂 Jon wrote in there a promise to provide for me and our family one day. Made me laugh! We spent the rest of the day together and then he came along on another photo shoot with me. I took my aunt and uncles family pictures. At the end of the shoot, my uncle gave me an envelope which at first I thought was money in it, hehe! But nope, it was another card! He wrote about how blessed he feels to have a front row seat watching me use my God-given talent. Sho shweet. After we got back, we decided to watch a movie on my front lawn. I ran inside to get pillows, brought them outside and opened my laptop to find another card. 🙂

Monday November 11, 2013, I woke up early and found card #13 on my bed. It said “By now you are probably getting tired of these cards and wondering how much longer they will continue” He said some sweet things I’ll keep to myself, and then said how excited he is for the shoot today.

I met up that morning with Laura to go shopping for a dress for the shoot. Succeeded in finding a bright yellow one that I felt very pretty in and then had girl talk over lunch. I told her everything Jon had been doing and told her, “Well I thought he might propose Friday, and then Saturday I was almost sure! NOPE! He faked me out for sure so I figured, Sunday it will happen! Then maybe it will be today at the photo shoot, and if it’s not today, then Tuesday or Thursday which is our 7 month anniversary!” [Yes we celebrate month anniversaries. :)] She said “Oh gosh, I hope he doesn’t do something without telling me, I don’t want to fumble with my camera and miss it!” So that definitely through me off too.

Went and met up with Jon at Lake Seminole Park at 3PM. He looked very handsome! 😉 We were about to start the shoot and he rolls a bright yellow tandem bike over to us outta no where!! [When we first started dating, I told Jon I had always wanted to do a shoot with a tandem bike and a huge balloon! He remembered!] I asked him where he got it and he said, “Eh I don’t know, it was just leaned up against this tree!” I’m thinking..yea, OKAY! Not believing that one. So we start taking pictures, trying to ride the bike we realized there was no air in the tires. Picture this: Two people riding a tandem bike with no air in the tires and having no experience riding one before! My arms were wobbling so much when I was trying to drive it! But we made it work. 🙂 Later he pulled a HUGE pink balloon out of his trunk! I shouted “AH!! You’re making all my photo dreams come true!!!” The fact that he even remembered I had said that made me love him even more. During the shoot I just kept waiting for it to happen, and nothin’.

After the shoot, Laura had to be back at bible study in Tampa at 6 and it was already past 4 so she left. Jon said we needed to go drop off my car because he wanted to take me to dinner. So we got to my house and Jon said he thinks he left his phone in Laura’s camera bag because she was holding all of our stuff. [which was actually a complete accident!] So we called her and asked if we should go pick it up later or if she wanted to meet up with us. He talked to her and told her directions and then he got off the phone and said, alright we need to kill some time before dinner because shes gonna be a while since she was almost to the bridge. He said, lets just go to the beach for a little bit. So we went, the same spot we always go [right where we hung out the very first time.] Almost right when we got on the beach, dropped my quilt and gave me card #14. I opened it and it was BLANK. I looked back at him and he’s down on one knee, holding a beautiful diamond ring. My heart starts beating really fast and then I hear him say, “Tiffany Ann Weaver, will you marry me??” It took me a good 7 seconds to say anything at all! I was just freaking out in my mind thinking, “OMG! It’s really happening now?! It is!! He just asked me to marry him!!” So with a big burst of energy, a forceful, YES! comes out of my mouth! He take my promise ring off my finger and puts it on with the promise ring he gave me two nights before, and then put the engagement ring on my finger. Picks me up and twirls me around as people one avenue over are shouting and yelling “YAYY! YEAA! WOO HOO!!” When he put me down I gave him a huge hug and kiss and asked who those people are, he didn’t know! Just random beach goers! 😀 We just kept hugging and kissing and I started crying and Laura runs up to us after taking some pictures and gives me a huge hug [which made me cry even more!]. I asked her “You knew the whole time at the mall?!” She said “Try about two months ago!” She took some more pictures of us and then we sat on the blanket and picnic basket that Jon had also prepared with fruit, cheese, crackers, a card that said “50 Years” on the front and sparkling grape juice [since I’m not a huge wine fanatic.] 🙂 Laura took pictures of the set up and then got some during the sunset, then she asked to pray with us before she left. AMAZING. We both felt so calm after that and it was a beautiful prayer.

After Laura left, Jon got his laptop out from the bottom of the basket and then he showed me a beautiful 15 minute video that had a bunch of family and close friends saying congratulations included a few of my favorite photographers that I’m a huge fan of! In between people saying congratulations, he had put clips of him picking out the ring and getting it, standing in front of the jewelry store with my dad, and a few more clips with some of “our songs” playing in the background. I was pretty emotional. After that we just soaked it in. We left and he took me to dinner in St. Pete on a roof-top restaurant called the Canopy! We celebrated with a huge juicy burger! He gave me another card that said “YESSSSSS!!!” on the front and on the inside, he started off by saying, “She said yes!!!” We left the Canopy and I thought we were leaving and then he said, “That’s not it, there’s something else.” We walked up to a truck which was his friend David’s truck [Which was the same truck Jon’s friend Jeff was driving when he picked up the bike during the shoot!]. David had the tandem-bike from the shoot in the back of his truck, with all the tires blown up. 🙂 He drove all the way to St. Pete, just so we could have a 15 minute joy ride on the bike. [Shout out to Amanda and Chad Cook for letting Jon borrow it!! You guys are awesome!] So as we rode it, we shouted at people that we just got engaged and were obnoxious and didn’t even care! We gave the bike back to David and then Jon and I sat on a bench and he told me more of the back story behind all the planning that went into the proposal. After, we went home, told my family how he proposed and then fell asleep on the love seat. When he left my house, he put another card in my jacket pocket that said “PS.” on the front and he told me to read it when I got inside. It was extremely sweet and that ended the most wonderful. weekend. EVER!

The next morning, November 12, 2013, I had to wake up around 7:15 to get some papers from my friend Jenna and I ended up going outside when she got to my house and told her how he proposed and what happened over the past few days. When I came back to my room, the last and final card #18 was on my bed. On the front it said “More…” and on the inside he wrote something like, “I may have already proposed but that doesn’t mean I’m going to stop pursuing you.” and a few other things. 🙂

There you have it folks, that’s our story and I love that it’s ours. I couldn’t have thought up anything like it. It’s a God written story. If you lasted this long and read the whole thing, you must really care! Or…you’re a girl who loves romantic stories just like me!

I love you all! Please keep Jon and I in your prayers as we embark on a whole new journey of wedding planning! As of right this moment, we don’t have a date set in stone yet, but we are thinking about may 4th or 11th! I’ll keep ya posted! “

Love, Tiffany