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MaeLyn and Aaron

The Proposal

Aaron and I got engaged October 19, 2013 at the annual SCI Can Event, which is an event that Chris Norton, one of the guys that was in the hospital with Aaron, started after he suffered a spinal cord injury playing football for Luther College. Rewind back to August, Aaron and Chris were getting together for lunch in Decorah since they hadn’t seen each other in a while. Somewhere during the conversation Chris asked Aaron when he was going to propose to me, Aaron said, “I know I want to I just don’t know how.” Chris suggested that he do it at the SCI Can event in October, and the idea was born.

Chris and Aaron worked closely over the next couple of months to devise a plan to make this the most memorable experience of my life. Chris has a videographer with him named, Michael Crocker, so they decided to make a video. The story that I was told was that Chris wanted to do Aaron’s story for his monthly newsletter for the month of November. He wanted to get Joanne, Aaron’s mother, Aaron, and I all to discuss our experience of Aaron’s injury. Chris told me he wanted us to come to the event and they were going to show a short clip of the video of Aaron’s story that night. I obliged and said of course anything I could do to help!

Chris and Michael came to Aaron and my apartment to interview the three of us and according to me all went well. About a month later Chris asked Aaron and I if we would come to Luther College and do some further interviewing more about our relationship and how it has changed/grown since going through a spinal cord injury together. I thought nothing of it. Everyone still questions how the proposal was such a shock to me when I was such a big part of my own surprise engagement! I swear, I had no idea!

Now, back to 10/19/13, around 3 am Aaron got a call from Lucas saying he was about back to New Hampton but he ran out of gas and needed to be picked up. I’ve never seen Aaron climb out of bed so fast, later I found out he didn’t sleep a wink that night so he more than welcomed the idea to get his mind off of his nervousness. Around 9 am I went to Decorah, I was getting my hair cut and colored by my best friend, Tracy. I was gone literally all day. When I arrived back at home Lucas and Flynn were over and Aaron and they were eating a little something (another ploy to keep his mind occupied) and I had to hurry up and get ready. In fact, I was kind of negative about the thought of driving all the way back to Decorah since I had just been there all day. I was grumpy cause I had no idea what to wear and nothing seemed to look the way I want it. Pretty typical for me if you ask Aaron. I wanted to wear jeans and he came out of the bedroom with dress pants and a shirt and tie on and I was like, “what the heck, where are you going?!” He’s like, “MaeLyn, just wear a dress, please!”

We arrived at Luther and found our seats, there was a full dinner that night and Aaron didn’t eat an ounce of it. Chris had told us that he was going to have us come up and introduce us to the crowd and I assured myself that was why he was so nervous he couldn’t eat, little did I know! Chris asked us to come up and gave a brief summary of our relationship during his accident and then proceeded with playing our video. It was the first time I had seen it and probably the 15^th time Aaron had! I’ll let the video do the rest of the talking:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iATtmCYeiwA

It was the best day of my life, hands down. I love the fact that I get to keep this to perhaps show our children and maybe even our grandchildren. I always told Aaron that I knew him too well and he would never be able to surprise me because I would totally suspect something but as you can see, I was completely surprised and honestly, that was probably the best part about the whole thing! That, and the fact that I get to grow old with the man of my dreams! 

To watch Aaron propose to MaeLyn, click here.

Aaron and MaeLyn's story is truly a love story made for the big screen.

It turns out, Aaron did such a great job proposing that their engagement actually did.

Here are a few news outlets that featured this love story...

Nationally Syndicated TV Show:  Right this Minute:  Surprise! You Didn't Think I Could Surprise You With a Proposal, But I Did! 

KWWL: Surprise Engagement Finds Couple Moving Past Injury

The happily engaged couple....