We’re getting married!

Aric and I were on my family’s vacation in Anna Maria, FL. Towards the end of the week we went to lunch with my sister Chealsea and brother-in-law Chris right on the beach. If you asked me in the beginning of the week if I knew it was coming, I would have said no but I had a little bit of a feeling the day of. One of the signs of something being up is that no one really had much to say when we usually never stop yapping. Another hint for me was that Chealsea was literally talking about how she doesn't really love the beach and not even a full minute later Aric says, "So should we take the beach back to the air bnb?" We leave the restaurant and take the beach back and all of the sudden halfway down, I see my mom, Carrie, sprinting out of the trees with her phone (pictured below). Aric says "ouch" like he stepped on something and got down and next thing I knew he was on one knee with a ring in hand and said "Madison Elizabeth Norvell, Will you marry me?" Of course, the answer was yes.

I bought the ring while on the road when I knew that we were going on vacation to Florida. I found the ring that was a mix of the two she loved online so I ordered it to be picked up in town before we went. I made sure to ask her parents for their blessing the day I picked the ring up from Orland on my way home. I felt like my tongue was 10x the size of what it really was. When I finally got halfway through getting my words together, Carrie helped me fully get out what I was trying to ask. While planning the vacation, I had help from the family to get the timing perfect. We planned lunch with Chris and Chealsea later in the week. While Maddie was getting ready, I talked with the rest of the family to plan them being in the trees to watch. During the lunch, I was so nervous that something would go wrong. Once I saw Carrie come out of the trees, I knew it was time to get Maddie's attention, so I knew saying "ouch" was the way to go. I was down on one knee and asked her to be my wife (and she didn't even cry).