Our Engagment Story

Hello my dear family and friends!

As all of you know by now, on Friday July 9th, Matt Chapman asked me to marry him and I said, " Of course!". The events that lead up to this day are nothing short of a miracle.

On June 1st, I got a unique phone call from my dad. He called to tell me he just had gotten back from visiting his friends Geoff and Becca Chapman in Pittsburgh. Geoff and Becca's son, Matt, who is in the Air Force and was going to be coming to CO before he deployed to Afghanistan at the end of July. My dad asked if it was okay if he gave Matt, my phone number and email address, so that he could perhaps meet up with me for lunch on his way thru the state. While I found it a bit bizarre that he would be passing thru Crested Butte (which is in the middle of nowhere) I told my dad Matt could have my information. I hung up with my dad and called my friend, Lori, and said," I think my dad just found my husband....".

After some brief email correspondence, Matt asked me to come to Tacoma to see him. On June 18th, I hopped a plane from Denver to Seattle. I really didn't know what to expect but I knew if I didn't go meet him ( as it had been over 20 years since I last saw him) that I would regret it.

On a side note, I had been dating someone who was not good for me and he dumped me via text on Thursday night, then right after that text, Matt emailed me asking me to visit him.

This is from my journal before I left to go to Tacoma:

I am interested in the timing of all of this because right after that text, I got an email from Matt Chapman saying he wanted to fly me out to Tacoma. So that's what I am doing. It's going to be odd because I have only met him once in my life. So basically, I am going on a blind date across the country.... but I am trusting God. I trust that he has his hand upon me and that my life is given up to him. I believe that he has a destiny for me. I am not sure if this is it or not but if I don't go, then I will never know.

My two days in Tacoma, turned into a week... and per my journal " when he came up to greet me in the airport at that moment I knew."

On July 5th, Matt came to visit my family for a week in Cimarron. He fit right into our family like a missing piece of a puzzle ( my puzzle). After 29 years my heart finally felt complete.


Four days later, we got engaged over looking Morrow Point on our way to Crested Butte from Cimarron. After, I readily agreed to marry him, he said " we have to find you a ring!". That became our mission for the day. Now, as some of you know, Crested Butte is a very small town of 1,500 people so the chance of finding a ring that I wanted was nearly impossible. I told Matt, I wanted a delicate, antique style platinum ring with a cushion cut diamond. I also told him that I was going to be very picky.

As I expected the only jewelry store in Crested Butte had a limited ( and ugly) selection of rings. Over lunch, Matt pulled out his iPhone to find where the nearest Zales was. The nearest place came up as Aspen. I didn't think that was right ( Cartier or Tiffany yes... but Zales in Aspen? Not so much....) non the less I accompanied my future husband to Aspen. A two and a half hour drive later we pulled up to where Zales in Aspen was supposed to be and lo and behold it was a clothing store called B'Jewel.

I said, "Matt, there isn't going to be anything in Aspen and we can't spend $30,000 on a ring. This place is too expensive. " He said, " God has your ring here, we just have to find it." Mind you, we had a time constraint as we had to be back in CB for dinner with the family so we had 45 minutes to find the ring.

We started walking up the street and saw a jewelry store. We went in and described to the woman what we were looking for. She said she didn't have that kind of ring at her store but knew of a great jeweler who sold estate jewelery. She gave us directions and we embarked on a quest up streets and thru alleys to find his tiny little hole in the wall jewelery store.

The jeweler, Frank, (who we got to know quite well in a small amount of time) was a kind old man who had been in the same spot for over 25 years. The third ring I tried on was beautiful and it fit my tiny finger ( I wear a 4.25 ring size) perfectly. I asked him what the cut was and he said cushion. I asked him what the band was and he said platinum. It was the ring of my dreams. Frank gave us a very expensive bottle of wine as a gift. We took it home and celebrated with my family.

There are so many other details that I can't even get into or this email would become a novel. But this is the basic time line of events. I cannot begin to explain how floored and grateful I am that God answered not only my prayers but the prayers of all of you who have been praying for Matt and me.