‘Tis the Season to propose marriage, so it’s Disneyland Engagements Week here at This Fairy Tale Life! Who doesn’t love a Disneyland proposal (my own Disneyland proposal was pretty great), and we have five VERY different proposal stories to share with you this week!
Today’s Real Disneyland Engagement comes from Jennifer and Peter, who are better known as PB&J (a play on their initials). You may also remember this gorgeous couple from their Disney Weddings “Behind the Fairy Tale” spotlight and their spectacular Animation Building wedding reception.
Jennifer and Peter’s engagement was just as unique and spectacular as their wedding. They didn’t have a photographer at their actual engagement, but they did a “day after shoot” and recreated the moment. Please enjoy Jennifer’s re-telling of the day and their spectacular engagement photos from Ari Simphoukham Photography.
Peter and I got engaged on my birthday, way back on October 3rd, 2009. Peter wanted to do something special for my 26th birthday weekend, so he planned out a magical Disney-filled weekend, complete with tons of fun surprises.
Some backstory on the engagement storyline: When Peter and I first started dating, he was sent to Paris, France for work. We did the long distance relationship thing and kept in touch via the magic of technology, aka Skype, AIM and Facebook. Each night before he’d go to bed, he would write me an original “fairy tale” story based on the Princess and the Frog storyline. He nicknamed me “Princess Pobs” and he was “Fauchon Frog,” the name being a play on one of our inside jokes…
Flash forward to my birthday weekend at Disneyland. Peter was totally acting weird the entire day and spacing out. He was also being super-secretive with the plans for the day. We visit the Disneyland resort several times a year and we usually have a routine of what we do once we arrive, but something was a bit “off” on this trip.
We ventured into the parks, where Peter managed to eat everything in sight, from turkey legs to Dole whips, if it was food it was going in his mouth! There were many other little surprises throughout the day, like a cake decorating party with Pat.E.Cake at the Plaza Inn and little gifts here and there. For dinner, Peter arranged for a birthday meal at the Blue Bayou restaurant. This is when things took a turn from odd to beyond weird! During dinner Peter asked to borrow my iphone, typed something into it, and handed it back to me while saying, “You can’t look at your phone for the next hour.” Strange, right?
After our dinner, Peter immediately said that he needed to go to the bathroom. So I was waiting for around 15 minutes and started to wonder, “What is he doing in there? Stomach problems?” Then Peter called me, but instead of his usual Caller ID popping up on the screen, it was changed to “Fauchon Frog” (the character from his Paris fairy tales!). The call dropped and I was starting to get confused thinking, 1) why did he change his name in my phone, and 2) why is he calling me from the bathroom??? He called back again and just said, “Open your texts.” I opened the text and it read “Ribbit, ribbit, meet me at the Court of Angels.” Totally confused at this point, but I followed instructions and walked over.
Once at the Court of Angels, I ran into a random couple who pointed me over to the fountain in the corner. It was lit up and had a floating lily pad with a small stuffed frog prince on top. There was also a note attached that said something along the lines of, “I’ve traveled past the wishing well and castle, looked under the stars at Space Mountain, and licked Dole Whips in Adventureland, and now I’ve arrived here at the Court of Angels to make your wish come true and grant you your Happily Ever After.” At this moment I though to myself, “OMG, he’s going to make me go on a freaking treasure hunt around Disneyland?!”
Then I heard Peter call my name from the top of the staircase. I walked up the stairs and he appeared, met me halfway and got down on one knee. I started crying hysterically and I don’t remember much of what he said since I was still confused about what was going on. He then pulled out a ring box that looked like a tiny PB&J sandwich and said, “This was the moment we’ve been waiting for, and I love you. Will you forever be my Jelly??”
What’s funny is that in all the excitement, Peter forgot to say the actual words “Will you marry me?” He remembered about 10 minutes after, and of course, I said YES!
And that was the start of our journey to Happily Ever After!
Many thanks to PB&J for sharing your Real Disneyland Engagement story and pictures with us!
