Aloha!

I've been suffering from lack-of-blog-post guilt (I have made zero progress on the home office makeover). Things have been crazy busy lately, both at work and at home. I've been taking on a lot more projects at work which includes getting my first real estate staging gig! Exciting!

Boyfriend and I had also planned to go to San Diego for our annual vacation, but then he switched it up on me the morning of our departure and put me on a plane to Hawaii instead. WHAT??

This was the view from our hotel room:

I KNOW, RIGHT?? Well done, Boyfriend.

Thinking he had used all of his planning mojo on coordinating a secret trip to Hawaii and keeping it from me for a month (not an easy task...I'm obnoxiously nosy), I did not think he could pull off the next part.

SHABAM!



Well done, Boyfriend! Or I guess that would make him "Boyfiancé" now? Which is much harder to type because I have to track down a "é" every time. Tiny violin...

Yep, after seven years of togetherness, we finally decided we liked each other enough to decide to get married. When we announced it to our friends and family and I noticed a few things:
1) Facetime is awesome and it makes announcing an engagement really fun.
2) Almost everyone wanted to know if we had picked a date yet. (Ha, no! I just got this bling!)
3) EVERYONE saw it coming except for me. I think that's because I know Boyfiancé better than they do :p

So that was pretty great. I love my ring. I designed it, so I guess I should! My good friend Megha (whom I helped to build a planter bench with recently) has been my ring-confidant for the better part of 4 years, so I've been telling her every detail I wanted in a ring in case Boyfriend needed some guidance one day. It totally paid off, so thank you Megha, and good job Boyfiancé for executing it perfectly.

In other news, Hawaii was just incredible. We want to go back so badly! We stayed in Waikiki where we learned how to surf and got seriously crippling sunburns on the second day. Drank lots of beachy drinks, sat on the sand and wore sundresses (just me, not the Boyfiancé). I could go on, but I don't want to be that person that won't shut up about their recent vacation. So here are some highlights:

Waimanalo Beach. The best beach.

Iolani Palace, home of the former royals of Hawaii

Touring Iolani palace

Byodo In Temple

Huge bamboo

Nu'uanu Pali lookout

Luau guests

Hula dancers

Fire dancing!

Manoa Falls

Sunset sail with bottomless Mai Tais :)

I made this lei!

Vintage postcards

Engagement beach

Now hopefully back to our regularly scheduled programming. Maybe with some wedding planning here and there :)
Aloha!