Edward and Andrea's Romantic Marriage Proposal

A good marriage proposal story can be better than the most romantic movie or the most love-filled novel. Knowing that it's real - that it's actually about two people madly in love - somehow makes me tear up and feel a swell inside. They can help you to imagine the day you’ll get engaged, or to remember the romance of the day your sweetheart popped the question. After all, there are few phrases in the English language that are more sweated over or rehearsed than "Will you marry me?"

If you're about to be engaged, try reading these stories to help you calm the nerves and feel prepared. Or, if you're a romantic like I am, read them just because sometimes it's great to be a teary-eyed sap inspired by strangers.

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Edward and Andrea's Marriage Proposal Took Place Exactly 3 Years After the Day They Met

At 8pm on January 30, 2007, Edward Maurice and Andrea Gardner met during a Penn State class that would take them to Rome. As fate would have it, Ed sat in front of Andrea, who said hello and offered him a syllabus, having no idea of the future importance of that moment. It wasn’t until waiting for their plane to Rome at the Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport that they met again. Andrea, being generally inquisitive and not shy, thought it was the perfect time to introduce herself. This opened the door for the many fun adventures they were soon to enjoy in the Eternal City for the next few weeks.

On the second day in Rome, the schedule called for a trip to the Vatican. Andrea, with camera in hand, got a little sidetracked and lost touch with the group as she clicked away. Edward, for his own reasons, became lost as well. (He will later claim that he was checking out the architecture of the building.) Inevitably, they both ended up on the same path going to the top of St. Peter’s Basilica. Andrea struck up a conversation, telling Edward about her research on Italian wine and the many things she wanted to accomplish in Rome. They soon realized that they wanted to do the same things while they were there and ended up spending most of their time together. But Andrea -- being Andrea -- started to develop her own conspiracy theory on just how they kept on magically meeting up and “accidentally” running into each other.

This, and other moments on the trip, helped to solidify her theory that Ed might be an international spy in Rome to accomplish a secret mission straight out of a James Bond film.

On the return from Italy Edward was abruptly deployed which only added more fuel to the conspiracy fire. However, the two emailed and spoke on the phone several times during his deployment and thus their relationship began to grow. When Ed returned from his deployment on June 20th, 2007 they officially started dating.

On January 30, 2010, Edward insisted they go to eat at a new restaurant by Penn State with a mutual friend. Andrea reluctantly agreed. On the way, Edward said that their friend was running late and he wanted to stop at Penn State to pick up something and have Andrea watch a presentation he put together for an investment opportunity he had been working on. Normally, Andrea would have thought this was odd and would have built an entire theory around Edward doing something covert, but she was entirely too tired from a long day of work. The presentation started out as a sales pitch but about midway through the projector screen went blank except for one little sentence on a white background, “Does this room look familiar?” This simple little phrase left Andrea perplexed. The next slide clicked and another phrase popped up, “well it should because this is where we met 3 years ago on this date, at this time, in this very room.” Ed proceeded to get down on one knee at exactly 8pm and ask the girl of his dreams to marry him where their paths had originally first crossed. And she said YES!

Visit Andrea and Edward's wedding website.

>>> read next marriage proposal story
read previous marriage proposal story