Today is the day we’ve been waiting for! We can finally let you in on one of the biggest secrets we’ve ever had to keep: a surprise Paris proposal in front of the Eiffel Tower!
It wasn’t raining. Thank God. For weeks, we’d been praying that it wouldn’t, even though the forecast was not our friend. We walked down the steps of our hotel room. Into the cold morning fog. Onto the streets of Paris. With each step, we were more and more grateful that we didn’t have our umbrellas with us. Thick clouds? We could handle that. Rue by rue, the hustle and bustle had already started. Taxi headlights pierced the morning darkness. Beeping bells from bicycle riders cut through the silence. We could smell the pastries. We could see each breath as we wound round the river Seine. Whenever sunrise was supposed to be, the clouds made sure it got to sleep in.
We didn’t want to miss it, in any sense of the word
We’d been talking so fast for (what seemed like) so long that we walked right under the Eiffel. We stopped. Put our index fingers over our mouthes. Smiled a stealth, sneaky smile. And took a selfie. Minutes later, we got to the top of Trocadero, the iconic platform overlooking the most romantic building in the world.
Snack vendors were setting up their food carts. Street vendors were laying out their cheap trinkets. A few tourists strolled by, but kindly scattered like pigeons when they realized what was about to happen. Us, hiding behind a wall, gesturing back and forth between our ring fingers and our cameras must’ve been the giveaway.
The coast was clear. No rain. No crowds. No nothing.
So we waited.
The seconds felt like minutes. The minutes, hours.
We had to remind ourselves to breathe.
Their once-in-a-lifetime moment. Our once-in-a-lifetime moment.
Was just a moment away.
You could almost hear that Eminem song pounding through our heads.
What if you only had one shot?
Lord, please give us sharp focus… solid composition… and the right—
“That’s them!” Amy whispered, “That’s them!”
And the rest, as they say, is history.
Megan thought the surprise was over, until Joe let her in on a little secret…
“I flew Amy and Jordan here to take our pictures. And they’re standing RIGHT OVER THERE.”Â
The look on Megan’s face when it all started to sink in made our hearts grow three sizes at once.
Joe started to walk Megan towards us so we could fill her in on all the sneaky planning we did behind the scenes. She was still in shock.
After playing this moment out in mind for months and months, meeting her in person for the first time was one of the sweetest moments we’ll never forget.
Since Megan follows along with our blog and social media, one of the biggest keys to pulling off the surprise was for us to make NO mention of us traveling to Europe. No Snapchats. No Instagram posts. No clues. Nothing. We started to show her all the behind the scenes shenanigans, including the things we posted “from home” while we were actually in Paris.
We got to tell her with glee how Joe had emailed us wayyyy back in September, letting us know he wanted to give Megan a “proposal beyond her wildest dreams,” and that we’d even pulled off an entire Skype date without her knowing.
The look of sheer delight on Joe’s face says it all. Operation surprise proposal? BIG SUCCESS.
Then we got to tell her that when we Skyped with Joe, the three of us plotted that the surprise wouldn’t stop there. We’d take some portraits to capture their first moments as an engaged couple (before anyone in the world would even know they were engaged) AND THENÂ Joe was going to take her shopping to pick out two outfits for a full-scale romantic engagement session through the streets of Paris the very next day!
We’ll be sharing their “REAL” engagement session tomorrow, but we had so much fun doing this little surprise mini-session without even a moment’s notice!
We took advantage of the sunrise (and all our tricks for shooting in crowded places) and got them some shots in front of The Eiffel Tower and the Pont Alexandre III bridge before warming up with a cup of coffee and planning their engagement session (coming tomorrow!) We can’t wait to show you! But until then, here are a few of our favorites from just moments after she said yes!
Click here to see Megan and Joe’s romantic engagement session in Paris!