Making the Big Announcement

Once you decide to put a ring on it and become engaged your enter a whole new ball game.

When you and your boyfriend are first together none bothers you much about it. Your friends and family will want to get to know him, and you will probably have to meet his parents and all that. But other than that the opinions go about as far as "He seems nice. I like him."

Once you become engaged EVERYONE will have an opinion… and a million questions.
"How long have you been together?" "How did you know?" "Are you Sure?" "Are you pregnant?" And my least favorite but the one you will get the most "Whens the big day?" Literally the day after we announce our engagement people were asking like I already had the wedding plan set in stone.
   
When you announce you have found the man-of-your-dreams and you want to spend forever together what you really want to hear is "Congratulations! I am so happy you two found each other. Im so excited for you!"

What you don't want to hear is what so-and-so thinks about you only dating 3 months before you made this life changing decision that is defiantly going to tie you down and crush your dreams and end up making you unhappy because you're too young to know what you're getting into.
     Or all the rumors going around that you must be pregnant or crazy to be rushing marriage like that.

When you know that you have found your other half and you can't go another day without him, why should you not get married now? When ya know ya know. And its your life changing decision. Make sure your being smart and not rushing into getting married for the wrong reasons. And don't worry about anyone else. Don't let them make you second guess yourself.
And if you are a good friend and your friend announces it tell them you are happy for them and support them. And leave the stupid questions and opinions for the other people to say.

When you decide to make the announcement for yourself there are some Words of Wisdom I would like to suggest:

1. Tell your family first. Call them up and let them know the great news before anyone else.

2. Tell them to keep it on the DL. We texted a picture of us and the ring to his parents and it said "She said yes!" Right after it happened. By the time I got on Facebook awhile later, they had already uploaded the picture and announced it for us! I was SO upset.

3. Tell all your friends together so none gets mad about who knew first. Have a BBQ and invite everyone. Or post it on Facebook with them all tagged so its fair game.

4. I would personally wait a couple days to announce it. It gives you time to enjoy your own good news before everyone bombardes you with texts and calls and questions and opinions. and Secondly- (I've seen this happen twice) Someone changes their mind shortly after and everyone freaks out and it kills their relationship because maybe she just wants to wait a little while and you surprised her so she said yes because she didn't know what to do.

My husband and I talked about getting married and our future together before he popped the question so I knew it was coming and I had had time to really think and pray about it.

Looking back now do I wish I had waited to get engaged? -Yes
Why? Because our relationship was all about us and having fun up until that day. As soon as we put a ring on it we had a To-Do list ten miles long and an ongoing interrogation about just about everything until our wedding day. It wasn't until after our wedding day that our relationship/marriage become about us again. And I sometimes wish we had had just a few more days in our summer love story before we jumped into all that. But marriage is honestly better than that summer ever was, its just more work and we have to make time to hang out and go on dates now.