How We Met
It started when I decided to make the move to St. Louis, MO from a small town in Iowa to start a job! I moved here without knowing anyone and after living here for four weeks and finally getting into my routine, my mom came to visit me. That Saturday, on a cold rainy evening, my mom and I found a restaurant named Seamus McDaniel’s, an Irish place, to get some dinner and drinks! While we were there, one of the ‘locals’ started talking with my mom and I after he noticed I was wearing a Iowa Hawkeyes shirt. He made a comment about my shirt and introduced himself as ‘Bubba Bradshaw’, which made my mom and I giggle a bit from never have meeting a ‘Bubba’ before! Bubba mentioned that his family friends own the restaurant so he was there casually hanging out. Little did he know that he was going to run into me and my mom that night and then offer to show me around town since I had just moved there. I shyly agreed to his offer and about a week later we met at Bailey’s Chocolate Bar in Layfayette Square!! It wasn’t until date #4 when I found out his name is actually Corey, not Bubba, after were put on a wait-list at Kirkwood Station Brewing Company and Bubba told the lady his name was Corey. To my defense, I thought he was just saying Corey so the host wouldn’t question him, but later while he was telling me stories, it turns out, his name really is Corey! I told him how ‘relieved’ I was knowing his name really wasn’t Bubba *just kidding!!* but it was challenging for me at that point to call him anything other than Bubba!
How They Asked
We’ve been living together for 10 months at this point and we had been talking about when we were thinking about getting engaged. Bubba had mentioned months before that he thought about proposing during our trip to Ireland, but he took it seriously when I had mentioned I wanted my sisters and parents there during our engagement. My family isn’t the *best* at keeping secrets, so the plan I had for Bub was to take them out to dinner, tell them he was going to propose, and then propose that night so the secret wouldn’t get out! I was partially serious, yet joking when I said this because I knew that however, Bubba would propose, it would be extremely special.
With that, we were back in my hometown two weeks before we went to Ireland for two weeks with his parents and some relatives. In Iowa, my sisters and mother had each ‘cornered’ him and asked him when he was planning to propose. In all seriousness, he told them he wasn’t going to because he knew I wanted my family there for the proposal. Since I was able to stay in Iowa a few days later than him and he had time on his 7-hour drive to St. Louis to think about this proposal thing, Bubba said he knew the timing was right therefore, he bought a ring a few days later while I was still in Iowa. On my flight home, Bubba called both of my parents and asked for their approval. Depending on who tells the story, my parents say he choked up a bit, while Bubba says they were choking up a bit!
After searching through many, many engagement rings, Bub found the perfect one and brought it to his parents house for his mom to keep safe as we headed to Ireland to visit for adventure and to meet for the very first time ever, meet his 3rd cousins and see the farm his Great Grandpa grew up on. Without knowing that a ring had been purchased, I jokingly asked Bubba several times during our two week vacation if he was going to propose. He definitely fooled me by continually saying ‘no’ and giving reasons why. All it took was day 10 of 13 in Ireland, when we went to visit the family farm. As soon as we got there, we introduced ourselves and met many relatives! It was a very cherishing moment.
We toured the land his Great Grandpa lived on, farmed, and where he went to school (which was right across the street!) Moments later, Bubba asked me if I wanted to take a picture together on this red and white bench in the garden. I knew at this point something was happening and I became SUPER nervous. We sat down on the bench, took a few photos, and then he asked if we could switch spots. Nervously (but extremely excited) I said “If that’s what you want!” which led to Bubba dropping down on one knee, asking “Will You Marry Me?!” and then me crying for what seemed to be FOREVER!! These obviously were happy tears, yet all I could manage to say was “Are you serious?! Is this for real?!” – which eventually led to me saying “YES, OF COURSE!” I was so incredibly overjoyed and so incredibly happy. I never knew that I would be that overwhelmed with joy that I couldn’t stop crying!
Since my family was not in Ireland for this proposal and it was 12pm in Ireland and 7am in Iowa, I immediately called my parents and my sisters to share the amazing news! They couldn’t contain their excitement either and they cried happy tears with me. So much love was shared during that time.
Mariead Bradshaw (Bubba’s third cousin in-law, and whose house we were at) immediately brought us champagne to celebrate with. She helped make this moment so special because Bubba had reached out to her the week before we traveled to Ireland and Mariead made sure there was a special place for him to ask the question in the garden with flowers and a bench to sit on. I could not have imagined getting proposed to in any other place in any other way – on the Bradshaw Family farm that has been around for 6 generations.
