Keddiebears: Melissa and Jon are engaged!!

Last Friday night, at our final regular PEF meeting of the year, Alex Hwang '10 stood up during our normal sharing and prayer time. He started out by saying that he wanted to give thanks for two people that he really respected, and who had shaped his Princeton experience thus far. And then he launched into a really sweet tribute to his older brother, Jon, a graduating senior this year. Which totally brought tears to my eyes. And the second person Alex wanted to give thanks for was Melissa Plapp, also a graduating senior, and Jon's girlfriend. Which made me even more teary-eyed -- how much must Alex love his brother, to want to include his girlfriend in his end-of-year tribute to Jon?

Alex started wrapping things up, by saying what a blessing it had been to know Jon and Melissa as brother and sister in Christ. But that soon, he'll be able to call them brother and sister. Because as of that afternoon, they were engaged!

And the room literally exploded. I squealed in a register I don't think I'd ever quite hit -- and I wasn't the only one!

And, of course, we all rushed them at the end of the meeting, to congratulate them, and get the whole engagement story... And by "we all," I mean all the women in the room. :)

Side note: Anna, I know I promised I'd get all the details, but... there's social reporting, and then there's stealing someone else's thunder. So you're just going to have to ask Jon and Melissa for the proposal story!

Jon and Melissa are both such stalwart, strong believers, and a wonderful couple. We're so excited for them!

They asked me to take some engagement photos of them around campus this afternoon -- and since Jon has now debuted the photos in his own Facebook album, I've been given the green light to post a few here. :)

[Click to enlarge thumbnails.]