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Andrew Ranftle

@andrew_ranftle

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I wanted this to be a complete surprise…which became harder than I expected.

The night before, I was supposed to pull Taylor’s dad, Gary, aside and ask for his blessing. The problem was Taylor and her mom Lorraine were around us the entire night…and both of them are basically investigators. 😂 There was absolutely no believable reason I could come up with for needing to speak to Gary alone, so I went to bed without doing it and was pretty stressed about how I was going to pull this off the next day.

On the boat, everybody eventually went off on the jet skis and was hanging out in the back, and I finally got my chance. I pulled Gary aside, told him what I was planning, and asked for his blessing. He gave it to me…and somehow we both managed to go back and act completely normal.

Nobody else knew. Literally nobody.

The only people in on it were my good friend Bobby and Tori, who deserve all the credit for the incredible pictures and videos. I was slightly concerned Bobby might give it away after a few drinks 😂…but he held it together.

Not long after I spoke to Gary, Bobby and Tori suggested we take the boat over to a private beach for family pictures. A few people really didn’t feel like getting off the boat, so suddenly I’m the guy aggressively lobbying for family photos…which is not suspicious at all. 😂 Somehow we got everybody over there.

The plan was to start with the whole family, then take pictures with smaller and smaller groups until eventually it was just Taylor and me.

Taylor thought it was just another picture.

Then I got down on one knee.

She was in shock…

Her first response was, “I’m gonna throw up.”

She was completely shocked. All the misdirection over the last few months actually worked.

But the part that got me the most was what happened afterward. The kids immediately came running over and hugged us. Seeing how genuinely happy Asher, Aaden and Alijah were completely put me over the edge emotionally. Alijah told me it was the happiest day of his life. Asher told me it was the best birthday ever…his birthday had been the day before.

That meant more to me than I can explain.

Taylor cried for probably an hour. She FaceTimed her f

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Bits of bliss ❤️

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Some pics from a week with great friends and family. Fire Island-CT-Vermont #fireisland #tpccromwell #orvis

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Destination weddings are cool I guess

Congrats @lisa_cecc17 & @ant_cecc16 and thank you for giving us the experience of a lifetime ❤️🤌

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The garden and flowers are starting to produce #garden #cucumbers #radishes #sunflowers🌻 #shastadaisy #zinnias

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Rangers Win !!! Rangers Win !!! #nyrangers

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Let’s Go Rangers #nyrangers #aruba #lgr

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LGR

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First day of the season. 3 runs open top to bottom at #okemo. #fresheggs #ludlow

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Fun weekend surfcasting with Chef Andrew. Only 1 keeper but we will be back !!! #stripers

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Great family time and boarding in PC !! #parkcity

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Let’s goooo !!!

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