Holy Matcha – It’s a Proposal!
We love people, have you noticed? We love sharing their love stories and we are smitten for a sweet proposal story. Geraldine reached out and I was extra excited because she's just an hour away from me so I get to go down and try her cafe AND share this sweet love story. YAY ME. Ok, enough about me ... take it away Geraldine!
Holy Matcha
My name is Geraldine Ridaura, I’m a young entrepreneur and I’m the founder of San Diego’s first matcha cafe, Holy Matcha. I love all things matcha and I have a beautiful 3 year old Russian Tabby named Mita, he’s my life. Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day (especially brunch) and I am engaged to my best friend, my rock, my partner in crime.
Here’s a quick background, when we became boyfriend/girlfriend in 2010, we went to San Francisco for our first date and ever since then, every time that we are in SF we ALWAYS go to “our park” which is Washington Square Park and have lunch there.
So here we go… fast forward 7 years later:
On Monday, December 11th, I was woken up at around 4:30am by a number of calls from my boyfriend. When I saw that he was calling, I immediately picked up (thinking it was an emergency) and so I answer and greets me and tells me that I need to get up and get ready because we have a flight to catch. Mind you, I was half asleep so I had no clue what was going on, so I asked him for what and to where, he responds that we are going to San Francisco and I felt a rush of excitement through my entire body (never once did I smell anything fishy), I just love San Francisco. He also said that he had already spoken to my employees prior to surprising me and that everything at the cafe was set for me not to work that day and everyone was aware that I wasn’t going to go in.
I was a little shocked about this whole situation, but I was so happy that I was going to San Francisco, happy that I was taking a day off of work (my first day off in 10 months since I had opened), and lastly, I was extra excited that I was going to spend some quality time with him since I’m always working.
Once we landed in San Francisco, we go straight to (our usual spot) The Buena Vista for some Irish coffee and proceed to go to other cafes for matcha (I’m obsessed with matcha) and just enjoy ourselves (it was a gorgeous day). As we are walking around and enjoying ourselves, I decided to climb Russian Hill which leads to the top of Lombard Street. It took a while to get to the top, but when we made it, I wanted to FaceTime my mother and show her the awesome views (mind you, this detail has purpose towards the end) but she never once answer any of my calls. We get to the top of Lombard street and we do the typical… take photos and the views were truly gorgeous that day, there was no fog and it was surprisingly warm for December, but he was actually ready to go and I thought to myself, lets go get lunch ( I was STARVING) and he said he still wanted to stop by "our park” and that’s when something snapped within my head and I was like NO I WANT TO EAT. What felt like a million years for the uber to arrive, when it finally arrived, I thought we were going to lunch, but the uber took us to our park and I just didn’t understand why or most importantly why he didn’t care that it was almost 3pm and I was starving ( I didn’t have breakfast or lunch by this time).
This is where the fun begins:
We are at our park, Washington Square park, I am basically “hangry” and he wants to take a photo, we take it and then I am ready to leave and as I turn around to tell him that, I see his face and he looked weird. He then proceeds to grab my hands and wants to connect and starts telling me he loves me etc., and I’m not having it, I cut him off and told him “I know you love me, but can we please talk about us over lunch or after lunch…” and he kept on trying to dig for a connection from my end, but I felt that the more he tried the more I got anxiety because I wanted to leave. A few minutes later, he starts crying and then it hit me, I thought “The reason he’s telling me that he loves me, brings me to our park, and now he’s crying… he’s going to tell me that he cheated on me” and I said this to him and he denies it and so I was lost and confused as to why he’s crying profusely and he then tells me, “you’re the most difficult woman I’ve ever met in my entire life, I love you, I brought you to SF not just for a day trip…” and again I interrupt him and I told him that I couldn’t spend the night as I need to work the next day and the poor thing is crying and I can see it in his eye how frustrated he is, I just truly didn’t understand what was going on.
So he continues, “you are so frustrating, shut up Geraldine! I brought you here, to our park, because I want to propose to you and you are ruining it!” - then he takes out the ring and my heart stopped. Every girl dreams of this day and for some reason I always thought I’d cry, but I didn’t. I was beyond shocked and it’s almost like my body went numb. He gets on both of his knees and asked me if I wanted to marry him… I’m assuming I said yes. That whole moment from when he took out the ring I do not remember, it’s all blurry. He gets up and hugs me, you know the typical, but then he’s like, “oh wait, where are they?” And I didn’t know what he meant y this, and as I turn my head and look right, my parents pop out from behind a try and are crying and that’s when I lost it. I cried like a baby. He’s always known that my parents are my everything and mean the world to me so having them present when I get proposed would be out of this world beautiful for me. NOW I understood why my mother never answered her FaceTime calls.
I am engaged.
I didn’t even know what type of ring I wanted, yet the one he made for me was perfect and since that day I haven’t taken it off.
We think that our BRAND NEW Romantic Botanical Free Printable Wedding Invitation Suite would be perfect for this Geraldine and Sean. You can grab it for free right here. The entire suite will be available soon for the taking.
I love my business, I really do, but getting engaged to this human that I’ve dedicated my life to and all of a sudden I opened my business and I put him on the back burner and he stills stayed by my side, never once complained about not getting attention, he wanted to marry me. That day, I practically told everyone in San Francisco we were engaged and I was the happiest girl in the entire world. On the plane that night back to San Diego, I told him that I wanted to have an intimate wedding vs a huge wedding (in college I always wanted a huge wedding), I now have my own business, but I really want to dedicate some time on my personal life and make it special, so I suggested Europe. On August 4th, Sean and I will be getting married in a private villa outside of Rome, Italy. We’ll be joined by our immediate family and I cannot wait.
I am currently running a business, managing 10+ employees, planning my businesses 1 year anniversary coming up in March, I chose my wedding dress (arrives in May), and I’m planning my wedding!!!