Ring on finger!

Yay! It happened!

Here's the story...

On Saturday I had plans to have dinner with my friend Tara at Wasabi, which happens to be across the street from David's apartment. Being a caring, loving girlfriend, I brought him a pizza from the Mack (he loves that BLT pizza) and promised him I would come by after dinner. He called and texted a couple of times during dinner wanting me to give him a 15 minute warning before I came back so that he could make sure he was home from running errands. I thought it was weird, but I did--David's usually not needy like that.

After dinner, he met me in the hall and led me to his door. It was all dark and he had lit a path of candles from the door to the table in the living room. On the table where a TON more candles and the ring box. He said to open it up and when I did it had a key chain in it. I turned around with the key chain and he was holding the ring out to me. He said, "Will you marry me?"

Ahhhh.

Of course, I said yes. Then we split the bottle of wine that came free with the ring purchase. I love a freebie!

We joked later that it was just "confirming our appointment" since I have already reserved a church, bought a dress, and told everyone I know. We're cute.

Announcing and setting dates!

So this past weekend, David's parents came to town. We sat down to dinner Friday night and "officially" told them the news....pretending like they didn't already know. :) In their defense, Dan and Debra pretended to be surprised and even initially denied that Danna had informed them of our plans. However, the fault doesn't totally lie with Danna for spilling the beans...apparently, David's mom had found cards for jewelry stores in his apartment before Christmas. Oops.

As the weekend wore on, we found out that Debra didn't just "know" we were going to get married--she had shared it with her friends. Apparently, at lunch one day last week, they had asked about David and she stated that he was getting married but "don't tell anyone yet--he hasn't told us yet." Cute.

On Monday, I called both of my grandparents to tell them the news. Grandma Stainbrook was excited and informed me she thinks another of my cousins will be getting engaged soon. She also said that St. Louis was pretty far to travel, but she would make the exception for my wedding. Thanks. The phone call to Grandma Brownback was a hoot. She first asked me what size I thought my dress would be (whatever fits and can be found at the Goodwill, Grandma) and then said, "Isn't that quick? But, you know, it's ok. Because you're old. How old are you now? 27? God!" She also questioned whether David would love my dog (she's amazing, of course he does!).
AND Grandma Brownback is supportive of our August date because the planting will be done. Yes! Planting is done!!

On that note...a date has been set. We decided on August 1st...and the church has been reserved!

So now I've got a whirl-wind of activity. On Friday I meet with a mortgage counselor and a real estate agent about buying a house (oh yeah....that too) and then on Tuesday and Thursday Mom and I are going dress shopping. I'm pushing hard for the Goodwill, but have made appointments at "real" places too. David filed his taxes so I'll be getting a ring eventually (you can laugh--I think it's funny too). I'm glad it's coming--I had figured we would be celebrating our 1 year anniversary before he officially proposed :)

Thank goodness for Spring Break!!

Empty Threats and text message miscommunication

So last night, K-State played Mizzou in basketball. I didn't watch (is anyone surprised?) but about 8:45 pm, I received a phone call from Dad.

"Darcie, you tell Dave that if he doesn't cheer for K-State, the wedding is off."

I laughed and sent a text to David. He countered something about a rubber game, whatever that means. I informed him that an appropriate response is, 'of course, honey. I love you WAY more than Mizzou.' David failed.

Earlier that same day, David managed to type the wrong thing. Text message is hard! I had called our church to find out possible dates. I sent David the following text...
"Church available all July and Aug and Sept except 9/19 and 9/26. Cost is $XXX [way too much]. Thoughts? What about 8/1?"

David replied, "Darcie...I am having a hard time breathing...something is wrong with me...$%$#"

Not exactly the response a girl is looking for. Luckily, my phone rang before I saw the text with him explaining that he didn't see my last text and was really having difficulty in breathing. Hmmmmm....

An alternate, but not true, story

David sat down, man to man with Alan "Poppa Bear" Brownback.

"Sir, I want to marry your daughter."

"Do you have a job?"

"Well, no but, I have been offered an internship that would pay roughly $1/hour."

"You know, I've always doubted my daughter's ability to find a man who could support her. You're not really doing a whole lot to dispel those myths. I have this stray cat at my clinic. Would you rather have that? It would complain and nag a whole lot less."

"Yeah, I think I'll take the cat."

David left Lyndon the proud owner of the little cat named Veronica Breadbasket. He didn't manage to put a ring on his girlfriend's finger yet... in fact, that is most likely farther away now, considering the $76 trip to target that followed to buy kitty accessories.

It's halfway official!

We traveled to Lyndon, Kansas this past weekend to talk to Darcie's parents about our desire to legally bind ourselves together.

We settled down in the beer room to a late dinner of pizza and gallons of beer. After shooting the breeze about David's embarrassing job offer (at an astounding $1/hour pay rate) we told Mom and Dad that we want to get married in late summer or early fall.

Dad promptly reached into the refrigerator and pulled out two more beers. It was cute.

Considering that Kyle and Cher got married in '08 AND Grant and Hanna are planning to get married 7/19/10...they handled the prospect of 3 weddings in 3 summers very well. Mom started working toward logistics and Dad talked about how we were going to be poor for a while (very true). However, we received a blessing and Dad's insistence that, because we want a small wedding, those we don't invite will just have to "learn to deal with rejection."

The title of this post is "halfway official" because this is the first and only formal step we've made. No ring (see above comment about the $1/hour job offer) and no purchases/reservations of any kind have been made. All we know is that we want a keg involved somewhere and likely a hog or fried chicken. Everything else will work out.

Next step: telling David's parents and both extended families. It's going to be a busy next few months!