Mr. Right

   I have been wanting to write this post since last Sunday (the 12th) after it happened, but we were busy having fun at Magic Kingdom and then with work and being lazy the last days off I had, then working over the weekend, my blogging has been neglected. It almost didn't get done today, but for some reason I feel more awake than usual tonight. Possibly because I took two walks? One with Alana (3.5 miles) and then one after lunch by myself (2 miles). But the first thing on my To Do list for today was "blog about how wonderful Michael is".

 ^^ My new favorite picture of us ~ on the ferry boat after Disney.

   We had a super great weekend (the 11th and 12th) and I just wanted to take time to write about it so I can share it and always remember it. Michael had to go into work at VAMP that Saturday to help one of the students make up time she missed for one of her practicals, but surprised me by coming home early (around 2:30). I told him that I usually like when he texts me that he's on the way home so I know I have about half an hour to get the house tidied up. That day I had all my bath/hygiene products all over the floor, organizing what I wanted to keep and pitching what was expired, then writing down what I had so I stop buying more. We drove to one of the outlet malls in Lake Buena Vista so he could look for new shoes. We held hands and walked around a lot, but he didn't end up buying anything.

   It was funny because now instead of pointing out nice cars, he nods and says, "Look at that. That's a nice stroller! That's the one we should get." I love this phase we are in, how he tells me every day that he is so excited to be a dad and that so many of our conversations lately revolve around baby stuff. I like when he comes up with ideas too. For the baby shower invitations I just got kind of generic but cute ones from Dollar Tree. He was appalled and said we needed to look up invitation ideas on Pinterest and make our own! (However a few days ago I said I was just going to use the cheap ones after he told me that none of his friends like babies so he doesn't even want to invite any of them to the shower we were going to throw at our house in May. That kind of made me sad.)

   Anyway, so then he decided that we should go look at strollers so he could show me the one he wants ~ pictured below. We practiced walking around the store with it and it moved very easily. We also "accidentally" found out that the front wheel can be detached. He found a rocking chair that is super comfortable, and now I want that too ~ the one he is sitting in in the picture. We looked at sets of cribs and dressers. He pointed out which ones he liked, which were nice, and we agreed on the off-white color. We looked at bed sheets and blankets and found ones we think are super cute as well (for a girl), although we can't put them on our registry yet since we still don't know which gender Chip is! We had the Anatomy Scan appointment this past Thursday (the 16th) and that was a 45 minute ultrasound of the technician getting measurements of all the body parts which came out normal. But during that whole time, she still couldn't get a good view of the downstairs area!? Grrr..

    After Babies R Us we went to dinner at Chevy's and it was amazingly delicious as always. I don't remember the free chips and dip being sooo good, but I ate almost two baskets of them! I would say that is my favorite Mexican restaurant, and I'm glad they have one down here. The first time(s) we had been to Chevy's was in California. I took the rice and beans to work the next day. Those were so good too, especially when scooped with sour cream and cheddar flavored Ruffles!
    At one point while we waited for our food, Michael was doing an impression of someone who was stuttering (?) or singing a line of a song where the music made it sound like stuttering, but he was so cute and seemed embarrassed after he did it. I laughed a lot and he asked why, looking even more embarrassed at that point. I said it seemed like a very first or second date thing where the boyfriend is trying to be cool and funny, but ends up saying something that they feel is dumb and automatically think "aw, I hope I didn't just mess it up" or "I hope she still likes me". I love it so much when we have fun and laugh a lot, especially on a date. Maybe part of it is because Michael and I never had a real date until we were already boyfriend and girlfriend. So having those "first date feelings" is very enjoyable like we're making up for it. I guess our first real "date" was going to see HP6 even though it was not one-on-one, but that's when we held hands for the first time. Before that we just hung out a lot at Full Sail and at each other's apartments (and Ryan was almost always there, at my request).

   This picture above was from when Michael felt Chip kicking for the first time! He had the biggest smile on his face- even bigger than in the picture. I think he only felt two or three and then Chip stopped, and he hasn't felt any since then. I think today Chip got hiccups, which was interesting. I read that at 21 weeks (which I am now as of yesterday) the baby can get hiccups and what I felt were less "powerful" than the kicks, and it was happened every five seconds, for about 15 times. Kicks tend to happen every 30 seconds and only for about five times before they stop. The kicks he felt were on Valentine's Day after I got home from work. He surprised me with flowers- red roses and tulips. And speaking of surprises, he got me good again last night. He texted me while I was at work saying that he wanted to discuss how the baby room should be set up since we talked about buying one big piece each month (crib, dresser, padded rocking chair, and stroller/ car seat). Shortly after I got home he said, "Okay, so what I was thinking was..", turned on the light, and he had the crib and dresser set up and decorated already!! It was such a great surprise that I totally was not expecting since he didn't tell me he had ordered them. He also got the mattress and mattress pad/cover that is dust mite and water (pee) proof. I just made sure he put it on our credit card and that his parents didn't pay for all of it. They already help us with so much that we could be -and, I think, should be- paying for ourselves, but they insist. I loved that he put some of the stuffed animals on the shelf and had the blue fox blanket draped over the side of the crib. He doesn't want me posting pictures of it though. He wants our parents to see it in person first, and his family won't be down until August. Hopefully he will let me post some in a month or two when the whole thing is done with framed pictures and birch tree decals on the walls.