It's official!

Here's a crappy phone picture of my new engagement ring!

I'll post a picture of the happy couple once I'm on my own computer. Thursday night, T made a big deal about taking me out on a date and spending quality time with me. At around 6:00, he picked me up and asked if I wanted to go to the beach until our "real" evening started. I didn't care what we did, so off we went to the beach, T's phone receiving text messages all the way there. Something was up...I pretended not to notice. We pulled into the exactly right parking lot and walked down to the sand. As soon as we had turned the corner around a dune, I saw a white table and two little wood chairs sitting in the sun. I gasped, "Did you do this?" He just smiled. As we walked closer, I saw that the table had been draped with a lace table cloth, real china, wine glasses, and four candlesticks. This was the work of two very good friends. He'd gotten others involved in this date. T pulled my chair out for me and then reached into the giant picnic basket for the Olive Garden he had picked up. "I'm sorry I didn't make this and it's not really fancy..." he began but I was too busy squealing "Breadsticks!!!! I was hoping we'd go to Olive Garden." I'm easy to please, you see. Out came salad and breadsticks. We talked about nothing in particular and people gave us curious glances as they walked by (me in my dress and he in his button up collared shirt and nice patent leather shoes). Out came the steak, summer vegetables, and spaghetti. T couldn't decide what I would want more so he opted for all of it. We had a little of everything and then T started babbling. And I knew it was coming. I dropped my fork to listen to him nervously tell me how I'm always there in his dreams, in his thoughts, during his day. I'm the first person he wants to talk to when he's trying to make a decision, or when something good happens, or when he just needs to complain. I'm there and he wants me there all the time forever and he knows I've been the best thing that's ever happened to him (all the while he's fumbling with his pocket and standing up and walking over to me) and then he gets down on one knee in the sand and says "I guess I'm just trying to say, Will you marry me?" And I say yes and he slips the perfect ring which fits perfectly on my finger. And then the part you never see in the movies...we clear the table, throw away the napkins, re-pack everything into the picnic basket and proceed to carry everything back to the car. Perfect.