Back-story: How your parents met, dated, fell in love, got married, and had you!

Hmmm... how do I fit several years of information into one blog post?

I guess I should start by saying I think it's really important that Baby G knows who her parents are (are? were?) outside of being parents. I remember growing up thinking the adults around me were all-knowing demi-gods who never made mistakes and always had the right answer for any question instantly. I can't really remember the exact moment I realized that adults were just older versions of myself (with the same decision-making struggles who also had to bear the brunt of the consequences of their actions), but over time I realized that the adults in my life were once working towards the very same things I was working toward and made many of the same mistakes in the process. I want Baby G to respect us as parents, but I also feel like it would be good for her to know our faults and who we were before we became her awesome parents.

My husband and I will likely post separate entries about our own personal back-stories (before meeting each other) but I wanted to take a minute to post some of the basics about how we met, dated, fell in love, got married, and had our beautiful Baby G.

I first met my husband back in the early 2000s. I can't really remember exactly when it happened, but I can guess it was probably sometime during 2003 (the year I graduated from KU). My best friend (Uncle J) and I decided suddenly we wanted to invest our time and energy into playing Magic: The Gathering...

*pause for effect* Yes. Your mom is a nerd and so is Uncle J. Don't worry, though... your dad is a huge nerd, too. This is actually how we met the first time.

Mom and Uncle J: Being totally annoying nerds together since 1998.

At the time, the best place in town to play M:tG was Mass Street Comics. Uncle J and I would stroll down there from time to time to pick up booster packs of cards to build our decks. (It's actually sort of painful to type this out) I kept noticing the handsome shop-keeper when we would go in but always sort of felt like he thought Uncle J and I were total weirdos.

*pause for effect* Yeah, he was right. Anyway...

We went in several times over the year or so we focused on playing M:tG (before moving on to something else just as pointless and time consuming/expensive, probably) and I was always a little excited to go hoping I would see this handsome shop-keeper. Eventually, we stopped going in and even more eventually, the shop closed down.

I actually saw that handsome shop-keep one more time after the store closed before we met for the second time. He was pumping gas at a gas station on the corner of 23rd and Harper. I tried to catch his eye to wave at him nonchalantly (like I was cool, or something) to see if he looked like he recognized me. He didn't look my direction and I decided not to embarrass myself.

Fast forward past a couple of failed dates/online chats with loser guys/general disdain for the whole "dating" process, etc. In the fall of 2005 I was HUGE into Myspace...

*pause for effect* Yeah, Myspace was this thing that people used to use before Facebook, which is probably ALSO antiquated by the time Baby G is reading this. Or, maybe Zuckerberg has taken over the world and Baby G knows him only as "Lord Zuckerberg" or something. Who knows?

Anyway. I had a profile on Myspace and one day in the fall of 2005, I got a random message from some guy who didn't even have a proper profile picture and went by the name "Doc Ock" which meant absolutely nothing to me despite being a nerd. I wasn't in the habit of responding to people I didn't know, so I thought about ignoring it. Instead, I checked out his profile. Hey... this dude was pretty funny. Ok, fine. Let's do this. I responded. One response after another became a whirlwind online romance full of disgustingly adorable flirting. I couldn't really get him to show me a picture of himself (I was wondering if he had a hunchback or something) until I finally pestered him enough that he, likely, sent me a picture to shut me up. My thought processes went something like this, "Hey... that guy looks like... no... it can't be? Isn't that the shop-keep guy from Mass Street Comics? It sure looks like him... hmmmm..." I, of course, played it cool and didn't let on that I knew him and the flirting continued. Eventually, I let on that I knew who he was and told him, sheepishly, who I was thinking he wouldn't remember me. But, he did remember me! He thought I was cute! (WIN!) He didn't approach me at the time because he was in a relationship and figured Uncle J and I were, too as we always came in together.

We finally met up in person (again) and our first date was actually at a wedding reception (loaded first date, no?) We moved very quickly (as in "he moved in with me pretty much immediately because I lived with Uncle J at the time, but Uncle J was in Iraq because he was a Marine and I was super lonely and bored and head over heals for this new guy I had just re-met"). Uh... anyway... so he moved in and when Uncle J came back he got a job in Leavenworth and moved out, leaving us two lovebirds to build our first nest together.

*pause for effect* D'AWWWW!!! *kissy faces*

Mom and Dad: datin' and lookin' super cute!

Fast forward to the fall of 2006 (November 25th, 2006): We spent a lovely evening on the Plaza complete with delicious dinner (OMG chocolate lava cake NOM!), an "interesting" carriage ride (with a driver who regaled us with super inappropriate and un-romantic stories the entire time despite having dropped big bucks for a romantic ride), and a sweet proposal of marriage by a fountain (instead of the carriage ride like he had planned) via a comic book! I, of course, said YES!

One year later (November 10, 2007) we were married at Danforth Chapel on the campus of the University of Kansas in front of all of our friends and family! We had our wedding, then we had our reception (at the Knights of Columbus), then we had a kickass after-wedding jamboree at The Jackpot Saloon where we partied until the wee hours of the morning!

Secret identity: Total Rockstars!

Fast forward to the summer of 2010 (around late May, to be exact). I had just spent the last year and a half losing a TON of weight (over 100 lbs) and I was feeling pretty proud of myself. I had kicked a lot of bad habits and instilled new and healthy habits into my life. That's why I couldn't understand why, all of a sudden for the last several days, I had an extreme craving for high-sugar coffee drinks (I haven't really ever been a coffee drinker). On day 3 of feeling like I would shank a dude for a caramel macchiato, I began to put two and two together. I did the math ("Oh crap, has it really been that long since my last cycle??"). I freaked out for the next several hours at work until I could go home and take the pregnancy test I had sitting in the downstairs bathroom (there were several other times I thought I might be pregnant, but wasn't and I had an extra one laying around). I rushed home, way more excited about the prospect of peeing on a stick than I had ever been, and took the test. I had barely put the cap back on the stick and sat it down on the counter when I saw the double lines. Preggo, for reals.

*pause for effect* OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG........

I ran over to my mom's house to share the exciting news (there were tears, some were even mine!) then ran out to Walgreens to buy two more tests to be TRIPLE sure I was really pregnant. After two more positive tests I knew it was time to tell the hubby... who happened to be out playing kickball with about 50 other people... across town. I booked it over to the field, found him in the crowd, pulled him aside, took a deep breath and said, "Um... I'm pregnant!"

*pause for effect* I really wish I could describe his face. It was priceless!

The rest of the kickball game was spent spreading the news to the other 50 or so people present. Joel got high-fives from the dudes, I got giddy squealing from the ladies. It was a blast! I am going to devote another entire post to my pregnancy and all the fun and not-so-fun things associated with it, but...

Fast forward to February 11, 2011: Welcome to our family, Baby G! Now that Baby G is caught up and remembers everything from this date forward (right?) I will save the rest of the memories for other posts.

Dude, I have a baby. Also, I'm exhausted!

Our lives were fun and full of adventure before Baby G, but the addition of Baby G has added a completely different level of adventure we didn't think possible. I guess I should thank Magic: the Gathering for bringing my hubby and I together and, ultimately, leading to Baby G's birth, but I just can't bring myself to do it. It's far too nerdy!