Eric and I actually met in a Chicago chat room on aol. I was there looking for recommendations for stuff to do since I was new to the north side. (And yeah, I liked to stir up my fair share of trouble back in the day.) Anyway, he sent me an IM, which led to several emails. A few weeks later it led to a phone call, which lasted 6 hours. One night, he called me on his way home from work to complain about a bad day. Out of nowhere, he said "I really, really, really, really want to see you tonight" Me, being the smart aleck I am, thought to myself "Well, if he had said 'really' one more time, I would have gone." This was going through my head just as he uttered one more word out loud...."really". So I took it as a sign and went over there. He was a perfect gentleman. Within the month, I was spending several days a week with him and we moved in together a year later. Two years later, I found out I was pregnant and gave birth to our daughter in July 2007.

We had talked about getting married for quite some time. When I found out I was pregnant, one of the first things I said to him was "And don't even think of asking me to marry you because I will always wonder if you asked because you WANTED to, or asked because you felt you had to" It was never brought up again. On Christmas morning of 2008, we woke up early and opened gifts in front of the tree. While our daughter was playing with her new toys, Eric told me "Santa left a little something for you". It wasn't a big deal - we had always given each other stockings on Christmas. But this time, he took down his own stocking and handed it to me. I pulled out the usual stocking stuffers while I watched our daughter dancing around with her new Barney toy. In the very bottom of the stocking was a ring box. I opened it to find my ring. Eric got to one knee and told me "I want to do this the right way. I love you. You have given me everything I could ask for - your heart, your mind, and our beautiful daughter. I want nothing more than to have you by my side for the rest of my life. Will you marry me?" And being the oh-so-sophisticated girl that I am, I leaned over and gave him a hug! D'OH! After finally saying yes, I proceeded to make an even bigger fool of myself by thanking him about 40 times. lol

Right now, we're looking at a wedding in Savannah, Ga in the fall of 2010. Savannah is a place we fell in love with when we visited a few years ago. We loved it so much, that we chose Savannah as our daughter's middle name. As it stands right now, it will be a planned elopement - just me, Eric, and our dd. When we return home, we'll host a brunch for our family & friends. (We hadn't planned on doing anything, but were guilt-tripped into it by several people who want to be able to celebrate with us.) We've chosen Maggiano's.... which is the restaurant Eric took me to on our first "real" date.