Successful Shopping and The Proposal Story

{Edit: I've decided that this post is a PERFECT candidate for Elizabeth's Fabulous Find Friday-come on, these are some FABULOUS finds!}

So as promised, I'm finally going to tell you all about my AWESOME proposal!

But before I do (Get it, I do, like wedding vows? I'm so funny!), I have to show off a few awesome purchases that I made today!

I've been trying to cut back, really, I have...

I made 3 stops today: Lowes, Staples, and Target (you can see where this is going).

Stop #1-Lowes:

I got this AWESOME rug that will be moving into my classroom (though Charlie has already approved it staying here).

Dark brown and off white chevrons.

Adorable.

You're jealous, aren't you?

It's ok, it's an awesome rug. I'd be jealous, too.

Wait until I tell you how much I paid for it-you'll be even more jealous.

No joke.

Stop #2-Staples

Come on, it's school supply season. I can't just ignore school supply season. That would be wrong. And sad.

So to prevent myself from slipping into a deep depression from lack of school supplies, I stocked up on 25 pocket folders (which just so happen to match my adorable crate seats) and these super fun markers for anchor charts.

Did I mention that the markers are smelly?

I. Love. Smelly. Markers.

I see LOTS of anchor charts on my horizon.

Stop #3-Target

You know I can't pass up a trip to Target. And I needed coffee. And it just so happens that we have a Starbucks in our Target. It's heaven.

You should be proud of me-this is probably the cheapest Target trip I've had in months. (No seriously, months.).

I found these super fun picture frames (that match my classroom perfectly) at the Dollar Spot for $2.50 each. (Not exactly a dollar, Target. Shame on you.)

While I was lurking around in the Dollar Spot, I found those super cute birthday cakes for my birthday display (that I am finally getting around to having for my 3rd year of teaching, sigh). Did I mention that they're reversible? They are. One side is blue, the other pink. Hello, color coordination.

And lastly, check out that super cute bunting that I got for a whopping $1.18. Even better-it's actually fabric, not paper! Woot!

I've decided that the first person to leave me a comment and guess the grand total of my shopping trip (to the nearest $1, because I don't know where I left the Lowes receipt) before midnight tomorrow night can pick a resource from my TpT store for FREE! (Don't forget to include your email address so I can contact you if you win!)

I know, I'm the best.

Now, onto that proposal.

The Proposal

Ok, let me preface this with the fact that Matthew is NOT a planner. He's just not. I'm lucky if I can get him to plan a cookout with close friends more than a day in advance.

So Matthew had been telling me for a couple months that he was going to plan a surprise day for me, because he knows that I LOVE surprises...and because he's not a planner.

Let me remind you, at his point we had been dating for about 2 weeks shy of 3 years, so this girl was itching for a proposal and he knew it. So he made it very clear that I was POSSIBLE that there could be a proposal at the end of my surprise day, but not to expect it and then be disappointed if it didn't happen. 

We met up for lunch downtown at Jimmy Johns that day, and he had worked from home that morning because he had a project that he needed to finish up without distractions. All through lunch, I was trying to talk him into just taking the afternoon off so that we could hang out, but he wouldn't bite.

After procuring cookies from a nearby cookie shop, we walked back to our cars, where I made a final plea for him to take the afternoon off. 

Didn't work.

Instead, he got a smirk on his face and told me to go sit in my car and wait about two minutes for an email because, and I quote, "Your surprise day starts now!"

He hopped in his car and drove off while I sat giddily waiting for the email.

I finally got the email, which had a link to a website.

I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but Matt is super smart when it comes to computer stuff. Programming, the works.

The past week or so, he had been spending a lot of time coding in the evenings, which really isn't all that uncommon. He gets caught up in a project and can't stop thinking about it until it's done.

Well, turns out that he wasn't coding for work.

You see, Matt had been spending all of that time writing a web app. (For those of you who don't speak computer geek, a web app is like an app that you would install on your iPhone, except it runs from a website instead of a standalone application.)

So the link that was in this email was a link to the web app he had created. 

A web app for a scavenger hunt. I LOVE scavenger hunts. 

The scavenger hunt took me all around town to different places that were significant to our relationship (and included features like location verification to make sure I was where I said I was).

And since I'm a bit of a geek, I took screen shots of each step. (And I'm really glad that I did!) Since it would take me forever to upload all of the screenshots onto Blogger, I've posted the album to my Facebook page, so you can check out the whole scavenger hunt there.

You REALLY don't want to skip that part.

Remember, even though this totally SCREAMS proposal, I was told not to expect it, so all afternoon I was trying to convince myself to not even CONSIDER it.

So after the scavenger hunt, I got all dressed up for our dinner date. We went to a pretty fancy restaurant in town that we like to go to for our anniversary, Valentine's day, and other important events.

During dinner, he told me that he had a couple ideas for things we could do after dinner, but he hadn't decided which one he wanted to do.

I was convinced that the planning had ended and that he was simply winging it. Sigh.

After we finished eating, Matt decided that we needed to have dessert. 

I don't turn down dessert.

He then told me that we needed to kill a little time before our next activity, so we slowly ate dessert, and then went for a walk around Central Park (not the New York one...). After meandering aimlessly through the park and failing in our attempts to take a picture of ourselves, we finally headed toward the car.

After we got in the car, he pulled out a blindfold that he told me I had to wear on the way to our next location.

Now let me preface this with the fact that I do NOT like not being able to see. That's the main reason why I don't like haunted houses. I actually LIKE being able to see where I'm going-it freaks me out if I can't. I apparently never conveyed that to him. Whoops.

So the whole way there, I'm bugging him about taking off the blindfold and whining about how I hate not being able to see. You guys, I was paying attention to every turn trying to figure out where the heck we were going. 

Apparently I did a pretty good job, too. I found our later that we took a few trips through some parking lots to throw me off. (I knew we didn't have any roads that curvy in town!)

We finally park at the mystery location and Matt comes around to help me out of the car (and I'm still really wanting to take that blindfold off). We walk around the car, and then up 3 stairs (NOT cool while blindfolded) into this building.

As we walk in, I can hear on of our songs playing...go ahead and click play. You'll want the soundtrack for this one. I'll wait.

I'm totally clueless as to where we are, there's a musty smell like an old building, but I just can't figure out where we are.

He leads me into a room that has a concrete or tile floor, and then onto carpet. We dance around for a few minutes (still blindfolded, sigh). 

Then he takes off the blindfold and I'm...

In my classroom which he and some of our friends had decorated. They had strung lights from the ceiling-he had been waiting for it to get dark. They had taken one of my rugs and put it in the middle of the room and moved one of my tables to the middle which had the ring box.

And then another one of our songs played...you know the drill.

Yup, that's right-he proposed in my classroom. I know. Gets me choked up, too.

After I said 'yes,' he walked over to the door and asked if we should go see everyone-our friends who had helped decorate had been sitting down the hall in the computer lab the whole time. And apparently, one of them recorded a video of me walking into the building blindfolded, you know, when I was complaining (oops).

Of course, orchestrating a proposal at school, during the summer, and at night required some collaboration. Apparently my principal was in on it as well as our district's head of MIS.

Yup.

Turns out that Matthew can be a bit of a planner after all.