4.5 months.

As we drove to the California desert to see family, Taylor Swift sang exactly what I was feeling at that moment.

"You are the best thing... that's ever been.. miiiiiiine."

I held his hand from the passenger seat and just stared. And he caught me and looked me with that sweet smile that makes me giddy. I turned away and looked at the road, and he looked back at the road. Then I looked at him again, and he caught me again. He never just lets me stare at him and take in all those details that I love so much about him. He always knows when I'm looking and can't help but look too and make me laugh. Every. Time.

Finally I looked away and back at the road with him but got that nervous giddy feeling in my stomach. It just kind of hit me that in 4.5 months, Stephen and I will be married. Like, married married. Husband and wife. Partners for life. Growing old together. Having a family and little "mini-mes" of us we joke about having one day. And I still can't believe some days that he's actually... mine.

The funny part is that I wasn't supposed to be here in California right now. I was supposed to be in Florida getting excited about him coming out for my birthday and Christmas. But the night before the night before Thanksgiving I got a call from my mom. She and my grandparents were both horribly sick and having just got over a bad cold myself, we agreed it would be best not to be around them. When I told Stephen, he begged for an hour for me to come spend Thanksgiving with his family. But that meant buying a ticket right then and getting on a plane the next morning.... and hello, was I really THAT spontaneous? I didn't think so.

Until I hung up the phone.

And in my analytical way I overanalyzed all the reasons why I wasn't that spontaneous enough to just change plans last minute.

But then I realized, I hated that. I wanted to be spontaneous.

So I bought a plane ticket and headed to the airport the next morning. On the way, he called and asked what I had decided, and for the first time ever, I lied to him. I told him I decided to drive to my grandparents about 6 hours away. That was the perfect amount of time to distract him until I landed in San Diego. Once the plane landed I called him immediately as soon as it let me have service.

"I have a confession to make," I said on the phone when he answered.
"What??" He asked.
"I've been lying to you all day," I admitted.
"What do you mean?"
"I'm not at my grandparents, SURPRISE, I'm at the San Diego airport. Come pick me up."
"You're still lying," he said in shock.
"NO, I'm NOT," I argued.
"You're lying. Stop lying. Are you really here? You can't be here, you're lying. Wait, are you REALLY HERE?" he said started to get excited.
"YES, come pick me up!"
"I'm on my way, but I think you're still lying."

And oh my gosh, I hated lying to him all day leading up to it. I so never want to do that again!

So now I'm here in San Diego and we've been going on all these double dates with his friends and hanging out with his family. These are a few shots one of his friends took of us at dinner and tagged us in on Facebook, and I just look at it and smile. I smile because I see in the photo how happy he makes me. And how proud I am that, as Taylor Swift would say, he's the best thing that's ever been mine.