the meals.

i love food, i really do.  i am not shy in a restaurant, no matter who i am with, and love having a kitchen filled with food.  i also love to cook.  im not very good mind you, but i do love it.  i like being able to prepare things and piece things together to make a meal.  growing up mom did most of the cooking and as i got older i always volunteered but that didnt usually work.  so when i went to college i was excited to do it on my own, until i realized how hard it really was.  i definitely got better while i was there, but not great.  after i moved home with my parents i didnt cook much again, so when i moved out i was really excited to get to explore my skills again.

richard and i are both fairly plain eaters, and we also eat similarish things.  when it comes to sandwiches mine has meat, cheese, and thats it.  no mayo, no mustard, no tomatoes or lettuce.  he is close to the same, except with no cheese.  i am a pretty plain jane eater, but i do think i am starting to expand a little bit.  when he and i first met his dad actually asked me to help him expand his eating choices, my family and friends are still laughing about that conversation.

before moving in together richard would always tell me that he wanted to gain weight, which trying to understand that as a girl is a whole new crazy idea.  we as women are constantly trying to lose weight, tone, stay the same, or have body image issues in general.  it never really occurred to me that men do as well.  body image issues is something i have struggled with my whole life.  i am a curvy girl, i have a big butt, hips, big curly blonde hair, big boobs, and pretty fair skinned.  i love being a curvy girl, sometimes though, those curves got a little too out of control.  i never took it to the extreme of an eating disorder, thank goodness i was surrounded by the right people in my life, but there has not been many times in my life i have felt completely comfortable in my own skin.  right now however, i am beginning to feel the most comfortable i have in a very long time.  this is also, a lot of work.  i am in the process of losing weight on a plan that has been very successful for me in the past few months, post latest half marathon.  clothes are fitting better, i am actually needing to replace some, overall i feel much more confident in myself. plus i am determined to not gain the stereotypical weight you add on when moving in with a significant other, we'll call that love pudge.  so he had decided that he would definitely gain some when we moved in because we would be eating meals together and my meals usually include many different things, especially dessert.

i thought this was going to be great, i would be able to come home and cook for us both, then when richard came home he would have something to eat.  now after the first grocery store adventure, part 1 and 2, i really began to wonder how this was going to work.  the things we were buying were completely different.  no way was i eating vegetables out of a can and he laughed when i carefully picked my fruit.  i started to realize that we eat in the sameish places, but when we eat at home, its very different.  he is a chicken nuggets and mash potatoes eater, while i may have the chicken nuggets but with carrots and strawberries, two things he doesnt even like.  i dont really like to eat after 8pm, and richard isnt even home most evenings until after 11pm.  i would plan what i thought i wanted to eat for dinner in the morning, he doesnt need to decide until he goes to work.  we both spent a lot time trying not to hurt the others feelings about not wanting to eat what they were eating. 

so by the second week, i had given up the thought of eating the same meals.  i know it sounds silly and maybe a tad dramatic, but it saved us both from getting our feelings hurt and really there are so much bigger things to fight about than meals.  it was energy trying to save face and come with a rebuttal that didnt need to be there.  when we are here on weekends together or randomly during the day we are very conscious about making sure we eat meals together.  i may make an extra veggie, he may add another carb, but we are still cooking and eating together.  who knew coordinating meals together would be so difficult.

the schedules.

when i was younger and thought about growing up and living with a boy-now mind you in this interpretation i would be married to him lol-i always believed we would get up, get ready in the morning somewhat together then come home and be together in the evenings.  while the being married to him changed so did quite a few other things.  the biggest thing to change was the schedules.

i work in higher education, have a fairly normal weekday schedule and the occasional saturday.  i am usually home between 630p-730p with one day a week come home after 8p.  richard works at a shipping company in their warehouse hub in the evenings monday-friday.  he goes in somewhere between 3p-5p and is home between 11p-midnight.  he has had this job the whole time that we have dated, so we talked at nighttime, usually when i am in bed and he is driving home.  this has definitely messed with my sleep in the past, but it got to the point where i couldnt sleep through the night without it, it was our routine and it worked for us.  this definitely made us make the most of our time together, as we spent most of our weekends together.  not seeing him during the week was tough, some weeks where definitely tougher than others, but we always seemed to make it work.  as we began to seriously talk about moving in i wondered how this routine was really going to work.

whenever we did talk about moving in, i still had that togetherness idea in my head about the mornings and the evenings.  i had never really seen it done any other way, and wasnt sure i was really ok with this.  but when i talked to richard he always sounded really excited about our opposite schedules.  he always told me that i would be able to come home and have all this time to myself to watch my girly shows-i will admit most of them are pretty girly lol-and relax from my day.  he would still be there in the mornings and be able to get up with me while i was getting ready for work to start the day.  and he would have the time to himself during the day and see me when he came home, we could still talk about our days and spend time together at night.  i never had the heart to tell him that i wasnt really ok with this plan, because i knew in my heart there wasnt anything i could do to change it.  i think what bothered me the most was that i was finally going to see him everyday and go to bed with him at night, which i was really excited about, and all he talked about was the space.  

i got to the point before we moved in where i realized part of the reason he wanted "so much space,"  he had never really lived with anyone before or had to seriously share his space before.  he was an only child growing up and lived much of his life with his dad.  the closest thing he had to roommates was when we met and they were living with some family friends.  but even then, he was pretty much on his own, he had never really shared his up close/personal space with another person, much less a girl.  i had lived with a younger brother growing up and a family that would constantly walk in and out of my room at leisure.  i lived with many different roommates in college, fantastic ones in the end, crazy ones, naked ones, quiet ones, and loud ones.  i had figured out how to live with other people that i was and wasnt related too.  however none of the a fore mentioned roommates had been boys, that in itself i knew was going to make a huge difference. 

the first night i came home from work it was very eerie.  i didnt totally feel like i lived there yet, there were still boxes in the living room lol.  i wasnt really sure what i should do, so i did what i always do.  i changed out of my work clothes into my pjs and wandered into the kitchen to make dinner.  as i made dinner for myself i kept expecting other people to come home, but i wasnt really sure who i was waiting for.  i also wondered what was i supposed to do when richard came home.  do i stay up and wait?  do i go to bed?  i knew things were going to figure themselves out when he called that night to say he was on his way home.  i-being the huge overthinking girl that i am-wondered if he was going to, and i was so glad he did.

the next night i came home was my late night and i had already eaten dinner, so i had one less thing to do when i got home.  i still felt a little bit lost on what to do.  i had this i live with a boy feeling, but i dont ever see him.  when he does come home he is awake and ready to go.  he wants to talk and tell me all about his day, he asks questions about my day and the things i did.  he watches most of his shows at night and is up till 2 and 3 in the morning, this has taken some definite getting used too.  the hardest part is the fact that it is 11 or 12 at night and i am ready for bed/falling asleep when i finally do get to see him.  i dont really spend anytime with him in the mornings either.  my alarm goes off and as i am getting up to take a shower/make coffee he is rolling over to keep sleeping.  i always kiss him goodbye as i am walking out the door, while a little piece of my heart is sad that i cant get back into bed with him.  how am i going to get used to this?

a few days later it was like a switch flipped.  i came home from a particularly long day and was so ready to just flop on the couch and pass out.  it was so nice to come home to my own apartment and be able to do that.  richard was at work like usual and i was so relieved to have a few hours to myself to unwind.  when i was living at home there were a lot of times i wanted to do this exact thing, but it never seemed to happen.  i finally felt like i understood where he was coming from with the goodness of our opposite schedules.  there are still some nights where i wish he was home when i got there with his smile to make the perfect ending to my not so perfect day.  we are both trying to get better about the night time.  quite a few nights i have fallen asleep on the couch which actually turned into a good thing, because now i can stay up a little bit later chatting and watching tv with him.  he always gets sad when i go to bed and he is still up for a few more hours by himself.  we spend all day apart and then spend an hour, maybe at night together.  the best part is though, its so much more time than we used to spend together, and i am so grateful.  the mornings are still a little sad, i hate leaving.  nobody wants to get out of bed in the morning, and i especially dont now with him sleeping next to me.  but as i am leaving each morning, i still smile watching him sleep and am so glad that we made this moving in decision.  it has already brought us so much closer.

the grocery store.

i love the grocery store.  i am surrounded by food with endless possibilities.  most of the time i walk up and down the aisles singing with the incredibly entertaining store music swaying back and forth as i go.  i make a list as to not forget anything however more things always jump in the cart as i wonder, but im ok with that.  it is also one of the few errands i actually enjoy going by myself.  going with other people always makes for a good time, mostly because everyone shops different.  i know that sounds weird, but think about it.  i prefer to go up and down each aisle (skipping the dog, kid, toiletry aisles) to make sure i get everything i need, and some other things i probably dont.  i start in the produce/deli section and work my way to the other end.  some people go straight for the items they need and run out as quickly as they can.  others sit and read the label of every single thing they put in their cart.  

i have been grocery shopping with richard many times before.  i always got very excited about going, while he dreaded every minute of being in the store surrounded by so many people all of which were in his way.  we shop on two complete opposite ends of the spectrum.  for starters he grocery shops at walmart, i grocery shop at albertsons.  he runs through, skipping whole aisles then having to run back to them.  i take my time and go up and down each one.  when we decided to move in, i often wondered how the grocery shopping would work.  would we go to both stores?  would he do his own and mine on my own?  would we find a new one altogether?  or most importantly...which one of us was going to cave/compromise on this one? 

as it stands now...we are two store grocery shoppers:)  however we both go to the other persons.  the first week we embarked on this adventure we started at walmart, which i absolutely despise, i am a target girl all the way.  my plan was to actually buy quite a bit more there then i probably ever would again, i mean we were literally starting from scratch.  we needed everything from sandwich bags to salt and pepper shakers to lunch for the week.  we went during the middle of the day on a monday hoping for less crowds so we could take our time, which worked out pretty well.  however i think it still drove him crazy that i went up and down every aisle:)  my plan was to only buy the things i needed here and still go to albertsons when we were done.  richard was doing his full blown grocery shopping though.

coming from two different households you have two very different perceptions of what you need/and want in your kitchen.  for example, we bought two different kinds of butter, brummel and brown for me and stick butter for him.  two different gallons of milk, 1% for me and whole milk for him.  two different breads, white for me and wheat for him.  two different kinds of macaroni and cheese, the blue box-the only kind that really matters-for me and the disgusting velveeta kind for him.  two different kinds of snacks, cheeze-its/100 calorie packs for me and chips/popcorn/cookies for him.  

as we approached the registers you could see the big question on both our faces...how do we split all of this up?  one spice for you, one box of sandwich bags for me?  so i decided i will pay for the together stuff and he can pay for his stuff.  he had paid extra the nite before when we made the target/walmart run.  however he stepped up and said no, we are splitting the whole thing down the middle:)  once the cashier was finished ringing us up ($140 later),he asked how were paying, when we told him to split it, he looked at us a little funny.  we told him we had just moved in together and this was our first grocery trip, after a small chuckle which turned into a huge laugh, he looked at us and said, see how long this splitting everything lasts with a goofy grin. as  we smiled and told him this was a partnership, we plan to keep it this way, a friend of his came over and asked how long we had lived together.  when we told him 2 days, he gave us the same small chuckle to a huge laugh and also said, good luck.  we both looked at each other with a little surprise and realized there was nothing else we could do but join in the laughing. 

once we got home and put away all of our new groceries, i decided i was really hungry.  we had already decided on making pizza for dinner, but i hadnt eaten lunch yet and was starving.  so i began opening cabinets and the freezer and the refrigerator to find a startling fact.  we had just spent $14o on groceries and had nothing to eat!  it was all "starter food" we decided to call that week.

later that evening i went to albertsons, which is literally across the street, and did my own grocery shopping.  as soon as i walked in a gave a huge sigh of relief.  the lighting was so much nicer, there was not nearly as many people, the music was on, and the best fact, i was not in walmart.  yes, i had just spent quite a bit at the first store, but i had nothing for me.  as i wondered through the aisles, i began to realize how much i really needed at the store.

when i finished shopping that evening i went home to an empty apartment.  this was the first time we had spent apart since we had finished moving two days before.  i know its silly, but i kind of missed him.  i put away the groceries and flopped down on the couch with a grin on my face.  "i live here," i thought to myself, "with my boyfriend."  and i settled in for a night of monday night tv, anxiously waiting for richard to come home from work, having that grin on my face the whole time.