Home, for now

So Karl just posted, but I have a few more things to add.

As you know from the last post, we went to the Renaissance fair, and where the fair was located was also Iowa's Ski resort... It made me laugh so hard. This is as big as their "mountains" get. 

Lately Karl has been wanting me to make his lunches, which is great and saves us money, so I have had fun playing hous-wife,  but all he gets for lunch is sandwiches, which I would think he would get sick of, but he claims I make the best sandwiches and they never get old. Maybe I'll figure out something else that's cheap, fast to make, and easy to pack.

His usual assortment of goodies.

Karl and I have a silly thing that we do. Our right to each other's things are our rings (being married). Here I was saying to Karl "Who said you could drink my grape soda?" (just joking) And this was his response.

So Karl and I are back living at his parents house, and all we have is this little room, but we have made it ours. These are our 4 little walls. Hopefully we can get an apartment soon so we can do this on a larger scale, in our living room, etc.

The tree says "The roots of a family tree begin with the love of two hearts."

And there ya have it.

Renaissance Faire N' Stuff

Karl here!

Ah, here we are once again its time for another blog. Not too much has happened since the last time we wrote but we can sure come up with something to share with you.

It has been a crazy couple of weeks, we have been trying to find apartments and stuff. For a while we were given the privilege of house sitting for some members in our ward and it was great. It was nice to play "house" for a couple of weeks. I wasn't used to having the responsibility taking out the trash and I forgot to take it out. Once or twice. But other than that it was nice having a place all to ourselves.

As time went on we tried looking for our own place that we could call home but out here it seems that people who run apartments are just way too picky these days. We tried a couple different apartments and got the same answer. You both don't have much rental experience and another excuse was that Emily was too new at her job. Im like WHAT?! that makes no sense. So after looking everywhere we gave up in a sense. I thought about it once and I figured it might just be smart to hold off getting an apartment and work off any debts that we had and save up to get a nicer apartment.

But then this past Sunday I was thinking about school a lot and I decided to take a peek at BYU-I. I never ever wanted to go there to be honest. The main reason being that it was just so stereotypical. " A Mormon going to BYU? That doesn't surprise me." But it wasn't until I started to look around I got a very good feeling about it and I have decided to shove those thoughts to the side and try to attend there. I have been rejected once so I have to go and retake my ACT, but I think that I might try out the SAT. I hear its easier. Who knows.

Either way I would love to finally start going to college and move on with life. Get a good job and start a family. But that will be a while from now I imagine. So I'm sure all of Emily's family is shrieking with excitement at the thought of her being closer. I don't blame them, this girl is wonderful and they love her like crazy so I am sure they want her "back".

Here are some pictures for your enjoyment.

Emily and I went to Target and she had fun trying on gardening stuff, except those boots suctioned to her feet and she had a hard time getting them off. 

Emily and I recently got to go to the Des Moines Renaissance Faire and had some fun looked at an old commoner court trial and jousting and sword fighting. Emily was most excited about getting her face painted. While she was waiting I guess some triplets cut in front of her delaying her beautification. It was ok though she got a cool story while waiting for 45 minutes. This was a quote from her Facebook

"Today we went to the renaissance fair, and I went to get my face painted. In front of me was a little girl about 4 years old, born with her face looking a little different and having deformed hands. [There were some triplets who were asking her why she looked so funny, making her cry, which broke my heart. Their mom was explaining to them that she was born like that, just like people look at them because they were born triplets.] When she was done getting her face painted and the lady showed her in the mirror, she brought her 3-fingered hands to her face in amazement at how pretty she looked, and it made me tear up just at how happy she was about it."

Pretty cool.

Emily in the middle of getting her face painted.

The final product. She is really pretty huh?

Later on we went and tried out some of the old time games like axe throwing. The one that I am pointing at is obviously mine Emily threw 3 and so did I except she hit two on the same spot. The guy running the booth told me to run away. I just might or at least if I am handcuffed to a drainage pipe in a sinking boat I can count on her to break the cuffs. Titanic by the way.

 Us getting ready for some archery.

 

Look at that form.

We had a blast. 

Us Singing At Iowa Reception

Here is the video of us singing Love Me Tender (Our Song) as requested by our parents.

The Wedding

This post might be pretty long, but it's kind of to catch up to where we are now. And get ready for some reading, 'cause I'm gonna tell you our story from the very beginning. (it's not very long) I was going to school at BYU-Idaho, and I had been there for 2 years. I couldn't decide what I wanted to major in, I had just moved to a new apartment with girls that I wasn't comfortable around, I didn't really know anyone in my ward... Things just weren't going very well at the moment, so I went home to Washington for a while to try and figure out what I was going to do next. My old roommate and great friend had told me she was on a dating site, ldssingles.com, and that it was nothing to be ashamed of, that you could just go on there and talk to guys, have fun, etc. I still thought that was silly, but I figured I may as well, especially since I was going home to the middle of nowhere. I wasn't on there very much, and I never responded to anyone, especially since I would have had to pay to talk to people.

Meanwhile, in Iowa, Karl had just gotten home from his mission in June 2012, and had been working as a car detailer at Bob Brown Buick/GMC. In the beginning of December he got in a freak golf cart accident at work, where it had hit some ice and he was ejected, breaking his ankle. He was home for a few weeks with a broken ankle, and he was also on ldssingles, just browsing... When he happened to come across a "cute girl from Washington." On December 14th he sent me what was called a "flirt", and all it said was "Hi." I would usually look at the message, look at the profile, and move on, which was the case with Karl. I looked at his profile, I saw that he was from Iowa, and I immediately wrote him off, 'cause it was way too far away. But he was so cute, something made me go back to his profile and look more into it... And I decided "well, what could happen?" And I sent him a "flirt" back. He then sent me a message, and I had to make a decision to pay for it so I could talk to him.

We went from talking on ldssingles, to talking on facebook, to texting, to calling, and then to skyping... Every night. We just couldn't get enough of each other. However cheesy it may sound (thus the name of our blog: A Hint of Cheese... 'cause we can be cheesy sometimes), our personalities just clicked. He was hilarious, and sweet, and cute, and just so much fun! It was like talking to myself, because we were/are just so alike. People think that it's not easy to get to know someone online, but it was just the opposite for us. We got to know each other's personalities better than if we had physically met, because all we could do was talk. It was like we got to go on a date with each other every night, the only thing that was different was that we couldn't touch each other. Which made it that much more special when we could finally hold onto each other. Moral of the story, if he hadn't broken his ankle, and if I hadn't gone home to Washington, we never would've found each other. I was a little skeptical about online dating at first, but someone said to me, "If you're meant to find someone who lives half way across the country, who cares how you find them?"

After a while, we decided we couldn't take it any longer, and we planned a trip in February.

Karl flew out to Washington to see me for a week.

We took him to Seattle to see the sights.

And I flew back with him to Iowa for a week, where he took me sight seeing in Pella and Des Moines,

and we went ice skating.

One night, we were reading scriptures together, and Karl looked at me and said "what if I proposed to you right now?" Then he got down on one knee and said "Emily, I love you. Will you marry me?" (He thinks he sounded really shaky, but that's not how I remember it) I said "Yes" and kissed him. Then he pulled out this ring from his pocket. It is the most perfect ring I have ever seen, and he picked it out all by himself. There is a wedding band to go with it, which I have now.

Now you might think that this was sudden, but we had actually been talking about it for a while, and we knew we wanted to get married, and Karl bought the ring before he came to Washington. He was also planning on proposing in a pretty little chinese gazebo in Des Moines, but it was cold and snowy the whole time I was there, so he just couldn't wait. After a week in Iowa, I went home for about a month, and then I moved out to Iowa to be with my fiance. I found a job, and a family in Karl's ward was so nice to let me stay with them.

We had many fun adventures, like trying to cook together occasionally (I swear pinterest will be the death of me),

And trying to go on bike rides together,

And I even convinced Karl to sing in the ward talent show with me. (It didn't take much convincing, he was actually excited about it)

We got our engagement pictures taken by a lady in our ward. It was really fun, and we got to go around Des Moines to find fun spots to take them.

We worked, and anytime we weren't working, we were spending time together for a few months. Our wedding date was set for July 13th, and on July 7th, Karl and I flew to Utah (where we were getting married) to make sure everything was ready. We got there on tuesday,

Got our wedding license on wednesday,

Got my endowments on thursday (I stole this picture from Lindsey), we left us a whole day on friday to take care of any odds and ends, and also to be able to rest up a bit,

And we were married on saturday, In the Bountiful, Utah temple. We picked Utah, because it is the most central for all of our family (extended included) and we wanted to share our special day with them, and we picked Bountiful, because it was the most beautiful. :)

We had so many great people come to see us!

One of my best friends (and old roommate) Makenzie,

Karl's Grandpa,

Karl's grandma.

This is my Aunt Laura pinning on my dad's corsage.

My niece Darcy

Karl's Aunt Bonnie and Uncle Tim

Two of my best friends, my cousin Lainey, and my friend Makenzie

The whole group that came. Lot's of wonderful people.

I think my cousin Kenny is the most excited... There are 4 pictures like this, and his face is exactly the same in every one.

The girl cousins (and Makenzie) and two of my nieces.

My Jensen Grandparents.

My Grandma Jenne. My Grandpa wasn't able to come due to health. But he was at the Washington reception.

Karl's Campbell grandparents

Karl with his siblings and cousins.

Karl and his siblings. Love this picture.

The Andersons (including me)

The Jennes

My siblings

My nieces and nephews. Ezra was pretty tired and wasn't really into taking pictures.

Makenzie again!

We had an awesome outdoor reception at my Grandpa's cousin's daughter's house. I have never met them in my life, but it was so nice of them to let us use their house. Then we got rained out and had to take it inside, but it was beautiful while it lasted.

There was great food.

Traditionally my mom makes mints for weddings. They are the best.

My mom and sisters and lots of other people worked so hard on making these great cupcakes! It was blueberry with raspberry filling, key like with lemon filling, and pina colada with pineapple filling. So good. And we got this top which was really pretty too.

Our rings

This little girl was following me around and just kept staring at me. I talked to her a little bit, her name is Kimbry (not sure how to spell it) and she told me I was very pretty. Her mom told me she is going through a princess phase and she loves princesses, and she thought I was one. :) So cute.

This cake was really good. The lady who owns the house was carrying the cake downstairs and accidentally dropped it down the stairs. She felt so bad, which makes me feel so bad. This was only the first of 3 receptions, so we had 3 chances of getting a cake topper, and we decided to keep the one in Iowa anyway, instead of trying to take cake across the country.

Washington reception

Washington Cake Topper.

The Iowa Reception

The boys and their ties.

At the request of our parents, we sang... It was Love me tender, "our song." If I can figure it out, I might put the video on here later.

A lady in the ward made this cake for us. It was so pretty and tasted really good! And yes, we did get this cake topper saved. :)

The cake started to crumble in Karl's hand, and he goes "there's only one way this is goin' in."

Another lady in the ward made this awesome tile for us.

These two girls (there's another one behind if you look closely) came up to us and asked how he proposed, so we were telling them. I like this picture, because Karl's face makes it look like I'm hilarious. 

These are some wonderful women that helped us with the food and serving.

This is the hardest group to get to stand still, so this is the most normal picture we could get. This is basically our family. From left to right, Nathan Anderson, Chandler Cox, Sean Tognetti, Tyler Tognetti, Daniel Anderson, Karl, me, Camilla Cox, Mindy Anderson, Rashelle Anderson.

This is totally a candid picture, which makes it all the better. These two brothers are crazy, and this picture to me looks like they're planning on going to crash this party.

All of this craziness of a wedding and three receptions was lots of fun! But now we are trying to settle down, house-sitting for a family in the ward and going on with life. Which is fun too. I love starting a life with this man. He makes me so happy.