Things I would never do naked:


– Walk in front of my deck doors at night with the blinds open and lights on.
– Iron.
– Stand in front of my deck doors at night with the blinds open and lights on WHILE ironing.


Yesterday morning I got my first nosebleed of 2012, because I’m too dumb to be proactive about my aching sinuses and dry boogers until my nose starts bleeding.  It’s clear that at this point in my life I’ll never learn.  I’ve accepted it.


Peter hasn’t.


Because Peter loves me and cares more about my dry sinuses than I do, he told me that he was  going to take me to Fleet Farm to get a humidifier.  I think that he decided to take me there because I’ve been talking about getting a new humidifier that holds more than a gallon of water and costs more than $10 (when it comes to humidifiers, the more you spend, the better.  Trust me.) for months, but hadn’t done it.  And I also think that he is starting to think about the fact that in two months he will be waking up next to me for the rest of his life, and he doesn’t do well with blood.  But that’s beside the point.


ANYWAY, we got to Fleet Farm 5 minutes before it closed, so I pretended like I was on Supermarket Sweep and ran around the store until I found the humidifiers, told Peter to pick one out, and ran to the front to pay.  We even had a minute to spare!  I would have been so good at that show.  When we got back to my apartment, it was snowing, and I was walking to the door as Peter was getting the humidifier out of the car.


Because I am a creep and nosy, I always look into other people’s windows when the blinds are open.   And I should have learned my lesson.  When I looked up, I saw a naked man walking in his living room!  With the lights on!  And the blinds open!  I quickly averted my gaze and then I couldn’t stop laughing.  I was so shocked!  I was not prepared to see that!  


Of course, after that little incident, I didn’t learn my lesson to mind my own business, because if you don’t you might see a naked body that you aren’t supposed to be seeing.  


Tonight when I got home from babysitting, I looked up into the apartment where lives the naked man.  


And this time, he was ironing.  
In front of the window. 
With the blinds open.  
And lights on.  
And naked.  


Now THAT could end very, very badly.

First of all, I would like to thank everyone for all of your support, love and help.  You’re making planning my wedding a lot easier, and it’s a wonderful feeling knowing that so many people want to make the day perfect for me and Peter.  You are all doing a wonderful job of making sure that I am getting my top choices (venue, for example), and I am beyond thrilled  and really, really cannot thank you enough!!


However, now I need to throw something out there, and I don’t think you’ll like it.  I’ve thought long and hard about this, and yes, I need to say it.  You won’t be happy.  Ok.  I’ll just say it.  My hands are sweating.


I don’t know.  


I do not know.  
I, Sara Jane Vanderstappen, do. not. know.


MAN.  It feels GOOD to get that off my chest!!  Allow me to explain:


I know I said it in the last post, but I have no other way to describe it – these last few weeks have been such a whirlwind.  I really can’t even begin to describe all of the emotions that have been running rampant through my mind, body, and soul.  Yes.  All three.  It’s THAT intense.  I need to really try hard to give you an idea of these emotions.  I’ll start with a timeline:


November 25, 2011: Peter asked me to marry him.  I said yes.  And I was quite thrilled.  Still am, actually.


November 27ish, 2011: Peter and I decided to get married in June, 2013.


December 5, 2011: I called the church and booked the date of June 8, 2013 for our wedding.  This was quite an exciting day.


December 15, 2011: We met with the photographer that would later become our wedding photographer.  For our June 2013 wedding.


January 3, 2012: Peter’s mom told us about a wedding contest that she thought we should enter.


January 10, 2012: We sent in our application for the “win a wedding” contest.


January 19-20, 2012: Peter and I went down to Lake Geneva to look at wedding venues for the date of June 8, 2013.


January 24, 2012: We found out that we were semi-finalists in the contest.  We also found out that if we won, the wedding would be on April 26 or 27.  2012.


February 4-12, 2012: Voting for the winning couple.  You all helped us win, and it was SOOOO exciting!!!!!!  THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!! 


February 13, 2012: We found out that we won the wedding.  But that is all that we found out. So we knew that we were getting married sometime at the end of April 2012, but that is all we knew.  So we contacted the photographer, the DJ and our bridal party to tell them that our wedding date was going to change pretty drastically, but we didn’t know when the wedding would be.


February 18, 2012: Peter and I had to make a guest list.  We hadn’t even really thought about a guest list.  Because we weren’t supposed to get married so soon!!


February 19, 2012: We registered for our April wedding at two stores.  Peter also made the invitations, and got them to a place where the only thing left was putting in information that we didn’t have.  Like date.  And church.  And venue.  You know, the little details.


February 20, 2012: We found out the venue and the menu.  We found out at 11:15 when the radio announced it.  We didn’t get called before anyone else.  With this, we found out the exact date.  From there, we were able to book the church, finish the invitations, get accommodations, and did I say book the church?


Also on February 20, the voting for my wedding dress began.  


I have a confession: I didn’t know what dresses were going to be put online for everyone to vote on.  So when you asked, I was being honest when I said that I didn’t know which dress you should vote for.  No, I did not try on any of the dresses before the voting began.  I like dress 2, so please keep voting for it.  


More things I know about my wedding dress: the dress that gets voted on WILL be the dress that I wear on my wedding day (so again, I’ve fallen in love with choice 2, so vote away!!).  I will be able to make changes to the dress as I see fit (ie. add a belt, change style a little bit to make sure it fits my body well, add straps, shorten train, etc.).  The dress is being sponsored by a custom designer, so it will be one-of-a-kind made only for me.  When I make changes to the dress, I will not be telling anyone, and when I have my fitting I will not be taking pictures of myself in my dress.  The only people that will see my REAL wedding dress before the wedding are my mom and Peter’s mom.   This is one aspect of the wedding that I want to keep a surprise.  Again, you will all know the dress that I’m going to wear, but it won’t be the EXACT dress.  


Peter isn’t going to go on the WLKG website from here forward, because I don’t want him to see my dress.  He’s ok with that.  He won’t know anything about my dress until he sees me walking down the aisle on our wedding day.  I know he’ll love the dress that I wear.


When I say that I don’t find out anything until everyone else does, I’m being 100% honest.  I’m not just saying that because someone tells me to.  I really do not know anything more that what I’ve written on my blog or shared on Facebook. 


As for things that are being voted on in future, I also don’t know that.  I mean, I know the categories that are being voted on (click here if you missed the last post), but I don’t know what the specifics are.  I have not seen the bridesmaids dresses that you will choose from.  I have no idea what the flowers look like.  I do not know what flavor cake will be voted on.  


So I’ll make you a promise – when I find something out about anything that has to do with the wedding contest that we won, I PROMISE that I will let you know.  It will first appear on Facebook, because that’s the easiest.  It may take a day or 3 or maybe even 4, depending on how busy I am, to put it on my blog, but I promise I will.  Mondays are going to be very busy for the next couple of months, because those are the days that we find out one more detail of our wedding, and we are able to do something with it.  But I promise you that you will know things when I know them.  


I want to tell you that I’m not upset for all of the questions that are being asked.  The questions show me that you really do care, and you want the day that I marry my best friend to be the day of my dreams.  But please be patient with me – because a lot of your questions I really just don’t know the answers to.  


I have had every emotion possible in the last few weeks, but the one that I’ve had the most is awe.  I’ve been in awe about how supportive everyone has been.  You’ve all been so wonderful and kind, and I truly do not have the words to show my gratitude for that.  


I never would have dreamed that Peter and I would win a wedding contest to have our wedding essentially planned for us.  While I’ve had my moments of stress and anxiety, I can honestly say that now that we have the main details figured out, the only emotions I have a positive ones – happiness, excitement, gratitude, love, inspiration, amusement, awe… the list goes on and on.  So thank you. 


And keep up the good work 🙂

Hi.

Does anyone even read this thing anymore?  

I know.  I’ve been horrible lately.  But I have a really good excuse.  I really really REALLY have been wanting to do a blog post about my life, but I just couldn’t because I wasn’t allowed to say some really exciting news.  And I knew that I would spill the beans because it has been ALL I’VE BEEN THINKING ABOUT FOR THE LAST THREE WEEKS.

No, I’m not pregnant.  That would not be very exciting news at this point in my life.

Now I will tell you the story of our journey to WIN A WEDDING.  And we are SO close.  

Back in the very beginning of January, Peter’s mom called us and told us about a contest that the local Lake Geneva radio station was doing.  After some googling and a little consideration between Peter and myself, myself and my mom, myself and my sisters, myself and Peter’s mom, and anyone else that I thought would have some good insight, we decided to fill out the registration form so that we could potentially win a wedding.

The form was kind of fun to fill out – we really struggled with “telling our love story” because there are a couple of important key points that made the proposal even better.  After typing out everything that we wanted to say, we had a whopping 2 pages of love story, but they only allotted for about 3/4 of a page.  So we cut.  And cut.  And cut.  And finally, submitted something that included bits of my engagement blog post, bits of Peter’s humor, and bits of truth (just kidding – majority of the truth…).

The rest of the form were questions like “How important is it that your wedding have a theme?” and “how many bridesmaids/groomsmen do you want”.  When I filled out the form on my own, I put down “Not important” and “8” respectively.  Peter got his hand on the form, and the answers ended up looking something like this (My responses are in bold.  Peter’s are in italics.):

How important is it that your wedding have a theme? Not important.  Peter jokingly says he wants a Star Wars theme but I can assure you he is joking.  RIGHT PETER?  We will NOT be having a Star Wars theme wedding.

How many bridesmaids/groomsmen do you want? 8.  Sara has a huge family, and Peter is just ridiculously popular.  (Peter wrote that.)

Anyways, you get the picture.   We submitted our form along with a picture of us looking all in love and stuff.

Best hair day of my life.  Can’t replicate that.

 After it was in, I obsessed about whether or not we would win kind of forgot about the contest.  Work was getting busy, and my social life was OBVIOUSLY just booming.

And then, about 10 days (but who was counting?  Certainly not me) later, I got a phone call from the radio station while I was at work.


WLKG: HI!  Congratulations!  You and Peter and semi-finalists in the win a wedding competition!!!

Sara: We ARE?  THAT IS SO GREAT!!!!!

But since I was at work, I had to stay all cool, calm, and collected, which is NOT one of my gifts.  Anyway, the rest of the day is a blur because I was trying to work, but I was also trying to figure out how we can win this wedding, and I had to call everyone I knew, of course.

Oh, I forgot to tell you.  I asked the radio station if there was a date set for the wedding.  I haven’t mentioned this, but it’s important to the story – Peter and I were planning on getting married June of 2013.  If we win the wedding, the date will be pushed up significantly.

To the end of April.

2012.

I about fainted when the girl on the phone told me that.  

Cue anxiety.  I wouldn’t describe myself as an anxious person, but oh my WORD what a horrible feeling.  I was jittery all the time like I was hopped up on 5 cans of Red Bull, I couldn’t focus, and I was EXHAUSTED.  I didn’t want to talk to anyone because I didn’t want to cry about it.  It. was. awful.  

And then it got better.  6 days after we found out we were semi-finalists, we had a meeting in Lake Geneva about the contest rules and things, and after everything was figured out, my anxiety went away.  And my competitiveness kicked in.  


WE ARE IN IT TO WIN IT.  Hopefully…

And now, here I am today getting ready to sell myself at Winterfest in Lake Geneva to get people’s votes.

What I need YOU to do is PLEASE spread the word!!!  Voting runs from February 4-Feburary 12, and you can vote ONCE A DAY.  Peter and I REALLY want to win, because we think it would be SO much fun. 

CLICK RIGHT HERE RIGHT NOW to vote, and also to listen to our radio interview that we just blew out of the water.  Actually, when we walked out of the studio, we felt like real schmucks because we thought we SOUNDED like real schmucks.  

The older generation has been telling me we’re adorable.

SO STOP JUDGING US, WE WERE TRYING TO BE ADORABLE.

And now, please vote for us.  Because how AWESOME would it be if we WON our WEDDING??????

🙂

CLICK HERE TO VOTE PLEASE.

I thought about writing a wonderful post about Christmas, but then I didn’t feel like writing.


So I’m drawing it instead.

But I’m better today, so that’s good.

The other day, one of my co-workers asked me if I wanted to make some Amish Friendship Bread.  Since one of my new favorite hobbies is cooking/baking, I was like HECK YES!  Because I love the Amish (they make amazing furniture)!  I LOVE friendship (that’s why I have so many Facebook friends)!!  And I LOVE bread (I never understood people who don’t like bread)!!!  What’s better than having friends that give you a bag full of bread batter?  NOTHING, that’s what!!!


I was all excited about this bread. 
Until I read the directions.  This bread is too high maintenance for me.


Day 1: Do nothing.  Hey.  I can handle that.
Day 2: Mush the bag.  Is there a proper technique to this?
…
Day 6: Add xxx ingredients.  Good thing that I have milk in my fridge since we had company over for dinner and I had Peter buy milk because it’s rude to not have milk.  Is it supposed to smell like this??


On Day 10 when it’s baking day, before you bake it you’re supposed to put a cup or something of batter into x number of gallon sized Ziploc bags to pass out to your friends.  Who the heck am I going to give this bread to?  Can’t pass it out at work, because I don’t want it back in MY kitchen.  I’ll tell you what.  I’m going to be a good friend and NOT pass those out.  I don’t want to burden people with the pressure of finding more friends to bake bread with!  Why did I ever agree to a friendship that has “baking bread” in the contract?? 


Jenna called me on Sunday.  Turns out that she was making her first batch of Friendship bread too.  


Jenna: Have you ever made this?


Sara: No.  I’m only on Day 4 of mushing.  I don’t want to make it anymore.


Jenna: I’m on the baking day.  I don’t want to do it anymore either.  I already divided the batter into other bags and started thinking about it.  Am I going to give people rancid bread batter?   I put milk in it like I was supposed to, but milk goes bad.  And then I started thinking about it, and if everyone takes a cup of batter out to give to people, how old is the milk in MY bag?  Seriously, I don’t want to eat this.  What if people get sick?


Sara: … I didn’t think of that.  I don’t want mine either.


Jenna: Stupid friendship.


Sara: STUPID FRIENDSHIP.


Jenna told me later that after some googling and widipedia-ing, the milk keeps the yeast alive or something.  Whatever.  


Guess what.  My baking day is on December 17.  Super convenient because it’s a Saturday.  Well.  Not for me.  Do you know what I’m doing on December 17?  I’ll just tell you.  Peter and I are driving to River Falls because my brother is graduating college (high five!!).  So now, I have to wake up at like 6 or something to bake this bread that I don’t even WANT anymore.


STUPID FRIENDSHIP.


So.  Does anyone want a starter bag of Amish Friendship bread?  


I’m serious.

Bottom line: I said yes.  And now we are engaged. 


And I AM SO EXCITED THAT I NEED TO WRITE IN ALL CAPS LOCK AND USE A LOT OF EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!!!!!!!!!  BECAUSE THAT’S HOW EXCITED I AM 😀 😀 😀 😀


There are two background stories that you need to know so that you can fully appreciate how wonderful my fiancé is.  And yes I love using the word fiancé.  LOVE.  And then after I say it, I get all giddy and smiley.  🙂


Background story 1: The first move


In January 2008, Peter asked me on a date.  But he didn’t just call me and ask me out.  He sent me a letter in the mail.  And the first page of that letter was a word search.  That he made.  All by himself.

I waited for TEN DAYS before I called Peter and told him… No (gasp, what?! I know.  I’m really cruel).  I was sorry, but I was not interested in going on a date with him.  It’s truly a miracle that we are engaged today.  Especially because a few months after I told him no, I told him I was ready to go on a date, and he told ME no.  And then I went to Mexico.  And then nine months after the first move, we started dating.


Background story 2: The time I thought Peter was proposing but he wasn’t


I kind of mentioned this in another blog post, but I didn’t actually write the story because I was really embarrassed, but now that we’re actually engaged, I can tell the story.  But it’s still embarrassing.


Peter bought a car in August, and when he took me for a spin, he told me to open the center console because “there’s a box in there”.  So, I opened the center console, and I saw a little white light shining on THIS little box.

I know it’s a little beat up – it’s been through a lot. And you can’t tell in the pic, but it’s glossy.  GLOSSY.  OBVIOUSLY that means that there is a RING inside.

And I started crying.

Sara: OHMYGOD!  OH!MY!GOD!  I CAN’T BELIEVE THIS IS HAPPENING!!!  


And then I looked at Peter, and I saw this:

Obviously this picture was taken in my living room. When Peter was proposing, he had it in his hands. And he was smiling.  And getting teared up. Because he loves me so much. Not because I didn’t say YES right away…

And then I started crying harder.


Peter: Will you marry me?
Sara: I WAS NOT EXPECTING THIS TO HAPPEN RIGHT NOW!  I WASN’T EXPECTING THIS FOR A LONG TIME!  I JUST CAN’T BELIEVE THIS IS HAPPENING!!
Peter:  … Well?
Sara: YES!!!!!!!!! YESYESYESYESYESYESYES!!!!!!!!!


More crying.  A lot of laughing.  A TON of staring at the sparkly ring that was on my finger.


Sara: You asked my dad, right?
Peter: Yeah, I talked to your mom and dad.  And Laura was there too, and she nodded her head.  So that’s good.
Sara: I HAVE TO CALL MY FAMILY.


So then, I called the house.  No one answered.  I tried 4 times.  No one answered.  And then I tried calling my mom.  STILL no answer.  Peter told me that they didn’t know he was proposing today.  So naturally, they wouldn’t be waiting by the phone for my call.  I came up with a BRILLIANT plan, since no one was answering their phones.  We were supposed to have dinner with my family when we got back from Janesville.  Instead of calling them, we would go home and SURPRISE EVERYONE THAT WE ARE ENGAGED!!!!! PERFECT PLAN!!!!  And I LOVE surprises!!


I called Jenna to tell her our exciting news because I didn’t want her to feel left out, since I wasn’t going to see her until Saturday.  It’s shocking that she understood what I was saying, because I was screaming and crying into the phone.  After I got off the phone with Jenna, Peter said that we should stop at his parents’ house first.


Peter: My parents know that I was proposing today.  Let’s stop there first, and I’ll drop off the wreaths anyway.
Sara: Are your parents even home right now?
Peter: I think my mom is.  I’m not sure about my dad though.  We can just stop by quickly, and then head to your parents house to surprise them.
Sara: OK!!!!!!  


The 45 minute car ride went by REALLY fast.  I couldn’t stop staring at my ring, and I couldn’t stop smiling.  And I kept getting teared up.  And then I would want to hug Peter, but I couldn’t since he was driving, so I would latch on to his arm and just lay on his arm and tell him how happy and surprised I was.  And he would tell me to stop doing that because he was driving and he didn’t want us to crash.


When we got to his parents’ house, I was talking away (surprise!) about how excited I was to surprise MY family, and he was nodding and listening and thinking about how much he loves me.  As we pulled up the driveway, I saw his grandparents’ car.  Then I saw my mom’s car.  Then I saw Jenna and Mark’s car…


Sara: *Crying.  Again.* Whaaaaaat?  I can’t believe this!!!  THIS IS PERFECT!!!
Peter: … surprise… 


I got out of the car and started jumping up and down.  And crying.  And hugging my fiancé.


We went up to the house and I just couldn’t believe it.  Both of our families were waiting for us at his parents’ house for a surprise engagement party.  There was more crying, more laughing, and a lot of hugging.  And I was sweating a lot.  We posed for pictures, we ate food, and we talked about how Peter planned the PERFECT proposal.


Throughout the night I was finding out more and more that a lot of people are a lot better at keeping secrets than I am.  Jenna went with for moral support when he picked out the ring… I was on speaker phone when I called her to tell her that I was engaged… Peter drove down to Lake Geneva and asked my parents’ permission when I was in Colombia for a work conference… He kept the ring in a lock box at the bank… So many secrets…  And I never would have guessed.  At all.


So yes – Peter and I are engaged, and we are SO happy and excited to get married.  It’s been a little over a week since he proposed, and I still can’t believe it.  


Sigh.  Best. Thanksgiving. Ever.

FYI: WAY more sparkly in person!!!!!!! (And although you can’t tell in the picture – my nails are manicured) (Yes I got a manicure less than 24 hours after I had a ring on my finger) (EVERYONE IS LOOKING AT MY HANDS!!  I WANTED TO LOOK PRESENTABLE!!)

😀