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!!)

😀

Ever wake up in the morning feeling like P. Diddy and lay in your bed for a loooooong time and try to WILL yourself to go back to sleep because it is only 7:03 and WHY CAN I NOT SLEEP PAST 8 O’CLOCK??  


So you lay in bed and think about a whole bunch of random things like how you failed at seeing 11:11 on 11/11/11 TWICE yesterday, because in the morning you were at work and got a phone call so you were distracted, but then your high school English teacher reminded you via your Facebook status that you still had one more chance to see it at 11:11 PM.  But then you went to dinner with the love of your life and his co-workers, and when you got home you had to lay down on the couch because your stomach hurt really badly because you thought it would be a good idea to eat ice cream for dessert without taking a Lactaid pill, even though you know you are lactose intolerant and that you would be in pain and want to die later.  So while you were on the couch cursing yourself for eating ice cream, and cursing the love of your life for LETTING you eat ice cream, you were watching Seinfeld, and then you fell asleep sometime between 10:30 and 10:45 and woke up at 11:08, but since you are confused and disoriented when you wake up anywhere except your bed, you forgot that you should sit in front of your computer for three minutes so that you could see 11:11 PM and 11/11/11 underneath it.  Instead, you got up from the couch and went to bed in your clothes because you couldn’t muster the energy to change into pajamas.


At 7:43 you accept that you are awake and then you roll out of bed and remember that you slept in your clothes last night for no apparent reason other than laziness, so you put on sweatpants and a tshirt.  You then open your bedroom door and are blinded by the morning light shining into the hallway, so your eyes start to water.


Then you see the shirt that you wanted to wear TONIGHT is sitting in the basket right in front of the washing machine so that before you went to bed last night you would remember to put it in the washing machine, because you were SUPPOSED to put it in the washing machine before you went to dinner but you forgot.  That shirt had to go in the washing machine asap, because said shirt can’t go in the dryer and needs to line dry.  So you put a load of clothes in the washing machine.


And then your mom calls and is all chipper and says, “GOOD MORNING!!” and you croak, “hiiiiiiiiii mooooooooooooom” and she remembers that you are under the age of 80 and you don’t have children on a Saturday morning, so you should really still be sleeping.  So then she asks if she woke you up and you say that you’ve been awake for 45 minutes but you feel like you have a scratchy throat.  She says that she hopes you’re not coming down with something, and then says, “Well, I already talked to Peter about this-” and you cut her off and say, “You talked to Peter about something before me?!?!” and she continued about Christmas presents and ideas and then you laid down on the couch and cover up with a blanket and close your eyes while your mom keeps talking to you.  And then she says that she has to go, so you hang up the phone and continue laying on the couch.


After 20 seconds of listening to the washing machine run, you decide to turn on the tv, and when you start flipping through the channels, you think for the millionth time how you wish you had cable TV because NOTHING is on regular TV on the weekends until Sunday night at 7 PM.


While you’re flipping through channels, you start to get hungry, but since you’re not much of a breakfast eater, you don’t have any breakfast food.  You get up off the couch and shuffle over to the kitchen wishing you had a pair of slippers, make a mental note to add it to your Christmas list, and then decide to detour to your bedroom to get a pair of socks and a hoodie, all the while trying to get your knotted hair out of your face and into a knotted ponytail.  


Upon entering the kitchen, you rummage through your cupboards and find a box of Betty Crocker quick-bread mix for Lemon Poppyseed bread.  You have the necessary ingredients, so you pre-heat the oven and throw all the ingredients into a bowl and use a wooden spoon to mix it all up.  You think about how hungry you are, and then when you put it in the oven you remember that it takes 35 minutes to bake, so you eat a couple pistachios to hold you over.


While the bread is baking, you move your clothes from the washer to the dryer and watch Gumby on TV.  


After you get bored with Gumby, you decide to open up your computer and go online.  While you’re Facebook stalking, you see a Youtube video of the Ellen DeGeneres show that you watch, and then you start to remember how on Thursday night you were watching Youtube videos while Peter was working on his computer, and then you started watching videos of soldiers coming home and surprising their families.  Then you remember that while you were watching the videos on Thursday, you started to get teared up and Peter looked at you, but decided not to ask what’s wrong.  You THEN clicked on a Youtube video that was a 10 minute long montage of clips of soldiers coming home and surprising their families, and a lot of the videos are of little kids, and you started getting a little more teared up and your nose started running.  You tried to hide your emotions from Peter because you didn’t want him to roll his eyes at you, but then by minute 4, tears were streaming down your face, and Peter asked if you were ok and you said yes, but then by minute 6 you couldn’t hold the emotions in and you were sobbing and Peter kept looking at you like you were a lunatic saying, “What the eff are you watching??  Are you going to be ok????” and you kept saying that you were FINE even though there were tears and snot dripping all over your face.  You really were a mess on Thursday night.


Then the kitchen timer beeps and you take the bread out of the oven, and wait for it to cool even though your stomach is eating itself and you really want to break a hunk of the loaf off with your hand and shove it in your mouth, but you decide against it because you got burned a lot in cooking class, and hot things on your hands hurt.  You sit back down on the couch and take clothes that you should have folded yesterday out of the dryer to fold today.  But then you decide that they are too wrinkled, so you throw them back in the dryer to heat up and you decide that THIS TIME when they come out of the dryer you will fold them RIGHT AWAY so that they are not wrinkled and you don’t look like a schmuck.


You sit back down with your computer sitting on your lap, and then you  look at the clock and realize it’s only 10:53 AM and that you’ve wasted your whole morning when all week you were thinking about what a productive weekend you were going to have.  


But then you decide that relaxing is productive.  So you put in Mary Poppins and lay back down on the couch.  Folding clothes can wait until later.


Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.

Dear Mom,


I know that I should have said this a long time ago, but I think a part of me just didn’t want to admit it.  Now, I’ve been pushed over the edge, and I just NEED to say something.


Yesterday, I had Peter bring 2 baskets of laundry over to my apartment so that I could make him look presentable and be confident that he is wearing clean clothes on a daily basis.  When I started sorting the laundry, towards the bottom of one basket, I began getting suspicious.  Then, I realized it.  He had put dirty laundry into a basket ON TOP OF already folded shirts and shorts and socks.  I. was. pissed.  Why the eff was he giving me CLEAN CLOTHES that were STILL FOLDED to wash?!?!


I don’t mind doing his laundry.  Especially because he buys the detergent.  And he brings me out to dinner.  I don’t mind putting his shirts in the dryer again because I neglected to fold the laundry right away and they got wrinkled.  I don’t mind folding all of his clothes, or ironing his shirts and dress pants.  


What I do mind, is when I see clean clothes in the dirty pile.  And I mind when I see him take a shirt from the bottom of the pile, leaving the rest disheveled.  I also mind when he leaves his clothes in the basket instead of putting them in his closet or dresser.


Mom.  I realized yesterday that I am becoming… you.  I remember, all those years ago, you screaming at us after we cleaned our rooms because we would put anything on the floor in the dirty laundry.  I remember you following us upstairs and showing us our drawers in disarray, making us straighten them.  Threatening that we will have to do our OWN laundry if you EVER saw our drawers like that AGAIN.  And I also remember rolling my eyes at you.


For this, I apologize.  Because now that I have someone putting clean, FOLDED clothes in the dirty laundry basket, I send them texts like this “Peter Romenesko.  The bottom half of the basket of laundry you gave me is still CLEAN.  And halfway FOLDED.”  And when he responds “Whoops!”, I respond “THIS IS WHY YOU SHOULD EMPTY THE LAUNDRY BASKETS I GIVE YOU OF CLEAN CLOTHES.  You’re lucky I still love you and don’t ABANDON you and make you FEND FOR YOURSELF.”  


Why don’t I abandon him, you ask?  Two reasons.  The first one, is because I fully realize that if he had a disheveled appearance in public, it would reflect poorly on me.  The last thing I want someone thinking is, “Who is the girl that is dating that poor schmuck?”  And the second reason is because I don’t want to let his parents down.  They trust me to take care of their poor, helpless child when he is away from home.  I don’t want them to think poorly of me.


So, Mom, I apologize to you now for taking advantage of your mad laundry skillz.  For every clean shirt I didn’t want to put back in my drawer.  For every pair of underwear that I took from the bottom of the pile, leaving the rest in disarray.  I only have one person’s laundry to do beside my own, and I am almost going crazy.  How you managed with 7 children and a farmer husband, I will never know.  


I also thank you for passing these skillz on to me.  Although, I’m not sure if it is a blessing or a curse, because I find myself cursing a whole lot when I’m doing laundry.


Love,
Your favorite daughter.