Halfway Gone, But I'm on My Way

Well the last time I updated Candy and I were just getting back from Colorado for Candy's birthday.  That was almost 4 months ago!!!  Slacking does not begin to describe how badly I've treated this blog...  Well that shall change!  A new year will soon be upon us, and with it will be updated posts from yours truly!  It will be amazing I promise.

So a quick update on everything that has been going on.  September Candy and I celebrated our 6 year anniversary!  We started dating on September 18th, 2006.  Our Colorado trip was our event-of-the-month for September, so we didn't have anything else for most of the month really.  Early October I went out with a couple of friends and we took some pictures of our cars, here's a couple of pictures..

October for our event we went out bar hoppin' for Halloween!  Here's a quick pic from my instagram (@k_Guhl) of us at Ultra Lounge in West Glen:

I was an astronaut, and she was Alice (from Alice in Wonderland) with a half sugar skull.  It was kinda funky, and she got a lot of compliments.  It was a really fun night.  Next Halloween we're planning on doing something pretty big, so I'm looking forward to that.

November was a really big month for us.  On November 9th, we left for our big vacation that we had been planning.  Here was our itinerary:  Fly to Washington D.C. and stay for a night.  Drive up to Baltimore the next day, and stay for another night.  The next day we would be leaving Baltimore on the Carnival Pride cruise ship for Florida and the Bahamas for 7 days.  The trip was awesome.  Washington D.C. was really cool to see, and I wish we had more time to see all of the sights.  We did cram quite a bit into such a little amount of time though, so I'm impressed at what we got accomplished.  Here's some more instagram pics:

 

The next day we went up to Baltimore, and I was actually surprised by how much fun we had!  Baltimore is a really cool city, and I would actually go there again.  The Harborplace area was really nice, and we had a lot of fun.  

 

We left Baltimore the next day, and set off on our cruise ship.  The Carnival Pride was a lot like our last cruise ship, the Carnival Legend.  They're sister ships, but have different themes.  It was kinda different and kinda familiar all at the same time.  The cruise had its ups and downs, basically because the weather was so temperamental.  Keep in mind we left not even two weeks after Hurricane Sandy hit, so it was still pretty windy and the seas were really wavy.  Needless to say, the boat was rocking pretty good!  The only other negative part was our debarkation.  We were late coming back in because the winds held us back a good six hours from our return to Baltimore.  Because of this Candy and I missed our flight back home, and went through a huge hassle of trying to get a new flight, etc.  Then once we got back into Baltimore the debarkation procedure was so disorganized it was not even funny.  Couple that with everything that happened that day, and it made for a very stressful day!

So enough of the negative parts.  Let's get to the good stuff!  The cruise was GREAT.  The entire vacation was GREAT!  What made it even more amazing was that I got engaged to the love of my life.  I proposed on the first formal night of the cruise.  It was so stressful lugging that ring around the whole time before that night!  It was very hard making sure that she didn't know it was coming.  Here's the story...

We were getting ready for our formal night.  Candy was wearing a black dress, and I had my black suit, mint green shirt, and Burberry tie.  As we were done getting ready, and heading out the door of our cabin I excused myself feigning some forgotten chapstick.   Candy waits for me outside, as I quickly grab the little black box from its hiding spot in my backpack.  I stick it in my suit jacket's inner breast pocket, and head out the door.  We make our way down to the atrium lobby where the multitude of photographers are set up to take pictures of all the guests in their classy garb.  We take a few pictures, and I can tell that I'm not going to make it past dinner with this box in my pocket.  One wrong placement of a hand in a picture and my surprise would be ruined!  I shoosh my fiance to be off and away from the crowds of the busy ship, and begin my search for a quiet place to pop the question.  We head down past the sports bar and coffee shop, and walk past a wall with a painting of Aphrodite in Front of Mirror as it's wallpaper.  I figure that it would be fitting to have Aphrodite watch as I propose.  We walk down to the end of the hallway, and by now Candy is getting stressed about having to walk so far just to sit down.  I tell her that there was a reason I brought her here, and as I get down on one knee and put my hand in my pocket she puts her hands to her mouth.  I take the box out, and open it with a flick of my finger.  I ask her, "Will you marry me?"  She responds with, "Are you serious!?"  I take a second to answer, and I remove the ring from its box.  I grab her hand and with a anxiety running through my veins I place the ring on her finger.  She can't believe it, and we kiss for a moment.  I rise and sit next to her, holding her.  We both look down at the ring as it sits sparkling in the dim light.  Her eyes, wet with emotion, rise to meet mine.  I realize at this moment that she hadn't answered my question, and bring up this very point.  She laughs, and says "Well, yes, of course!"  We talk for a few moments as we're sitting there, and then decide to head back to the atrium lobby.  We sit down in the atrium as we're waiting to be let in to the restaurant for dinner, and one of the photographers calls to us, "I see the pretty ring!  Come take a picture!"  We laugh and take some pictures celebrating our big night.

And of course here's a picture of the ring!  I'll post the pictures that the photographer took later once I get them scanned (I've been lazy since we got back!). 

The rest of the trip was great!  We went to Cocoa Beach in Florida, Blue Lagoon in Nassau, and Lucaya Beach in Freeport.  We had engagement pictures taken in Freeport at the beach too!  Enough of me talking, here's some pictures!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Our wonderful waitress Rossana!! 

That's it for now.  I'll update again with some more pictures, and some updates from last month including a new addition to my car, our December event-of-the-month, and Christmas!!!

Rockfest and Colorado

These past few weeks have sure been amazing!  So the weekend of the 25th Candy and I went to Meskwaki Casino's annual Rockfest.  They had Hurt, Fuel, Puddle of Mudd, and Lifehouse playing.  We're pretty big Lifehouse fans, and I've always regretted not going to their concert a couple years back.  Naturally we weren't going to miss this one.  So we bought our tickets a few weeks before.  We went over to Tama that day for the concert, and the entire day the weather was crappy.  Raining most of the day and everything, and the Rockfest was outside so a lot of people didn't show up.  We even saw one guy giving away his tickets for free because he didn't want to go anymore.  What a mistake that guy made...  Hurt played first, and I had never heard of them before.  They were really good though!  The lead singer was very charismatic and played the crowd really well.  It wasn't normally my style of music, but it was pretty awesome.  It was kind of a harder rock than what I normally listen to.  I really liked them though.  Fuel played next, and the only thing really bad about the night was having to wait for the stage crew to set up the stage for the next band.  It took them longer than the bands actual sets!  So Fuel played, and I didn't think that I had heard of them before but then they played a few songs that I knew.  "Hemorrhage" was a good song, and a pretty big hit for them a few years back.  They were very good, and I'm glad we got to see them.  Puddle of Mudd played next, and again the wait was excruciating!  The bleachers were soaking wet too, so that did not help.  Puddle of Mudd was great, and again I was surprised that I knew some of their songs.  I guess I'm just really bad at remembering names...  I don't know.  They were really good though, and I wish that I recorded some of their songs.  "Blurry" and "She Hates Me" were my two favorites from them.  Again we had to wait, and by now we had been there for around 4 hours already.  I was holding up alright, Candy was getting a little anxious though.  Finally it was time for Lifehouse to come on, and the entire wait was worth every second.  I've been to quite a few concerts before, and I must say that Lifehouse was the best.  Even against the concerts we went to earlier this year I would say that Lifehouse was number 1, and it's pretty hard to beat Lady Antebellum and Rascal Flatts.  While they are different genres it is kind of hard to compare, but anyways enough of that.  The videos are posted below.  I've got a couple more also, so I might upload those in a bit so check back or check my youtube channel.  So the concert, yes, the concert was soooo awesome!  Lifehouse definitely does a great live performance.  They sang almost all of my favorite songs.  I was a little upset that they didn't perform "Everything," but they made up for it in my book.  I won't go into so much detail about everything, but if you are at all a Lifehouse fan or think you might want to be you NEED to see them live.  YOU NEED TO!!!!  

This next video was the BEST part of the night.  They sang "Hanging By a Moment," and as you can see in the video as it starts to get intense rain starts pouring down.  It was epic, and made the concert that much more fun.  Words can't describe how awesome it was.  Definitely a moment to remember.

So after the concert I had to worry about Candy's birthday!  I decided a little while back that I would surprise her with a quick four day trip to Colorado, and visit with one of my best buddies, Alex.  I told her about it Thursday night (Aug. 30th), and we left the next morning.  It was a 10 hour drive, but it wasn't really too bad.  We got to Denver around 3:30 mountain time, and Alex took us out with a few friends to go eat and have some drinks.  We ate at a pretty cool little sandwich shop that had an awesome brisket sandwich, but the highlight was our next destination.  We went to this place called "William and Graham's" that was a prohibition themed bar.  When you walk in it's just a tiny little "bookstore," but then they open up one of the bookcases and lead back to a secret bar.  Totally cool.  The bartenders were amazing, and they made some killer drinks.  Alex and I had a Blue Blazer, which the bartender sets on fire while mixing it.  It was nuts.  It was soooo strong, but did have a good taste.  Somewhat.  We had some drinks for a while, then headed out to get some ice cream.  We ended the night there, because Candy and I were exhausted from the drive, and wanted to sleep.  The next day we went out and did some shopping and sightseeing, and met up with Alex and company for some Korean BBQ.  I love Denver's food selections.  We headed back to Alex's and played some cards and drank a little bit, before Candy and I headed up into the mountains to the casinos and Alex and co. went out to the bars.  The drive into the mountains was beautiful, even in the dark of night.  Candy was a little scared, but it was a fun drive.  The little city where all of the casinos were was really cool also.  It was all kind of tucked back into the mountains, and real old fashioned.  The next day Candy and I went down to the Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs.  It was a really nice looking area.  It kind of sucked that it was so touristy and crowded, but it was beautiful nonetheless.  After Garden of the Gods we headed back to Alex's and met up with all of them.  We went out shopping at another mall for a little while before Candy and I had to start heading back to Iowa.  The trip was fun.  It was a little short, but it was good for a mini trip.  The drive wasn't too bad either.  I'd like to head back over there sometime.  It'll have to wait for a little while though, because we have some bigger vacations coming up that will take priority over Colorado again.  Anyways, that's all for now.  Catch you all later.  I hope you had a great birthday Candy!  I love you!

This was a very busy weekend!  I have a lot of pictures and a few videos to post, so I'll just let them speak for themselves.  Just to let you know though, I went out to the 515 Get Down IV Car Show and the Rascal Flatts concert at the Iowa State Fair.  Both were amazing, and I had such a great time!  Here are the pictures from the car show:

My buddy's 2006 Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX

My friend's 2004 Toyota Matrix XRS

And my 2004 Mazda RX-8

And here's a quick shot of me gettin' down in the circle.  It was the first time I've danced in quite a while!  It felt good though.

Those are the best pictures from the car show.  I mainly focused on mine, Jason's (Matrix), and Chris' (Evo) cars.  Chris won 1st Place for Best Import with his Evo, so congrats to him.  The show was fun!  It sucked that we had to leave early, but it couldn't be helped because we had to go to the concert!

The concert was great!  Eden's Edge, Eli Young Band, and Little Big Town opened for Rascal Flatts for the Changed Tour 2012.  It was the concert for the last night of the 10-day long Iowa State Fair in Des Moines.  The show was amazing!  I took a few videos of some songs, so check those out below.  I'm a big Rascal Flatts fan, so I was loving it!  The first video is of Little Big Town.  They did a cover of Lady Gaga's "Born This Way."  It was pretty cool.  The next two are Rascal Flatts performing "Banjo" and "Come Wake Me Up."  Check 'em out!!!