C9 Engagement ~ Karis & Terry with Katie Van Buren Photography

We love fantastic engagement stories and this has to be one of our favorites! Karis and Terry’s story was recently published on How He Asked Blog. We are excited for their upcoming wedding at Crooked Willow Farms this year and with the ever talented Katie Van Buren as our photographer and Perfect Petal as the florist and Epicurean Catering, this wedding is going to be spectacular!

Here is the post from How He Asked Blog:

How We Met (Told by Karis, the Bride!)

Terry and I first met in 2002 when we were twelve years old and in the seventh grade, but our story doesn’t really start until five years later when we were both seventeen. When junior year prom came around, my friend, Katelynn, was asked by Terry’s friend, Kyle. So it turned out that we ended up going in the same group together. Before the dance we were all at dinner together and I remember how Terry kept making me laugh and had the cutest smile. In the following months, we would all hang out together as friends and I would always look forward to spending time with Terry. Not only was he very funny, but he was also the sweetest boy I had ever met. By the end of the summer before our senior year, Terry worked up the courage (he was quite shy in high school) to tell me he liked me and after telling him how much I liked him too, he finally asked me out! On our first date he even had the daring to give me a little peck on the lips, and I am so glad that he did. He is the first and only boy I have ever kissed! We have been together ever since!

How I Proposed (Told by Terry, the Groom)

I knew I wanted to marry Karis soon after we began dating, but being a college student I knew I couldn’t afford the kind of ring and proposal that Karis deserved. So I began saving my money from various summer jobs and in 2011 I finally got enough to afford the ring that I knew Karis would love. So I excitedly went out and purchased the ring in November of 2011 and had a plan to propose to Karis a week later. However, I encountered a small snag. I had called Karis’ parents the day after purchasing the ring to find a good time to meet them and ask for their blessing in my proposal to Karis. The day after I met with them, Karis asked to borrow my phone to make a call and accidentally pressed the wrong button and saw that I had called her dad. She immediately became suspicious of the dinner arrangements I had set up for a few days later (in which I was going to do a surprise carriage ride afterwards with the proposal). At this point I knew my plan had been blown. When planning the proposal there were three criteria that I felt were absolutely necessary to make it special. 1) I wanted it to be a surprise. Although I knew she was expecting a proposal soon, I wanted the timing and location to be a surprise to her. 2) I wanted our puppy (Ginger) to be there since she had become such a major part of our lives. And 3) I wanted to have someone else there to photograph the event.

Since having criteria #1 compromised, I realized I needed a new plan. So in order to throw off her suspicions I decided to wait.. and wait.. and wait until she had (hopefully) forgotten about the phone call I had made to her dad. Luckily, the new proposal plan I had in mind required a lot of preparation and work. When I was a little boy I read the story Sadako and The Thousand Cranes and it always stuck with me since I also had leukemia as a child. For those who have not heard the story, it is about a young Japanese girl who developed leukemia as a result of the Hiroshima atomic bombing. While in the hospital she began folding paper cranes based on the Japanese legend that whosoever folds 1,000 paper cranes will be granted one wish from the gods. Never before in my life had I wanted a wish fulfilled so bad that I would work hard enough to fold 1,000 paper cranes. But after getting to know how wonderful and sweet Karis was I knew that if I could have one wish, I would wish to spend the rest of my life with her (in a slight variation on the legend I decided to fold 1,000 paper Kawasaki roses which I thought was a little more romantic than the paper cranes). So, I set to work in late December and began folding 10 – 20 roses a day (each one took me about 10 -15 minutes). As time went by I accumulated hundreds of roses and it became more and more difficult to keep them hidden from Karis. I had a suitcase in the trunk of my car with about 500 of them and couldn’t fit any more in there so I started putting them under my bed in another large suitcase.

Toward the middle of April a perfect opportunity opened up for my proposal to Karis. Karis was going out with her friends and I was supposed to be in class all night (until 11 PM). So I knew that if I proposed to her that night I could definitely fulfill criteria #1 (surprise her) because she wouldn’t expect me to be around until after class. I was able to get the aid of Karis’ friend so she would drive by this beautiful park with a gazebo and flowers all around on their way home. As soon as Karis left the house (around 8 PM), I set to work and grabbed my 1,000 or so roses (I think I had about that many by then, it was really hard to keep track of them all) and Ginger and began decorating the gazebo (the best I could) by placing roses along the columns and all around it. I set up rows of tea lights and roses along the path leading up to the gazebo. I had also brought a mini boombox with me and set it up nearby. By the time Karis’ friend texted me telling me they were on their way towards the park I had just barely finished setting it all up. (Story continued from Karis’ perspective…)

Told By Karis:

One night around 8 I met up with two of my best friends, Kelsey and Chelsea, to get drinks. We had all driven together downtown because parking can be a nightmare. We had a great time together laughing and catching up. Little did I know that Kelsey was in on Terry’s proposal plan. She was periodically texting throughout the night and asking me questions about Terry and what he was doing that night, like she had no idea! When we left downtown, Kelsey took an alternate route than normal. She said this was because she had recently been pulled over on the normal route, so I didn’t think anything of it. Then we slowed down near these beautiful gardens near Colorado State University. I noticed that there were candles everywhere and roses all around. Then Chelsea shouted “Wait I think someone is proposing here!” Then I noticed Ginger sitting in the middle of the gazebo. I got out of the car and heard “God Gave Me You” playing. I was frozen and in shock! I could not believe that this was actually happening to me, something that I had been wishing for since we started dating, nearly five years before. I began to walk up the candle lit path to Ginger and Terry appeared. He got on one knee and said “Karis, you’re my Belle (from Beauty & the Beast), my dove, and my best friend. Will you marry me?” I was still in shock and all I did was nod because I could not produce a single word. When I began to realize what had just happened I repeatedly asked Terry “are you sure, are you sure?” I just couldn’t believe that we were finally engaged after talking about it for years and years. It had finally happened, we were engaged, in the most special and beautiful way.