A Journey for Two

Today is the day before Jacob and I celebrate our second wedding anniversary and my thoughts currently are… how has it been two years already and, also, how has it only been two years?? Have you ever felt this about those things most precious to you?

These past two years have been the very definition of an adventure. We’ve traveled to two countries, ten states, woken up before the sun and crawled into bed long after the rise of the moon. We’ve danced barefooted on beaches, on top of mountains and in dirty kitchens. We’ve eaten both the finest cuisine and tasted our tears. We’ve shared in stresses, anxieties and fears.

I knew I loved you when I said “I do” but I never expected it to grow into something 10x more gorgeous, freeing, intimate, wild and true. My heart is bursting for the man who gave me his last name. It’s the greatest honor to carry this flame.

I cannot wait to see what the next year looks like for us in this journey and everyone it involves. We are incredibly thankful to our families, our friends and to you for supporting us, praying for us and being adventurous with us along this journey of lives well loved.

You are loved!

-Kriss

New Year, New Zip Code

Last new year’s as Jacob and I were resting together and reflecting on the year of 2018 and all of our moments together (aka marriage) we decided that 2019 was going to be another huge year for us, God willing.

The home where our love grew, where Jacob proposed and where our first year of marriage was written in the books.

The master plan was that I was going to complete my internship and undergraduate degree while Jacob was going to start the process of applying to new police departments. In March, he had applied to four or five different departments in Indiana and one in Colorado while I was halfway through the busiest semester of my life. But we were determined to come out on the other side with check marks by our goals.

The “Super Mover” is a game changer!

Then flash-forward to July and I’m an official college graduate completely unsure of what’s next while Jacob found out that he was selected by a department in Indianapolis. Aka we were elated and I think that following weekend I packed up everything I could get my hands on.

The calm before the storm.

But the kicker was that there were two different start dates. One date was at the beginning of September 2019 and the other was at the beginning of 2020. Naturally we wanted it to be the soonest date but, as God would have it, he was selected to start at the later date.

We were crazy gross, tired and sore but oh so joyful!

And like I said above, I was in this weird season of finding direction so to be hit with feelings of annoyance, relief and determination- we decided to make the best of our time left in Terre Haute, IN. We were going to book an international trip to Belgium, take full advantage of more time to pack and find our next home, travel for the holidays to see his family and to enjoy one last Christmas season living in the place where it all started.

Did I mention that we were tired?

When moving weekend arrived we were able to get our truck early and pack a full day ahead of schedule. On our last night in the house, we made the classic decision of ordering pizza and sleeping on the floor. I will admit that it was not as comfortable as my romantic side figured that it would be but we got a good laugh out of it and found that we wanted to get up earlier than usual the next the day. So with that we grabbed the last bits of stuff and things, locked the door behind us and took off onto our next adventure!

Days after the move, Tyson is still exhausted.

Now we are officially moved in and things are starting to feel like home again. Yes, there are still plenty of boxes left unopened with nooks and crannies here and there that I have no clue how to utilize but God’s timing is everything. I have felt it this whole process from the lack of patience to the mysterious future to the tears of joy shed during the quiet drive to our new home, God truly is in the details. And with this focus on the One who brought it all together I can proudly say that 2020 is going to be an amazing new chapter!

Next week on the blog we are traveling again! Can I get an Amen? So please sign up for email notifications and join me for some fun in the Florida sun!

-Kriss

Happily Ever Harrison

On the morning of September 8, 2018, I woke up to a quiet, rainy morning. It gave me time to focus my heart on what the day held for Jacob and I and all of the past chapters in life that got us to this point. I felt God in the rain and in the silence.

Soon my ladies came over to start getting ready for the wedding! It was so much fun getting ready with each and everyone of them and then later giving them the gifts that I personalized for the each of them. Like I said to start this blog post, so many chapters in life took me to this wedding day and in each of those chapters Christ brought alongside a women whom ended up becoming a sister, whom was like minded and we grew together in the same chapters of life.

 

On the morning of our wedding day Jacob and his guys got ready at a local hotel. While getting ready our photographer Stephen stole Jacob away for a moment to plug in deeper. We decided to write each other letters for the morning of our wedding. My words brought tears to his eyes while his brought warmth to my heart. I still can’t get over how the years grew us into the perfect partner for the other and even when I became impatient for him to come into my life- I wouldn’t change it for the world!

 

Going from our getting ready location to the venue spaces was…. honestly not my favorite nor my brightest shining moment. But with the love, understanding and shoe box turned into a fan to cool me down- we got every decorated, dress and lined up for action!

 

Whenever I stepped onto the aisle to walk towards my husband, I was overcome by joy. I always thought that I would burst into tears, oh wait I did that the whole time we rehearsed, but in the real deal I was beaming with joy. I am so proud of the man that I got to walk towards, proud for the relationships I had with everyone in that room and proud that Christ never gave up on me.

 

Something that we couldn’t do on our wedding day, is have the kind of day that we did without our bridal party, their loves, our families and friends! So here is a highlight of them in the roles that I love that they got to play on our day…

 

Between Ceremony and Reception we got in some family and bridal party pictures, those will be posted soon, and also a break! Wedding Days are no joke. So much to balance and so many people to see. But I was so excited to get our Reception started, hear some toasts, eat some amazing food, take our first dance, hug our loved ones and have even more excuses to makeout!

 

 

 

Thank you all for joining me and celebrating with me!

-XOKriss

Jacksonville, Florida

On the morning of October 6th, I woke up at sunrise in Jacksonville Florida, wrapped up in a cozy sweater and made my way down to the ocean.

Squishing my toes in the sand I found my spot on the coast. Within twenty minutes the sky was on fire with a beautiful message of a new day and another moment along the way for Kurt and Chelsea. It was wonderful to see this promise fulfilling itself throughout the day.

But with every wedding comes a full days worth of pulling together to make the dream a reality! So I headed back up the beach to get ready for the day!

Every detail seemed to come together flawlessly and so naturally. Some of this natural grace came from different members of the bridal party actually pulling in the greenery from around the houses we were staying in. I’m not sure why but it warmed my heart to see them trudging through bushes to find those beautiful leaves.

Chelsea was stunning in every way. Her grace was shown in the way she walked while her joy was painted across every fiber of her being. But this didn’t overshadow Kurt. Kurt’s gentleness went perfectly with his structured suit. His strength wasn’t diminished by the tears he experienced but somehow made him that much stronger.

To follow was a reception perfect for them from a signature drink at the bar, thoughtful moments with special people and dancing that I would later feel in every muscle. Their wedding day on the beach with both the sun and the stars was everything and more.

Thank you both for allowing Jacob and I be such big parts of your day and first steps as Mr and Mrs! We cannot wait for all of the years to come.

Also for transparency sake, I was not the official photographer for this wedding but definitely took some behind the scenes pictures.

XOKriss

Next week on the blog I will be sharing our wedding pictures!! Yep that’s right its finally Harrison time!

Eat & Drink Berlin

Jacob and I had tunnel vision for our trip to Germany and that vision was on the food and drinks. Jacob was excited for the traditional German food and beer while I was excited for fresh baked pastries, international food and mugs of strong coffee. Today on the blog I want to share some of our tasty stops along the journey.

— Food —

The beauty of Europe is that most people aren’t originally from the country that they currently live in, they travel often or they grew up in a household whose traditions differ compared to the society around them. So then you get this beautiful melting pot of languages, customs, ethnicities and foods. Jacob and I’s plan of action: eat a different cultures food for each meal.

Along the journey we experienced the following nationalities cuisines: Indian, German, American (tried to wiggle our way out of this one but it is what it is), Mexican, Australian, Turkish and Korean.

Some of my most favorite spots where found in the a.m. Because breakfast. These places also offered my favorite beverage, which is coffee and you can find all of those down below.

^ German Currywurst

Lunches consist of whatever we could find wherever we were at the time. Our overall relationship with food on our trip was adventurous but it was also one of our more stressful moments. I think this is because of all of the options around without fully knowing the extent of the things.

^Turkish Döner

One place we stumbled into eating at was at Potsdamer Platz. It is a glorified mall where the mentality is that its a place where you can live, work, eat and have fun all in one spot on the map. While here we saw their different choices of food but decided to go with the Australian restaurant. I had brunch, no surprise here, while Jacob expanded his love of meat. He ordered a meal that came with three different meats including tandoori chicken, Crocodile and Kangaroo.

Dinners were larger and were where we spent more money on food. The one that stands out the most to me now was our Korean BBQ night. It was Monday night, our dressy date night, and we just randomly picked this spot. We were sat inside in front of a grill and we, I, panicked. I had no clue what I was to do or how to do it. We quickly learned from our awesome waiter and went to cooking. I want to say that this was my favorite because of how interactive it was, how we were able to focus on each other and learn something new.

^Korean BBQ

— Coffee —

On our first morning of the trip we stopped in the Okay Café. We were the very first customers that morning so we got to really take in the beauty of the place, take our time to order, we talked about the day and enjoyed the sound of rain through the open windows.

^Okay Café

Coffee shops and cafes were my sweet spot but also the area where I struggled with German. A lot of the menus in restaurants and coffee shops had English under the German descriptions, but some were vague. I kept ordering the wrong kinds of coffee and kept chasing the craving for a strong cup of coffee. But the best part of this hunt was ending up in many different kinds of shops for coffee.

^Brick Coffee and more

In some I grabbed pastries, pretzels and full breakfasts while taking in the atmospheres and rest. Most of the shops we stopped in were just around the corner from our Airbnb, another amazing part of the experience. You don’t have to walk far before finding another coffee shop that has outdoor seating.

^Myxa Café Berlin

One of our mornings we went to the Brezel Company. We both grabbed a pretzel and a coffee for our breakfast. Americans, more than likely, are used to eating larger breakfasts but something about the simplicity of our breakfast that morning really made me feel good. It was salty from the pretzel and it was slightly sweet from the macchiato.

^Brezel Company Café Neukölln

— Beer —

Beer was the heart and soul of Jacobs drink cravings. He wanted to try as many historically traditional beers as he could but also wanted to learn more about the history and science of beer making in Germany.

In the previous Berlin post I shared how we went on a walking tour of Berlin on the first day of the trip. Towards the end of the tour they let the group know about a beer tour that the company offered. So on Saturday night we joined a 3 hour beer tour of Berlin.

While on the tour we tried 7 different beers, learned how to drink them to get the full flavor, learned about men and women’s roles in the making process and history, visited the oldest breweries in Berlin and got to meet other travelers from around the world.

My favorite part of the tour was… the pretzel, or brezel, with it’s sweet mustard sauce. Like I said before the beer lover in my relationship is definitely Jacob. I loved watching him learning so much, enjoying different brews with their different amount of hops and then scooting over my beer after I got my sip in.

If you are traveling around Europe anytime soon and want to check out this tour company you can find their website here.

In conclusion, Berlin is for food, coffee & beer

Lovers!

Next Week on the Blog! I will be sharing our honeymoon Airbnb home, its neighborhood and about the slow moments of our trip. Please stay tuned and eat a pretzel this month because its national pretzel month!!

-XOKriss

Traveling Berlin, Honeymoon Style

Here’s to the start of our Honeymoon story! A moment in our relationship that we have been planning for and have been swimming in excitement for during our 11 month engagement. And I can give you a spoiler right now, it was everything and more.

We left for Germany on a Tuesday afternoon. This leaving looked an awful lot like: millions of kisses on our dogs head, a 2.5 hour drive north to a friend’s house whom was taking us to O’Hare Airport, riding in her car for over an hour, sitting in the airport for 3 hours, 6.5 hour flight to Iceland and then a 3.5 hour flight to Berlin- all with a time zone change of 6 hours. *** and breathe***

But we got in Berlin around 6 p.m. on Wednesday. After finding our Airbnb we stretched, changed, hugged and set out to our new neighborhood streets of…

Wanting to keep our first night simple so we got dinner, grabbed a bottle of wine to celebrate and some mini German chocolates because why not!

The next morning we were ready to go! We laced up our shoes, threw on some jackets and grabbed our umbrellas before heading out on our only rainy day of the trip. This day was spent adjusting to the life lived in the city. And since you can’t live in the now without knowing the past, we joined a walking tour of Berlin. I have been on this tour twice before our trip but every time I go, I never regret it.

The tour itself begins at the Brandenburg Gate then heads out towards a Holocaust Memorial as you wander down the busy streets and end up in a massive courtyard of majestic cathedrals.

In the evening we walked around the gray streets of Berlin and through the lush woods of the Tiergarten, holding hands and talking about life. We tried food here and there as our stomachs saw fit but really just used the day to take in our surroundings and taking in our first trip as a married couple.

On Friday we made a huge decision. At the start of our honeymoon planning process we were going to do day trips to three other locations. Those locations being: Munich, Cologne and Amsterdam. We decided to scrap all of our previous plans and stay put in the beautiful city of Berlin. But with still wanting the castle and royalty feels that we had hoped to find in Munich we headed in the direction of Charlottenburg Palace.

There rest of the evening we viewed the East Side Gallery and kept our fingers crossed for other street art in the city. With not finding much on Friday night, my hunt continued into Saturday. We visited the Mall of Berlin where we stumbled across a huge fashion show with a live concert, Humboldt University where Einstein taught and finally victory finding a huge, beautiful wall mural.

Sunday was a day of highs and lows! None of it being negative but literal high points in the city and the low, watery moments offered in the city. We took a river cruise on the River Spree and then climbed to the highest point in the Berliner Dom.

One of the days that I was looking forward to the most was Monday. Before our honeymoon we decided that there would be one night that would be a dressy night for us. We’d wear something that made us feel good, find a good place to eat and celebrate our last night there. I chose a red velvet dress with strappy tan heels while Jacob chose straight tan pants, a polka dot dress shirt and the same suit jacket that we wore on our wedding day.

Thank you for joining with me today and hearing a snapshot of our trip. I cannot wait for next week and sharing more with you! Look forward to two of our favorite parts of the trip: Food and Drinks!

XOKriss

Our Story: How it all Started

I can’t believe that we are finally here at our wedding weekend! It feels like only yesterday that I met my sweet Jacob and now I will always know that he will be with me and I with him! And to better celebrate here on the Blog this week, here is our love story!

Around 2017’s new years weekend, Jacob moved from Colorado to Indiana while Kristen was currently living in Indiana. He was moving back to Indiana to start a new job while she was pretty settled into her life there. She just so happened to work at the same library where he worked security while he was at University.

It was an afternoon on a chilly January Monday, when Jacob and Kristen first saw each other. She was busy at work at the library when Jacob stopped by. He was only there to stay Hello to a few of his ex coworkers before going home for the day.

Whenever she first saw him, something in the air changed. She felt a pull to him and a spark that she had never felt before. He wasn’t what she expected but every piece of her was telling her that he needed to be in her life for whatever reason. The only way she could sum up that feeling was by remembering all of the past prayers in her lifetime for a sign of her “one”.

While he was in the library, he noticed her but was more so focused on why he had come to the library in the first place. He made his rounds, laughed and caught up with some of the old friends he knew and then was on his way.

What he didn’t realize was that while he was talking to patrons and employees of the library, she was at work learning more about him. Everyone who knew him from before had nothing but the best things to say about his character, spirit, heart and work ethic. These truths made her learn things about him that others didn’t realize. There was something about him that set him apart, that made him the sweet and genuine person that he is. And she knew right away that he loved the same unchangeable, never shifting Jesus Christ.

At this point in time he wasn’t fully moved back to Terre Haute. He was living about 35 minutes away. So on his drive back home from the haute, he gets a FaceBook message and it ends up being from the girl he saw working at the library. So what does he do? He writes back but still in complete confusion.

Before she sent the message to him, she had two questions to answer:

1. Did he love the Lord like she could feel on him?

2. Was he even single?

And the answers came back yes and yes. Sooner than she realized it, he messaged her back.

Two days later the two of them met for coffee. Both just trying this out to see what it would be like. She was dressed all in black with stoic body language while he was in athletic wear with bubbling energetic energy to match. They couldn’t be more opposite so no one could blame them for what came next- the friendzone.

They both friend-zoned each other but for whatever reason, maybe it was her first heart pull to him or his deep curiosity in what she was really about, they kept hanging out together.

Their time started with a couple of coffee shop hangouts, then grew to 4 hour long phone conversations, to long walks in parks, taking pictures together, holding hands, first kisses in parking lots, professions of love on marble bridges then like a turn of the page to a new chapter that starts with a man on his knee just wanting to love that girl with everything he has for as long as he breathes.

She may have made the first move and felt the first skip of heartbeat but he was the first to tell her how one day he would marry her. She knew and he knew somehow all along that they were meant to be. And as they say, the rest is history!

-XOKriss

Our Honeymoon Location Spoiler!

Hello beautiful people! We are officially 23 days until the wedding which means, to my delight, that we are a 25 days away from our Honeymoon!!!

It’s incredible how the time has gone, the memories we’ve made and all of the decisions that have happened for both our wedding day and our honeymoon trip! But we’ve kept the location on the DL! But not for long….

Jacob and I will be boarding a plane and traveling to Germany for our honeymoon! We will be based in in Berlin and we will be traveling during our time there to different locations in Germany.

The first location will be to Munich! There we plan on getting our fill of castles and classic Germany. This includes culture, music, food, beer halls and history that has taken place there!

The next location will be Cologne! We have lots of plans for a more artistic day spent there. We want to go to art museums, check out modern architecture and street art and try out some fusion cuisine.

Our last travel location will be the furthest from Berlin and that’s Amsterdam! We want to go on canal rides, sit in outdoor cafes, visit gorgeous greenhouses and other romantic places.

Besides these three day trips most of our time will be spent in Berlin, getting to know the life there better. This will be my third time to Berlin and honestly its a dream come true. In past trips I have gone with others and their partners and I’ve always said to myself that one day I want to experience Berlin with my special one- and here we are!

Picking our location was both overwhelming and also swift! We kept going back and forth with different states here in the US. I was feeling Nashville while he was feeling the west coast. This debate went on for a couple of weeks until one morning he came over to my house with an epiphany!

He woke up that morning and thought to himself “we’ve got the money, the time and the desire to go to Europe! And we should go!” After deciding, we booked our tickets and airbnb that following weekend.

So we are going and I cannot wait!!

-XOKriss

**travel images were taken by me on my last trip to Germany in 2015

Our Engagement Moment

How does one pick and plan moments to be captured forever? How can a piece of technology capture the love that connects me to you?

On a Thursday morning waking up in the home of our photographers in Michigan City, Indiana and at 3:30 in the morning, Jacob and I held hands and bowed our heads together. Taking this moment to connect and to reflect on the heartbeat that is behind “us.” We prayed for the day, for our future, for our photographers and for our love to be captured in the moments that were soon to come. Using this engagement session as a time capsule for the years to come. So here is the evidence my friends: here is our love for the one we get to love, cherish, honor, support for today and the days to come.

/ / / The sun rises when you are near / / /

 

/ / / And all of my fears disappear / / /

/ / / You are the one I want, You are the one I want to love / / /

 

57 Day till: #itsharrisontime

 

-XOKriss

 

You can find our Photographers at: https://rainstormphoto.com/