We're excited to celebrate with you!

Chris and I had mutual friends for a couple of years before we actually crossed paths. Our friends JoAnna and Tyler planned a night out a couple of weeks before their own wedding and that’s when we formally met. While at the bar, I sat next to Chris and we talked for most of the night. When things winded down for the night, we both left saying we’d see each other at the wedding in a couple of weeks. On 11/4/17 he made quite the impressionable usher at the wedding and stole my heart as we danced and I watched him proceed to fall on his butt attempting a dance move (there’s a video if you’d like to see it). Our relationship continued to grow and strengthen, even making its way through two years of long distance as I completed graduate school at Drake. During that time we’ve built on our motto of Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much. We’ve hit up our favorite breweries, dove head first into race weekends, traveled the country and enjoyed amazing times with our friends and family. We can’t wait to have many more of these moments for the rest of our lives!

Chris and I had gone to St. Petersburg, Florida over my spring break to attend the IndyCar race and then head over to Orlando for some Harry Potter World. Prior to us heading to Florida for spring break, Chris had created a photo book and had custom beer glasses made for us. The plan was to head to Need Pizza (our Sunday night tradition), where he had things lined up with the staff to help in the proposal. Then…Covid-19. We had to come back from our trip early and the whole state of Iowa was shut down. Since we couldn’t go to Need and that’s where the book and glasses were, Chris had to improvise. We had a date night where we picked up carry out and afterwards, Chris brought the book up on line for me to look at. He told me it was a book about the past year that captured all of our memories. On the last page there was a question, “Carissa, will you…” and before I knew it he was on one knee asking me to be his best friend for the rest of his life. Getting engaged during a pandemic and quarantine is something we’ll remember forever. Of course…I said yes! (After “ARE YOU SERIOUS?!?”)