Keiko's Shadow
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
New Blog
Saturday, March 7, 2009
The Story
The Sunday after Christmas Dell came up to me and asked if we could get together that week, he found out that I was heading back to Rexburg that Saturday and rushed to ask me out before I left. :) I was all prepared to say that I couldn't because I had to get ready to go back to school, but something about the way he asked me softened my heart and I decided to give him a chance. We met on Monday night for FHE and had a great activity, then we planned our date for Thursday. It was a great date! First we went for a walk in the park and had snow cones, then we went and played games with his family for a couple hours. It was really fun, and I felt really comfortable with his family. They made me feel like I was already a part of their family. After the games he took me to a yummy Chinese restraunt. Then we went to my house and he looked at some of my artwork. We ended up spending 7 1/2 hours together! It was wonderful, and I wanted to get to know him better. It was just so natural and comfortable to be around him and we had similar interests.
On Saturday I left for Rexburg. When I got there I was about to call him to let him know that I got there safely, but he beat me to it! Just as I was pulling out my phone he called me! We ended up talking for 2 hours! I have only talked that long with family before! We talked again on Sunday for 2 1/2 hours....then on Monday for about the same. We also emailed and chatted a lot as well. We talked all the time :) In a way it was good to be 6 hours apart because that really built our communication and helped us get to know each other that way, and we kept finding that we had more and more in common! In January we had a 3 day weekend for Martin Luther King day so I went home to visit. He came over on Friday and played games with my family. Then Saturday was my day to spend with my family in Caldwell, which was great fun. Then Sunday we went to church together, ate lunch with my family, then we went to his home later for dinner and played games with his parents. The weekend was amazing! I realized that I was falling in love...actually, by Tuesday I realized I was in love. We continued talking all the time and improving and getting to know more and more about each other.
It was amazing to find out how compatible we are and we just kept finding out how much we had in common and how similar we are. I never expected to find someone so similar. You know those lists that they tell you to write in young women's that has all of the qualities you are looking for in a husband? He matched all of them...he exceeded it! He is so much better than I deserve! There really is no perfect man out there for everybody, but there is a perfect man for me, and I found him. He treats me so well, makes me feel special, makes me happy,....he just makes me want to be a better person.
We had a 3 day weekend again in February for Presidents day, so I went home again. He arrived at my house just a few minutes after I got home and after eating soup we went over to Oma and Opa's to help Oma with her computer and help them find a hotel to stay in so they would already be in Boise in the morning for Opa's surgery. It was good to see them. On Saturday, which just happened to be Valentine's day, Dell picked me up from my eye appointment and we went to the park where we had our first date. While there he asked me to marry him. Neither one of us had expected a proposal that day, but the moment was right. We went to his house later and made a snowman in his Grandpa's yard, then he had me go on a treasure hunt for my valentine. That was fun :) After dinner we watched a movie with his parents and then he took me home. On Sunday we went to church again, then we went to my house for lunch and played games with my family and spent time with them.
Monday meant that it was time to return to Rexburg, but this time he came back with me to visit and look for some job opportunities in this area. On the 22nd of February, my birthday, he proposed to me. He had been giving me pieces of a heart all week with a message on it, and he gave me the last piece on the 22nd which told me where to meet him. So I met him at the Temple and he knelt down and proposed. He had a ring! I didn't expect that!! I was expecting a ring pop or a twisty tie because I am allergic to metal like mom, but he found a really pretty ring that doesn't bother me. After that we let everyone know that we were engaged. Since then we have just been enjoying spending time together and we have been looking for housing and working on wedding preparations and things. Last night was his last night here in Rexburg so we will be back to emails and phone calls until April 10th when we will be sealed together for eternity in the Boise Temple.
I never expected to go this fast in a relationship, neither one of us did, but it just feels right. Everything is working out, it is almost magical how it all happened/is happening. We found out that there were so many times where we could have met, we even lived in complexes right next to each other, I walked through his parking lot everyday! Even though we could have met then, the timing was right for us to meet now. The Lord's timing is so perfect!! This has been such a wonderful experience; I am so blessed.
We took our engagement pictures last week and got them back, so now you can see them too :)
Click here to see the pictures
Here is one of our pictures. We took one that looked like those Dutch kissing couple figurines :)
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Holland Collages
hing, that went through the center of the tank. You pull up on the knob to flush it. The other one was in Scheveningen when we went to TARZAN. It took me and Laena both 5 minutes to figure out where it was!! I'm not kidding. We kept looking around for it, it ended up being something funky, but I don't remember how it worked. Our favorite one was the one on the floor in the Paleis Het Loo. We called it the "Royal Toilet"...or I guess you could say, the "royal flush." :)
Here is also a collage of the "killer pidgeons". I will never look at pidgeons the same. :P
Here is a collection of all the birds that we saw...yes, we started collecting pictures of all of them too, especially after the pidgeons and the peacock.
HAPPY MEMORIES!!
Wednesday, October 3, 2007
It was a long flight over the ocean, and a lot more cramped because we didn't have the luxury of getting moved up to Economy Plus. So, we had sore legs just like everyone else. In fact, when I tried to lay my seat back a little bit to sleep, the lady behind me kicked my seat. So I put my pillow up against the window instead. Eventually we started descending and we saw Michigan as we flew into Chicago. It was pretty, and I was excited to get off the plane.
We had another 6 hour layover in Chicago. At least this time part of the time was spent in Customs, then traveling from Customs to the terminal. After playing scrabble for hours and eating dinner the flights for our time were finally up on the boards, and we discovered we were in the wrong terminal, so we got a bus to the next one over. There we sat again, waiting for our flight and playing speed scrabble. However, we remembered that the Chicago airport had these really cool hi-tech toilet seats with rotating seat covers, so this time we were ready with our cameras. In fact, Laena took a video of it. To see what I am talking about, click here.
Our plane ended up being delayed, so we had to wait even longer!! However, we eventually made it home. We were exhausted, the time change was throwing us off and our bodies had been awake for over 24 hours, though the time change made it the same day. Luckily our planes came in at night, so we could go straight to bed.
We were happy to be home.
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
Monday, October 1, 2007
Amsterdam!! Today Tante Marianne had to go back to work again, so she dropped us off at the train station and we took the train into Amsterdam. We had a map of the city that Tante Marianne gave us to help us get around. I also remembered reading about a canal bus, it is a little boat that drives around the canals to take you to all the tourist areas. I knew that there was a ticket that you could buy that would allow you to canal bus hop for a full 24 hours. So, once we found the ticket place that is what we did. We ended up going to the Rijksmuseum, Coster Diamonds, which shows how they cut di
We found more killer pidgeons during our stroll through Amsterdam.
It got a little nerve racking in Amsterdam when Laena went to get some more money from her debit card and the machine ended up eating it. We had anticipated using her cash for today's and tomorrow's adventure, so it kind of made us nervous because I didn't have enough money to pull off of my debit card, so we just had my cash and my credit card to work with. A lot of places don't accept credit cards, but I was able to use the credit card to enter the rest of the museums which was good because we could only use cash to buy the train ticket back home. I had pennies left after I bought the ticket, but we made it back home...even though we had a hard time understanding the conductor. :)
Sunday, Septmeber 30, 2007
How would you like to carry these pails around all the time?
Then we went to Stompetoren, where the WWII memorial is with some of our family. Our Oma's sister, Tante Trien was married during WWII. Her husband and father-in-law were part of the Dutch underground railroad, and ended up getting killed by the Germans, along with many others. So this was a memorial to some of those men.
Our Tante Ita and my Oma's nephew had stained glass made to put up in the church's windows as a memorial. We also got to drive by the old farmhouse, where our Tante Trien and Ome Piet had lived when the Germans burst in, killed the men, and burned down the farm. It was a really sad story, but it does make me proud to hear how my relatives fought for their country. I had heard this story when I first went to Holland when I was 11, this was the first time I was able to see the memorial or the house, so it really brought it to life. It is a story I will never forget.
For all of the pictures from the day click here.
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Friday, September 28, 2007

It was washing day again! The final washing so we could get a head start on our packing. While we were waiting for our clothes to wash, we went for another enjoyable walk through Purmerend. After our clothes were finished we went to Zaanse Schans again to grab some more souvenirs. Actually, it was for a specific souvenir that we had only seen there, and also some Dutch cheese to take home. Patrick had asked for some new wooden shoes too, since he had outgrown his old ones. He said that he wanted a black pair if they had one, but if they didn't then he just wanted a cool pair that no one in our family had ever had. Well, we found a very unique pair in Zaanse Schans!! I saw them, and said "Those are Patrick's shoes!!!" The shoe hanging up on the beam in the picture to the right looks just like Patrick's new shoes. When I gave them to him he started laughing, but not as hard as Oma laughed when she saw his new "Cow klompen".
After buying the shoes and the cheese, we went to go shopping in some other stores, and while we were looking in one store we found the hardware section where the toilets were on display. Now, I don't think I have yet mentioned our "toilet hunt", so let me explain. We found that toilets in Holland, don't have the same kind of handle as the toilets in the U.S., and depending on how old the toilets are, there are lots of different ways to flush a toilet. Sometimes it took us a while to figure out how to flush them. So, by this time, we had already started our toilet hunt and we had been taking pictures of the different ways to flush a toilet. So, we took advantage of the display toilets and Tante Marianne helped us look for any that we hadn't taken a picture of yet. These were of course, more modern toilets. You may think we are weird, but we had a good time and thought it was pretty funny.
After coming home we watched an Andre Rieu performance on DVD that we had borrowed from Ome Jan and Tante Annie Hopman. He is an amazing violinist from Holland and he and his orchestra are always really funny in their performance.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Thursday, September 27, 2007
Volendam!

We also picked up some new wooden shoes for Ardella and Dad. After shopping around for a while, Tante Marianne and I took a "koffie tijd" while Laena continued shopping. She came back with these huge bags filled with 15 pairs or so of slippers that look like wooden shoes! It was pretty funny, and she made the store keeper really happy!
We took the back roads home which are even smaller than the regular roads. They really are not meant for modern day cars, only one car can drive through at a time. It was a pretty drive though, and there was a beautiful sunset to greet us when we got home. Then we sat back and watched a movie to complete the day.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Well, the update for the rest of my trip to Holland is long overdue...like a year overdue!! Sorry about that.

Anyway, on the 25th we took a trip to Groningen to visit my friend Linda. She was actually going to stay with us as an exchange student when I was in high school, but it didn't end up working out. However, we have remained friends even though we never had the chance to meet. So, we were on our way to meet her for the first time.
Groningen is on the other side of Holland so we had to cross over a large Dijk to get there. I got to be the navigator again. Groningen was full of one-way streets and lots of students on bikes! It was a little difficult to find the right road that would lead to our hotel, but with some help we finally found it. It was a pretty neat hotel. It is an older one, but the bedroom made you feel like you were sleeping in the forest under some trees because there were lots of wooden beams. That was really fun! Plus, we actually had a view out of our window rather than the building wall next to us!! Woo hoo! Click here for a couple pictures of our hotel room
We met Linda, who became our "tour guide" for the day and showed us Groningen. Not only were there hundreds of bikes, but there were also hundreds of birds! Click here to see a couple of them. We went to a cafe for dinner and talked for hours! We all enjoyed ourselves, in fact Tante Marianne felt as though she had been friends with her for a long time, even though they had just met. After dinner Tante Marianne went back to the hotel, while Laena, Linda, and I went to visit Linda's apartment and then went to the theater to watch a movie.
What a wonderful day!
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Monday, September 24, 2007
In the meantime, enjoy a little scenic video I made during our drive into Alkmaar one day.
Click here
Friday, September 28, 2007
Sunday, September 23, 2007

Thursday, September 27, 2007
Saturday, September 22, 2007


Today was Emy's birthday, so we went over there to visit with her and Andrie. Marian, Ome Jan and Tante Annie Bruijn, Bea, Theo, Tante Iet's sister, and Dionne all showed up there during the same time as well. It was a fun gathering; I am glad I was here for Emy's "sweet sixteen". Afterwards, we returned the videos and rented a few more, then we went grocery shopping.
Friday, September 21, 2007
After we saw that museum we stayed in Delft to visit the Nieuwe Kerk and the Oude Kerk (new and old church), which was also neat to see. The Nieuwe Kerk holds the tombs of royal family members from the House of Orange, while the Oude Kerk holds tombs of other famous people, like the painter Vermeer. However, we weren't able to find his gravestone because we only had 10 minutes before it closed to look. Ah well, at least we can say we were there.
Since all the places close at 6:00pm, it was time to leave Delft and head out to Kinderdijk to see the 19 windmills that are still in use today. We arrived there just as the sun was setting, so we were able to make several beautiful pictures. Any earlier, and it they all would have been daylight pictures, any later and it would have been too dark. Perfect timing!!
Finished with our sightseeing, we began the journey home, but since Tante Marianne had never been there before, she needed a navigator. Being in the backseat, where I could turn on the light to see my map, the job fell upon me. I never had to navigate anybody before, but thanks to an excellent map we got to where we needed to be. It was a really good thing I bought that map before I came! Also, thank you Tante Tina for the guidebook, it has been well used!!
For all of our beautiful pictures from today's adventures click here
Thursday, September 20, 2007
We spent most of the day in Purmerend doing laundry. While we were waiting for the washers, Laena and I took a stroll through the nearby park and took some pictures. When we got home we played around with Laena's panoramic setting, then we looked at the pictures on the t.v. so that everyone could see them.Wednesday, September 19, 2007
We took a scenic drive through the country on our way to Bea's house. On our drive we stopped in the town of Neck to see some of our ancestors that are buried there. Then we drove on through Wijdewormer to see the house where our dad was born, plus Ome Jaap and Tante Iet's old house across the street. 
After that we went to Bea's so that the four of us could go see Zaanse Schans. I didn't remember it being so big. We had a fun and took lots of pictures. It was really windy, but it didn't rain while we were there.
For more pictures of us click here
Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Monday, September 17, 2007


Saturday and Sunday, Sept 15-16, 2007
Sunday, Laena and I went to church in Alkmaar, then Tante Marianne picked us up and we went with her to a housewarming party for one of her co-workers. It was a really nice house, a black and white theme. Afterwards we were going to go to Volendam, but I was sick to my stomach and Laena's legs were cramping. So we went home and watched our other movie.







