Delayed Recap of our first half of summer vacation!

** This post was written Sunday afternoon but because of the less than stellar Internet connection it is just now being posted on Thursday! Oops!

It has been a crazy whirlwind first half of our trip to Texas so far, but we are having a blast! It is so great to reconnect with friends and catch up on how life is going. It always reminds me to appreciate how cool it is that I get to live in Denmark and experience all of the new and exciting things. I've also really enjoyed hearing about all the adventures that have been going on over here while I've been away! :-)

Klaus has been getting the FULL American treatment on this trip including his first snow cone, his first Major League Baseball game (Go Rangers!), the first time getting to go thru the "fast line" in immigration and his first root beer float! :-) so far the only thing he's not a fan of has been the root beer float, he thinks its ruining 2 perfectly good things and way mess with a good thing?

 

Last night was our American wedding reception, I can't even begin to describe just how happy and grateful I felt to be surrounded by so many amazing people from all parts of my life! We had a blast getting to see everyone, I just wish I could have spent more time with everyone individually, but please know that I was sooooo happy to see everyone who made it out last night! 



The Joyces

Hellquists!

Friends!

The Family

Mom & Dad

Stair step Cousins

Captain America!!

Project Linus Ladies

 

We are currently in the car heading to St.Louis for a quick trip to visit my grandparents as well as do some of the tourist things with Klaus who will be seeing St.Louis for the first time! :-) I'm hoping to show him the Arch, the Muny, possibly the zoo and of course some of my favorite restaurants in the Loop and CWE! :-)

 

I will post more later but I just wanted to do a quick update while I had a bit of time in the car! :-)

 

XOXO,

Joy

 

Puppies and Plane Trips!

This weekend Klaus and I got to go visit Big Tex again :) Oh my gosh they have all grown so much in just a couple weeks! It was so much fun to see them playing with each other- at least for the first 20 minutes before they all got sleepy and passed out in one big pile! :) Big Tex is super sweet and was putting on his best manners for us by snuggling and giving us puppy kisses :) I can't wait until we can have him around all the time and get to see him change day by day instead of big giant leaps every 3 weeks! The breeder has been really great about updating us with pictures and videos which are adorable (you can see them here under I-Kuld if you'd like) but it was totally different to see them in person.

Unfortunately, this was our last visit with Tex until we go to pick him up and bring him home since Klaus and I are getting ready for our big trip to the states! :) We are so excited to see friends and family again!! I am starting to get a bit homesick so this trip is coming at the PERFECT time, and as an added bonus it will make the time go faster before we get Tex! :) We are also planning to spend a few days in St. Louis while we're over there so that we can spend time with my Nana and Pawpaw too, but for the majority of our trip we are looking forward to just relaxing in Texas and catching up with friends!

Around here it finally feels like summer vacation! A lot of our friends are travelling to summer houses or abroad and the weather has been BEAUTIFUL! :) I'm still surprised sometimes that pretty much the whole country shuts down for summer vacation, but its not as confusing as last year. It is still weird to try to go to the yarn store and see a sign telling people that they're closed for the month of July (BOTH of the yarn stores in Lyngby!!!)

Anyway, I hope everyone is doing well- I can't wait to see my Texas friends in less than a week!
XOXO
Joy

Celebrating America in Denmark!

I've been really terrible at keeping the blog up to date recently- SORRY!!! We've been really busy- lots of exciting things for me to fill you in! But first I want to post a few pictures from our "5th of July Party" (the 4th was a Thursday, and last year the danes were confused as to why I was having a party in the middle of the week so we moved it to Friday.)

It was a bit odd to be the ONLY American at the party, but I feel so blessed that my Danish friends are willing to humor me and play along with all things American! :) They even ate the PB&J sandwiches which is not something they typically eat! We also served pulled pork (BIG hit!), burgers, hot dogs, potato salad, ants on a log, popcorn, chips, fruit, veggies, and of course CAKE!

We had so much fun relaxing and spending time with our friends! Of course I wish I could have celebrated with my American friends and family too but I am so thankful for my friends here! :) AND Klaus and I will be back in the states in a few weeks and will be able to celebrate with everyone then!

 

Our other big exciting news is that we're getting a puppy!!!!! "Big Tex" will get to come home with us on August 10th!!!

This was taken when he was 8 days old!

Big Tex is the puppy at the
top right corner of the picture! :)

We've been spending a lot of time getting ready for Tex (puppy proofing the apartment, reading books, researching training clubs in the area, etc) Other than that, we're still running with the club a couple times a week and taking trips around Denmark (I'm still not allowed to go anywhere but to and from the states) and we're still waiting on my paperwork to come thru so I can resume my Danish classes/ find a job- but we've been told that we can expect that to come thru in September (cross your fingers!!)

I hope everyone is doing well, I will try my best to keep up to date with the blog. We're heading to Texas in a couple weeks and I can't wait to see everyone again!!! I miss ya'll!!!

XOXO

Joy

Danish Wedding Traditions Explained

So we've had some people ask us whether we had a "Danish" or "American" style wedding and party but really we didn't have either! We tried our best to blend the traditions from each style and ended up with a completly unique and very fun party!  I thought it would be fun to explain some of the danish traditions and show some pictures too.

• Toast Master- Our good friend Jesper agreeded to be our toast master for the evening which means he will be keeping the flow of the reception moving. He will let everyone know when it is time to eat, as well as introducing people who would like to give speeches or songs. Jesper did an AMAZING job and actually went above and beyond by doing the whole thing in BOTH languages and even recapping peoples' speeches in the non-native language (it was a little bit like the Olympics where you hear everything in multiple languages!!), it was great and everyone loved having him as Toast Master!

• Speeches and Songs- one of the traditions that was pretty different for the Americans is the "giving of songs". Basically, people will take the tune of a common song (Like My Bonny Lies Over the Ocean) and change the lyrics to be about the wedding couple. They will bring the lyrics written out for all of the guests to sing along! We had three songs at our wedding and they were all a lot of fun. The one his mom did came with a cute box to hold the song sheets that she made look like a Ham Radio (one of Klaus' hobbies) and had included yarn and knitting needles (one of My hobbies) Helle's song sheets were rolled up into scrolls with a blank heart attached that in the song she explained that people were supposed to sign their name on the heart and hang them on the branches she had put on our table. What's neat about this is that we have kept the branches in water and they are now blooming and look so pretty!

• Kissing Traditions-
  • Clinking on glasses- the Americans will be familiar with this one, however there's a danish twist on it. When the guests clink on glasses the couple is supposed to stand on their chairs to kiss.
  
  
  
  • Stomping on the floor- This takes the tradition one step farther and the couple is supposed to crawl under the table to kiss if the guests stomp on the floor.
  
  
  
  • If the bride leaves the room the female guests at the party will run up to the groom and kiss him! The opposite is done if the groom leaves the room- all of the men will run up to the bride to kiss her!

• Bridal Waltz- This takes place just before midnight and usually replaces the american tradition of the "First Dance", we will actually do both at our party. During the waltz the guests form a circle around the couple clapping and slowly moving in towards the couple. By the end of the dance they surround the couple.

• This is also when the guests take off the grooms shoes to cut the toes off of his socks!! Apparently this has to do with making sure he doesn't go after any other women now that he's a married man! I've also read that its to make sure the first wifely duty of the bride is to fix his socks... but I like the other explanation better!

• At the same time, the bride is having her veil torn into pieces by the women at the party! Apparently this is supposed to bring luck to both the bridal couple as well as the guests who take home a piece of the veil. They are supposed to make a wish for the couple and tie the piece of veil on their car antenna/ bike wheel/ etc and when the veil falls off the wish will come true. As best I can tell, these traditions replace the garter and bouquet toss that is usually done in American weddings (we opted not to do these since we did the bridal waltz).

We had so much fun with all of the traditions and it made for a really fun evening! I hope some of these explanations help a little bit, but really its all good fun just of the danish variety!

XOXO,
Joy

The American Invasion of Denmark (aka Joy and Klaus' Wedding!!)

So much has happened since my last blog post! Mainly, I GOT MARRIED!!!! :) Klaus and I were married on April 6th in a beautiful ceremony surrounded by our amazing family and friends! We both felt incredibly blessed and couldn't have asked for a better day. :)

The week leading up to the wedding was crazy busy but also SO much fun because the Americans arrived!! The weather was chilly but as good as we could have hoped for- NO snow or rain and perfectly blue skies for the majority of their stay in Denmark! :) I think it snowed the day after the wedding but for Denmark that's not too bad :)

Michelle, Paul and Noel were the first to arrive and we spent Monday and Tuesday showing them around Bakken and then Copenhagen.

Walking to Bakken with Michelle

Noel and Paul driving the bumper cars!

Then on Wednesday my parents arrived and we did some more sightseeing around Copenhagen in an attempt to help them beat the jet lag (not sure it totally worked...?) Thursday morning I made a trip to the airport to pick up Kim and showed her around the city a bit too including a stop at Ny Havn for a beer and people watching.

I left Kim at Nørreport and pointed her down Strøget for some shopping and headed back to the airport to pick up CJ and Jess. :) Klaus met us at the airport and we took the tired/hungry travellers back to their hotel to meet up with my parents and took them all to dinner.

Friday morning was spent setting up the reception hall with the Krogsgaards, me and Michelle. I think it turned out really nice even if it was a bit hectic to get it all put together. After lunch the Sheplers arrived in Brede and helped us wrap up the last bit of decorating before heading to the church for the rehearsal.

Talking thru the ceremony and figuring out how to make it work

In all the craziness of the day I FORGOT the rehearsal bouquet!!
But it was a work of art and deserves to be seen!!
Thanks girls!!

Friday evening we all went into Copenhagen for the rehearsal dinner at Madklubben Vesterbro, another adventure (there was a mishap with our reservation so they had to do some quick rearranging of tables to get us all seated) but we had a great time and very good food! :)

 

 

Saturday was the big day!!! :) Everything went very smooth and surprisingly I was not nervous or stressed at ALL. :) I think because I had done so much work ahead of time I was able to relax and trust that the rest of the pieces would fall in place and was able to just enjoy the day. It was PERFECT! :)

Mom helping me get ready

 

Bridesmaids

The Shepler women

There are so many more pictures from the day, but this post is already getting SUPER long, so I think I'll post the rest on facebook once we get them back from the photographer. :)

Sunday morning we had our FULL family over to the apartment for brunch and present opening :) By this point Klaus and I were exhausted and decided to opt out of the Sheplers' adventure to Sweden, which was apparently a good choice as they FROZE! This was the day the weather turned yucky and they got snowed on!

This was also the day that Klaus let me know what was going on with my visa application... There has been a mistake made (things happen.) and he got a letter on THURSDAY that said my application had been denied based on some miscounting of the days I've been in Denmark and what they considered my "first entry date". Thank God Klaus was smart enough to wait until after the wedding to tell me about it because I think I would have had a meltdown if he had told me Thursday or Friday, but unfortunately for him, he had to deal with it on his own for I'm sure what felt like an eternity. :( We have appealed the decision and I have been granted the ability to stay in the country during the appeal process, so no worries there. But unfortunately it takes on average 7 months for the appeal to go thru before they can re-look at the visa application... All this means that we will have to play the waiting game quite a bit longer (probably summer of 2014 before all is said and done...) I am trying to be positive about it and focus on all the things that I can do while I wait. Things that I wouldn't have time for if I had a job or school, but it is a tough time right now and the timing of it is pretty unfortunate. However, I refuse to let it take away from the amazing time I had with my friends and family at our wedding!

Thank you all for the love and support you have given us!
XOXO
Joy

PS- for those keeping track: I made 6 trips to the airport, saw the Little Mermaid 3 times and played tour guide to 8 Americans in just over one week!

Busy busy!

Sorry for the lack of updates, we are still WAITING to get a letter about my application, but it should come any time in the next week, so keep your fingers crossed please? I've been checking the mailbox at least twice a day, but apparently that has no effect on how quickly the letter will arrive. The crazy thing is that we found out the church we are having our wedding at has to issue me a CPR number in order to do the ceremony. Which means I technically have a number, but it is not attached to any of the rights that normal CPR numbers have. Its a little confusing but basically I still have to wait for the government to attach my number to my visa application to be able to go to the doctors or schools or libraries or apply for a job or anything really, but hey they gave me a number! ha! :)

Other than that, I've been really busy with the wedding planning mostly, I won't bore you with all the little details, but I am REALLY excited to see everything start coming together in such a good way! :) I also can't wait to see my friends and family again- Michelle and I talked yesterday and Noel informed us that they would be getting on a plane in 18 days!!! Oh my gosh! :) Sooooo can't wait to see them again! I have been a little homesick recently (nothing bad, just wishing my mom and Michelle were here to help me with the wedding stuff mostly) so to know that they will be here so soon makes me really happy. I can't wait to show off Copenhagen a little bit and show them my new life here and of course celebrate Klaus and I's new life together with everyone! :)

I've also started going to spin classes again which has been an interesting experience. I find myself completely exhausted after each class and I really think its the combination of the physical activity and the mental part of trying to understand what the instructor (a David Letterman look-a-like) is screaming at me in danish! ha! Luckily there's a really nice girl in the class who has let me sit next to her for the past few weeks and has been soooo helpful and patient with me. The first week she sat next to me she translated almost the entire class for me (a MASSIVELY impressive feat I must say!) And each time since then I've needed a little less and less translation. Last night it was actually the other way around where I would try to translate in my head and then just look to her and ask if what I thought I heard was right or not. :) The other big difference in these classes than the ones in the states is that we're all hooked up to heart rate monitors that are then synced into a system that displays them on a giant projector screen at the front of the class. Basically your HR monitor has a number on it and as you walk into the class you sign into the computer system and put in what your max heart rate should be and then it calculates percentages based on that. So when David Letterman says "femogfirs procent" I know that my little monitor needs to be at 85%. I also know that if I don't get my little monitor to say that, then David Letterman will point at it and yell "Kom Nu!!" haha!

So that's what's going on here. I know I promised pictures from our trip to Jylland to see Klaus' parents so I'll add a few here, but I've posted most of them on facebook too. :)

 

XOXO,
Joy