The Biggest Valentines Day Surprise Ever

Some of you may have heard about this during the past 6 months but I planned a surprise trip to Lawrence, Kansas for Karyn's valentines day present. Lawrence is home to the University of Kansas and is the alma mater for Karyn's sister and her late-father, Mark Pincus. Mark lived and breathed Kansas. If there was a football, basketball or women's softball stat about KU, he knew about it! Mark shared his love of Kansas and college basketball with everyone he came in contact with. This is exactly why I wanted to put this together for V-Day.

The surprise was very well constructed because of help from Risa, my sister-in-law, Ashleigh de la Torre, a friend and a KU Grad and Aunt Debbie, babysitter extraordinaire.

Karyn was made aware about a week before that we were going to go somewhere on Feb 9th for the day. She was led on to believe that we were going to get massages and relax at a spa south of Mount Vernon. This worked out perfectly because she knew we would have to take the GW parkway - the road that goes right by National Airport. As we drove on the parkway, Karyn was thoroughly confused when we pulled off @ the airport:

Karyn: "Why did you just pull off at the airport?"
Howard: "Oh, I am so used to going to this way, I must have messed up"
Karyn: "Well you can drive through the airport and get back on the parkway, don't worry..."

awkward silence

Karyn: "Wait, are we flying somewhere?"
Howard: "Oh, I guess we are"

So we got to the airport and I let Karyn swipe the credit card on the airline kiosk. Click here to see video of suprise! After Kansas City was revealed, I told Karyn that her family couldn't join us because of moving houses and other trips. She was sad that they couldn't join us and I even had Karyn call her sister (not knowing that Risa, her mom and Steve were downstairs already checked in and waiting at the Security checkpoint). We went downstairs and Karyn was stunned for surprise #2 as her family was right behind a hidden billboard!

So then it was off to Lawrence KS for a quick trip to see the Kansas Jayhawks play the Baylor Bears. We saw the beautiful little town, ate at some of Risa's old sandwich joints and saw the campus where she and Mark went to school. It was very emotional to see the place where my father-in-law went to school because he always spoke of it when he was alive. I always enjoyed talking to my father-in-law about KU because I never got to share that experience of even understanding what my dad's college life was all about. (I did get a change to go to UCLA once to see my dad's school and it was very special) We got to the see the paver stone in front of Allen Field House that was dedicated in memory of Mark as he was the leader of the Washington, DC area alumni association for many years.

The atmosphere in Allen Field House was electric and it was a memorable weekend for all of us to have for the rest of our lives. And lucky for me, Karyn is already planning my surprise trip to Toulouse France to see the Airbus factory.... Atleast in my head I think that.

Below are the pictures and videos from the event. Enjoy and Rock Chalk Jayhawk!

Pictures
The Pictures have been uploaded to Shutterfly and can be found at this link.

Videos
Video 1: The Surprise is revealed for Karyn @ the Airline kiosk
Video 2: Student Section during the KU Alma Mater before the game
Video 3: Intro KU Montage Video before the game
Video 4: Student Section during Player Introductions (throwing confetti)
Video 5: Student Section during foul shots
Video 6: Play during game
Video 7: "Waving the Wheat" after victorious ending for the Jayhawks