Elijah Fell and Jessica Gonzales are working on the final details for their July 4 wedding. Fell recently finished his second tour of duty in the Army and is readjusting to life at home before the wedding.

Despite the fact that he was mobilized to active duty in Kuwait, Army Sgt. Elijah Fell said he thought he had the better end of the deal when it came to planning his upcoming wedding to fiancee Jessica Gonzales.

“I got a chance to run away from the fact that there was all this work and planning to be done,” Fell said. “I was seeking refuge overseas.”

For bachelors facing questions of which floral arrangements better match the reception centerpieces, a second tour of military duty overseas may indeed seem like a refuge. But for Fell’s anxious fiancee, those 12 months apart were all that was standing between her and her soon-to-be husband.

“It’s been hard not really having him here and trying to fit everything that’s important throughout the week into one conversation,” Gonzales said. “I’d try to ask, ‘Do you like this color?’ and he’d go, ‘I don’t know what that color is.'”

The couple got engaged last year on Valentine’s Day, between Fell’s two tours of duty. They were able to communicate through letters, e-mails and weekly phone calls while Fell was overseas.

Although the long-distance wedding planning was stressful, Gonzales and Fell’s mother, Mimi, said Fell’s safe return home was what really mattered.

“The first time (he was gone) was really really hard,” Mimi Fell said. “It was isolating. Very isolating. There just weren’t many people around who were going through that experience. … Every phone call could bring the joy of another day to talk to someone you love, or the Army phone tree to say that the unit had been hit.”

Now the couple, who have been together for about seven years, are finally getting the chance to put the finishing touches on their wedding, which is set for July 4. Fell returned to Kansas from Kuwait on May 16 and is currently trying to readjust to life at home with Gonzales.

“He’s still the same person, but just your mundane day-to-day things have changed over the course of the year,” Gonzales said. “You know, the way you clean. He doesn’t like the way I clean and I don’t like the way he cleans. I mean, we haven’t been around each other for a year.”

Still, Fell’s mother says, the two have come a long way from the days of their youth.

“To watch these kids grow from teens with stars in their eyes for each other to soon-to-be husband and wife, in the midst of two tours of duty and Jessica finishing KU, has been amazing,” she said. “I just don’t even have the words to say how grateful I am that he’s here and getting married.”