'It was crazy because in between, when it’s not on camera, he’s just entertaining the audience and family members,' Sara said. When the cameras stopped rolling, Harvey continued joking with the families and the audience - one of the highlights of the experience, according to Sara. 'It was a pleasure just being around him and having normal conversations with him.' He is just a genuine, down-to-earth legend. Off the stage, Daryl said the 'Family Feud' host and comedian Harvey is 'just a genuine, normal human being. So when you hear funny answers and out-of-this-world responses, we totally get that now.' 'You only get a few seconds to answer questions, so you don’t have a lot of time to process the questions. 'Being under those bright lights and having Steve Harvey kind of look you in the eye, it puts things in perspective a little bit,' Daryl said. More: Want in on secret spots to have fun in Des Moines? We've got a newsletter for that.Īccording to Daryl, the pressure of being on the stage and time constraints made answering host Steve Harvey's questions tougher than it may appear to television audiences. 'It’s just so different when you’re on the stage,' Sara said. 'We’d watched the show at home and we’d be like, 'Why didn’t they get that? That was so easy.' But now I totally get why some people say some crazy things up there. Though the family had watched the game show on television many times before, Sara said it is more difficult than anticipated once on the stage. 'She was our design artist, our fashion designer,' Daryl said. 'She made sure we looked good on television.' Sara's mother, Nancy Mielke, was involved behind the scenes from the Mielke's home in Forest City. Sara Saunders and her husband Daryl, Sara's brothers Jason and Andrew Mielke and Sara's father, Bruce Mielke, participated on the show. More: 'Your ice cream carries a weight to it, sir': 'Saturday Night Live' dishes laughter in Blue Bunny skit 'We went through the process, and of course friends and family kind of doubted it, like 'That's not going to happen.' After a few interviews and emails and phone calls, it became a reality for our entire family.'Ībout a year later, the family found themselves on an all-expenses-paid trip to Atlanta to film on the set of 'Family Feud.' Let’s branch out a little bit and see if we can get on a game show,'' Daryl said. 'We were quarantined together, and (Sara) said, 'Let’s do something different. When West Des Moines couple Sara and Daryl Saunders applied to be on the game show 'Family Feud' toward the beginning of the pandemic, their family had limited expectations.

Family feud set design