Wedding Season 2014

Forget the baby talk, Wedding Season has begun! My best friend for the past 23 years (I'm 28 years old) so my lifelong friend - is getting married. She is a savvy sexy successful woman who is way to cool to call me her friend but for some reason she does. (Thanks!) Her #1 no-no is most social situations is children. She'd just "rather not". Rather not deal with the crying, rather not deal with the distraction and just "rather not". So at her upcoming wedding at the end of February she has a strict NO CHILDREN rule. Five of her nine bridesmaids are married and three of the five have children. More like toddlers, not children. Either way, they are not invited to the wedding.

I was so anxious for her reaction when I announced my pregnancy. I expected her initial reaction would be one of the following Pinterest comments:



    

YIKES!! Not so nice...
 Style Unveiled.com

God Bless this bride with THREE pregnant BMs
source

Ack! Even hubby recalls the bride-to-be saying "You better not knock her up!" ayayay

When the day came I missed my chance to tell her face to face. However, she knew something was up and asked me a few days later. She is happy for me and hasn't banned me from her wedding.

Let's face it, this pregnancy hasn't change me much. I'm a pretty lame friend anyways. I'm definitely not the one you call for a crazy night out. A crazy night IN? I'm all over that! lol

For all other pregnant bridesmaids out here: I found this website with pregnant bridesmaid advice. 

1. Be honest with the bride With this being my first baby I have no clue what to expect! But she is my BFF so she pretty much knows everything about me anyway.
3. Order a bigger dress Done!

       

This is the dress straight from the boutique. Yes I said boutique, not store because it came with a boutique price tag, we're not talking David's Bridal here!

 I took this picture in my 17 year old sister's bedroom so the color doesn't do it justice. It's a really pretty dress I will ABSOLUTELY wear again, believe it or not. Also I had extra spark that day (notice the static cling). 

This is before alterations. Can't wait to see how big I get by the end of Feb!

More advice....
7. BYOB: Bring snacks and water to stay hydrated. Fainting bride, cute. Fainting preggo, "TIMBER!!"
8. Comfortable shoes! Flats for sure!
9. Laugh at yourself Hormones = emotional. But tears at a wedding are OK!


I'm signing off with Grits on this. Being pregnant is hard enough, add in supporting your BFF on the most important day of her life and it's hard to remember to take care of yourself. So a definite Grit post.

Grits,

It's not like I can wear high heels right now anyways.

What I do for a living

My past life consisted of job titles such as:
Sales Associate
Wedding Planner
Director of Catering

all pretty self-explanatory titles.

My current job title is Stewardship Coordinator in the Office of Stewardship and Development.

Many of my family and friends ask me "But, what do you DO?"

In the beginning I would say "I'm a grant writer". But that's only half of my job. The other half is spreading the message of stewardship. Something I will share with you today.

I grew up in the Catholic Church and Catholic school system in the Diocese of Dallas, TX. I had never heard the word stewardship until I applied for my position here in Lubbock. My current professional contacts in Dallas parishes tell me the word "stewardship" still isn't used very often in Dallas.

My study guide

'Stewardship: A Disciple's Response' was written by the United States Council of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) and published in 1992. In this book one of the definitions for stewardship is the giving of Time, Talent and Treasure to God; a concept I had never heard of. I knew you were supposed to give a monetary offering at mass, but I didn't know there was a word for that. I thought  it was to ease your Catholic guilt.
Note that this book was written a little over 20 years ago. So many of our church 'elders' and volunteers (even today's CCE teachers) were not taught about stewardship and therefore do not share the message of stewardship to their classes. I've never been to seminary, but I suspect stewardship 101 isn't a course option.

Here's where I step in: My job is to spread stewardship. I am to help it become a common word that doesn't speak only to mass offerings or giving of treasure. I spent my first year on the job learning and studying Church teachings on stewardship (and yes, the word and concept is in the Bible). This being my second year, I am much more comfortable spreading the message of Stewardship.

I have been given plenty of opportunities to share the message. At this year's 2013 ICSC conference I was a moderator for a stewardship session (my boss got sick and I thought I might be called to present, but alternates stepped in at the last minute). And this past weekend I was a speaker at our diocese's Catechetical Conference  (the teaching of catechesis - your CCE teachers and youth ministers).  My one hour sessions were: Stewardship and the New Evangelization, How to host a Stewardship Sunday and Stewardship in our Religious Education and Youth Groups.

All of these presentations center around the following four principles of stewardship:
which I'll share with you tomorrow!


Stay Tuned!

The Honeymoon that wasn't

The great thing about Texas is that we have it all: Mountains, lakes, rivers, snow, heat, international borders, oceans, ports, beaches, etc.  The Sunday morning following our wedding, after breakfast with the best friends in Dallas, we headed down to one of Texas' gems: Galveston, a coastal town in the Gulf of Mexico. 

Being Sunday we didn't want to miss out on our first Sunday mass as a married couple.  So we found a church with an evening mass we could make.  It was at St. Anthony of Padua (of course! this is J's patron saint) in the Woodlands.  It was the youth mass and it was an amazing experience.  The deacon's homily was about the role of a father in the house and how the faith life of all children comes from the father.  Pretty cool thing for my 1-day-old-husband to hear! 

After mass we pulled into Galveston and decided to stay at a beach front, but hole-in-the-wall motel.  The weather is cold and rainy, but we'll be on a cruise ship for the next week!  No need to spend money on luxury now.  And since we'll be eating fresh fish from the ocean all week, we decide to order a pizza.  J is acting weird and he hates this hotel (it costs $47/night).  He has a feeling we should stay in a fancy hotel.  But when I suggest pizza he lightens up.  We walk into our hotel room and think "This is the type of room people are murdered in".  But we suck it up and enjoy our pizza.  We picked this place because of the free wifi, but the wifi doesn't work on his new iPad.  Now J really wants a 5 star hotel. 

We flip on the TV and hear the news: A Carnival ship is stranded in the Gulf of Mexico and will be towed to shore within the next few days.  You know you heard the story... 

Source

With all the wedding commotion, travel and lodging decisions we hadn't been listening to news radio.  I hadn't been checking twitter.  We were relaxing and enjoying each other's company!  Now we sit on a cheap hotel bed with pizza we have no appetite for, and discover our honeymoon is no more.  J is so disappointed because he had a feeling we should have stayed 5 star.  And now it's 11pm and we're stuck in this dump.  Happy Honeymoon. 

At 10 am on Monday (the day we are supposed to board the ship at noon - in 2 hours) we get a call from Carnival saying they have important information regarding our trip.  Are you kidding?!  We called our booking agent at 8am!  By now he's on the ball telling us what to do and offering what little help he can give. 

Realizing we need to start heading home and not waste our vacation days in this misty, cold and windy town, we start packing up and checking out.  We do stop by Hotel Galvez for a mimosa and bloody mary. 

 

yay! for wedding rings!

He had huevos rancheros and I had lox and bagels. 

  

Love this display!

Then we bought some sad souvenirs to remember this fiasco. 

Of course we made the best of it by traveling through San Antonio and enjoying a night on the Riverwalk with dinner at Fogo de Chao.

  

 

and breakfast at our favorite taco place.  Taco Haven

As of now, we're back to Green Acres, still awaiting our full refund and travel expense reimbursement from Carnival.  We're exciting to book our next cruise with the 25% discount we'll receive!  This time we're flying to Miami and getting on the brand new ship!  Viva Mexico!

Grits,