Mindy

Mindy is my 1^st cousin.  

I am 8 years older than her.  

Today is Mindy's birthday.  

I have always tried to be there for her (and for all of my other cousins as well) whenever she needed me.  Even though we never lived in the same town, I have so many memories of her as she was growing up since I spent much time there during the summers and when we lived close enough, we would go to Grandma Beck's house every Sunday for a few hours between Sunday morning and Sunday night church.  I even remember helping to change Mindy's diapers.  I really have always loved children – even when I was a child myself.  She was 10 when I moved out of my parents’ home into my first place and she and her sister would come and spend the night with me there and every place after that too.  I took them (and their friends) to Carowinds, to the movies, to church, to the store, to the waterpark, to go out to eat, and so many more places.

I was always glad to be there for my cousins anytime they needed me – still am.  But there was one very special time that I got to be there for Mindy and that was when she was getting married.  You see, Mindy got married in December.  My late husband had been a minister for all of 6 months at the time.  And Mindy wanted Rob to officiate.  At that time, since Rob was a student and just “licensed to preach” in the United Methodist Church and not fully ordained yet, the only place he could officiate legally was in a church where he was appointed to serve.  So Mindy and Jimmy decided to get married in our church.  Their wedding was the first wedding held in the renovated sanctuary. 

Their wedding was the very first wedding that my Rob officiated.  
Along with my dad to assist,
my Rob was the minister who married Mindy and Jimmy.  
He was so honored.  
He was nervous.  But it didn’t show.  
He did a great job.
It was to him and will always be to me special that his first wedding was a family member.  
I was very proud of him!

Since the wedding rehearsal needed to be held at our church (which was a different town from where she lived), I offered to host and cook her rehearsal dinner at our parsonage.  I remember getting up extremely early on the day after Thanksgiving and finding all of the sales that I could on Christmas dishes.  I wanted to buy enough dishes to do place settings for the almost 40 people who were going to be there.  And even though I’ve given some of them away over the last 18 years, that’s how I ended up with so many Christmas dishes.

Getting ready for that wedding rehearsal, rehearsal dinner, and the wedding was a challenge but I was still at the stage in life when I thought challenges were fun (imagine that).  
Mindy and Jimmy got married on a Friday night so that meant the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner were on Thursday night.  
As I said, I still actually thrived on challenges back then so it didn’t even faze me that I had to teach school on that Thursday and come home to cook for 40 people coming to my parsonage that night after the rehearsal (although I did have enough sense to choose an easy menu because of that fact – baked spaghetti and salad with the groom's cake for dessert).  
And it didn’t even faze me that I had to teach school on that Friday and then come home to help put on my preacher husband’s first wedding EVER.  
It was a hectic week.  
In addition to the wedding, Rob had final exams going on that week too
and I had my very first parsonage open house 2 days after the wedding.  
But I really do not even remember being stressed at all over my part of it.  
It was work – a lot of work – but it was fun work!

(Summer 2013)

(December 2013)

I’m glad I've had the chance to be there for Mindy (and her family) when needed.
I'm glad my late husband had the chance to officiate at their wedding.
And I'm glad our children are close.

Happy Birthday Mindy Jo!

I love you!  Always have - always will!