A Wedding In Pittsburgh - Part 1

"I love how God strategically places people in your lives at just the perfect timing."

That was a recent comment a new friend of mine wrote on her Instagram page.  I thought it was the perfect way to start off this post, because without a doubt, God was in all the details I'm about to write about.

Billie Jo has been follower of my blog since I started back in 2011.  In fact, if not for her and her faithful comments on each and every post of mine, I may not have stuck with These Joyful Mysteries for very long.  She was a positive influence and silently encouraged me to continue to write and journal about my family and faith.

Our families had the opportunity to meet a few years back.  They were lovely.  I felt so fortunate to be able to meet them in person and see just how awesome they all were. (You can read about that meet-up here.) Unfortunately, we live about 4 hours away from each other, so that was our only visit.

BJ and I continued to keep in touch via our blogs, text messages, and Christmas cards.  I had been following her updates about her oldest daughter Madison and her fiance' Nicolas in recent months.  They were going to be married in February.

I frequently joked with Bill that I was going to drive out to Pittsburgh (5 hours away!!) and crash the ceremony.  I had so badly wanted to see Madison get married.  I heard she was in love with a great man, has an eye for elegance, and that the entire wedding would be a class act.  I even thought about having my whole family do a weekend trip to Pitt just so I could catch a glimpse.  I probably would have done that if not for the little babies making travel a bit difficult.  Furthermore, I dreamed that it would be perfect if Bill and I could get away from all the crazy of our lives and go to Pitt by ourselves.
No joke.

About 3 weeks before the wedding, as I sat in my family room watching Avengers: Infinity War with Bill and the kids, I got this text from BJ.

I must have stared at the screen for 5 minutes straight.

I passed the phone over to Bill so he could read it.  I had tears in my eyes asking if we could make this happen.  He called his parents.  They said yes to watching ALL 7 kids.  God bless them and their generous, giving hearts.

This was actually going to happen!!