Good News - Finishing 2020 with a Celebration :-)

 Hey everyone, 

Just wanted to make a quick post about some amazing news:

Alejandro & I are getting married over the holidays. We are very excited for our upcoming wedding, which will be attended by a very small group of family and our closest friends (current Covid-19 restrictions require 25 people or less!) on December 30th in Louisville, KY. I grew up in Kentucky - us traveling to my family, who will be a majority of the in-person guests makes more sense then inviting them to travel to Louisiana during the pandemic. 

A brief bit about our story:

Alejandro and I met through salsa dance classes in September or October 2018. Alejandro remembers a first conversation between us happening at a dance social...Danielle doesn't remember a first conversation, but remembers a dance social sometime in November of that year when she felt some sparks :) 

CLICK HERE for a video of us dancing at a Valentines day social in February 2019...little did we know! Or maybe Alejandro knew (or hoped), but I was pretty dense and took a lot of patience to pursue. Thankfully, he is a very patient and gentle guy!

We developed a friendship between then and March 2020, when we decided to officially date. Our dating relationship began on March 6th, the Friday evening that was 1 week before everything shut down due to the pandemic. I suppose dating during a pandemic could be extra awkward if we didn't have well over a year of friendship going into things. We agreed to spend time together and with people as our jobs required (mostly my ministry job) but otherwise to do our best to stay home and physically distance from others. Over the next several months, we hung out a lot, mostly in the afternoons after I finished food deliveries (my main pandemic ministry) and Alejandro got off work. When I am coaching soccer and doing after-school programs, my time in the afternoons and evenings is limited. Between March - June, for the first time in my life, I was off work (like many people) after about 4pm. We used the time to cook dinner at home or order in, watch TV, and take walks around the neighborhood (we even made the neighborhood gossip rounds - "Alejandro has a girlfriend!"). CLICK HERE for a funny video (filmed by Alejandro) of me showing off an amazing pandemic inspired online purchase.

We attended church together online on Sunday mornings and eventually transitioned this into a home church meeting that we do each weekend and occasionally a friend or two joins us (starting a home church during a pandemic isn't exactly safe, so we haven't invited many people yet but eventually will). After around 6 months of dating, we discussed getting married. After around 8 months, we decided to go for it - who knows how long the pandemic will last (??), and we are ready to move into the next season of lives together. So, yes...the "proposal story" that has become such a feature of American culture is a bit absent from our story - we had more of a series of discussions-and-decisions, which is a great fit for both of our personalities. I really don't care much for surprises (sometimes when the anticipation becomes too much in a book, I skip ahead to literally kill the surprise so I can then go back and read up to the "surprise" in peace - haha!) - and Alejandro hates attention (he is very introverted and shy and is convinced I am an extrovert - but really I think I am in the middle of the introvert-extrovert scale while he is an off-the-charts introvert). So no grand (and probably stressful for both of us) romantic gestures were necessary for us. But if that is a part of your story or your vision, definitely no criticism - you do you!

My engagement ring has a unique story.

My grandfather bought it for my grandmother in the 1960s when they got married. It was what he could afford, a simple gold ring with one small diamond. It also has some beautiful craftsmanship that is handmade work you don't see often in current times (see the gold heart in the photo that is part of the setting and the ripples around the diamond). In the 1980s, when my dad wanted to propose to my mom but couldn't afford a ring yet, he used this ring. My mom wore it for the first several years of her marriage, just as my grandmother had. During that time, my little brother snuck the ring outside into the backyard and tossed it in the air and into a pile of leaves and dirt behind a cluster of trees we used to climb thankfully, my uncle came to the rescue with a metal detector and recovered the ring. My mom eventually returned the ring to my grandmother for safekeeping and she kept it for around 20 years before giving to me as a gift in 2016 when I graduated from LSU with my PhD - I'm her only granddaughter and was set to inherit the ring when I got married...but I tested my family's patience by waiting a LONG time to get engaged. I've kept it for the past 4 years, wearing it from time to time on my right hand. Alejandro had it resized for me and I officially got to move it to my left ring finger! He also bought me a simple and beautiful gold wedding band that I am absolutely in love with (see the photo of me trying the rings together).

About one month from today, we'll head down the aisle and become Mr. and Mrs...Alejandro Barrera and Danielle Thomas (it turns out that in his culture - he's from Mexico - it's not traditional for the wife to change her name, and I am 100% ok with that!). With name changes, I am not against it (for me, it's another "you do you" kind of thing) - but I knew I at least wanted to hyphenate because my PhD is under "Thomas" and I love my family name. It felt good when I asked Alejandro what he wanted and was expecting, and he was shocked I was considering the hyphen - "keep your name - I love it! It's your family name, and you need to keep it."

So yeah, that's the news! I am very happy and thankful to God for the gift of Alejandro and our partnership in life.