When you're little, you dream of your future marriage: who you'll marry or how the proposal will be. Maybe you danced around your room dressed up like a bride or made sketches of wedding dresses and your first house as a newly-married couple. I dreamed about all of these things, and more often than not, I had my older sister Mary Kathryn by my side for all of the dreaming and playing pretend. As we got older, we would spend hours watching "Say Yes to the Dress," recording every new episode and re-watching old ones countless times.
Tonight, all of those ideas we had dreamed together became a reality for her when her boyfriend, Jonathan, got down on one knee and she said yes. After the proposal she arrived to a houseful of her closest friends all waiting to celebrate with her. She walked through that door and we hugged and cried little tears of joy and excitement, and I felt something that goes so far beyond emotions, something that I think I'll only feel with my sister. There is something so special about sister bonds that I realized tonight more than I ever have before.
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Mary Kathryn is the friend who's lived through every part of life with me. I wouldn't be myself without her music taste, makeup guidance, ridiculous sense of humor, and astoundingly wise life advice. Like any sister relationship, me and Mary have our fair share of fights, but they often end in laughter. We usually don't have to make up for the fights we do have, because none of them are ever very serious. We act annoyed at each other but miss each other when we're apart. She's my best friend in every way, and when she got engaged, all of that hit me. The things we dreamed about and worked through together, the boys we talked about, the late nights on Pinterest looking at wedding dresses and hairstyles, they have all led up to those dreams becoming true and real. The next eight months will be filled with real life moments of stressful and exciting choices between dresses and flowers and everything bridal, and I'm floored to be able to stand beside her for all of that.
After the wedding, her excitement won't end because a brand new stage of life will start for her, and I can't wait to see the joy and growth that comes from their marriage. I cried tonight when I hugged her, from a kind of heartbreak because things won't be quite the same from now on, but I mostly had tears of gratitude for all she's done in my life and joy because I know her gigantic influence and impact won't leave me once she's married. She'll always be Mary Kathryn, my sister who lives with amazing passion and fight and faith in all areas, and who is going to be a beautiful bride and wife, and who will always, always be the best sister.
