The Fabulous Life of Stefanie

Last night Matty and I joined two of our dear HONO friends and four new friends at Stephi's on Tremont to fete our dear friend Ashley turning a fabulous 30. At the end of the night, when we were all saying our good-byes, Diana turned to me and said "see you next weekend" and for a split second I thought "are we doing brunch? do we have another birthday?" and then I realized: we will be seeing each other next weekend at MY WEDDING. H-o-l-y crap. My wedding!!!!!! A year and a half of planning and two and a half of spending every day connected to the most wonderful man in the world, and next Sunday we are walking down the aisle of our church and becoming husband and wife. Forever. And ever. Til death do us part. As you can imagine, I am beyond excited. Enthralled? Not even the half of it? Jumping up and down shrieking and squealing and squeezing my fists? Doesn't even begin to explain it. I get to marry the coolest guy in the world and he loves me as much as I...

That is wh at Matty told me when I woke up this morning. After I realized where I was and that I had indeed fallen back asleep after my usual 4am "wake up and think about wedding plans that could wait until tomorrow" time, Matty explained "23"! In that many days I will be happily (blissfully, wonderfully) married to my best friend. I cannot wait. Literally. I wish I could go to sleep and wake up and it would be the Friday before and it would be time to see my Mommy and get my nails done. But, alas, there are 23 jam-packed days between now and then. This is the last weekend that Matty is working and I will be home alone so I am going to try and get all of my honeymoon necessity shopping in and get some last minute things like my lipstick, nail polish and some honeymoon outfits. Next weekend Nina and I are going to NYC to party it up one last, single-girl time and to seek out two last very important things for the big day (sorry, my lips are sealed until 09.12). The ...

I just accepted a job offer! I am going to be the newest Case Manager at Community Work Services . I am so excited to be back in the real world and, more importantly, back to helping people! I think that this job is going to mesh really well with where I am at in my life. The work day always ends at 4:30, there is early release on Fridays and the day before holidays (of which there are 11 paid!), and there are no weekends or on-call shifts. This schedule is awesome because right now all I want to focus on (aside from work) is being married and jumping back into volunteering. Now that I am not directly working with the prison population I plan on joining an organization that goes into the prison to do tutoring and mentoring with inmates; this is something I have wanted to do for years but did not want to burn myself out by doing it in addition to my work with them. I am also going to diligently seek a board that I can become a member of, hopefully in the area of animal or child welfare....

I quit my job. Or, as I explained to a friend yesterday, I totally "Jerry Maguire'd" out of that place. I was miserable, not because of the work, but because of a boss that thought yelling and pointing and degrading people was a proper mean of communication. I went to HR. Then I called them. Ad I emailed them and nothing happened. Other people went, staff walked out of his office in tears and he continued his completely unprofessional behavior. It would not stop. So, in a meeting where I had a lot to say, he came in uninvited and took it over with his negative words and violent behavior, and I realized I could not do it anymore. My anxiety took over and I thought I would pass out, so instead, I stood up and walked out. Poof. I was gone. It was not an easy decision and it is by far the most spontaneous and irresponsible thing I have done in quite some time, but I am now totally, completely sure that it was the best way to handle the situation. I am less than two months awa...

It's that time of year! You know, when everything is getting warm and the sun is setting a little later and it's so exciting, except for those horrible allergies that make you look like you slept once last week and got punched in the face a bunch and sound super-not-sexy. I am not complaining, I am just saying, I HATE allergies. Ugh. I feel totally sick today and got negative sleep last night. Of all the times in my life I cannot be getting sick! I have a wedding to plan! Not to mention the need to kick my ass at the gym for dress shopping and the engagement shoot and my bridal shower! Go away pollen!!! But really, our wedding is so super close now that I am starting to get into some sort of zone. Sometimes I start looking at websites for dresses or hairstyles or shoes and I lose entire hours. Hours! My Mom is going to be here in a few weeks and we have 3 appointments booked for me to try on dresses and she gets to be here for my shower, which is so super awesome and is all bec...

We leave tomorrow! I am so excited to go back, on the three year anniversary of the last time I went, and see the progress that has been made. I am prepared to see that it has not progressed as much as I hope, but I am going there knowing that I get to help move it along, even if it is just a small piece of progress. I am most excited for Matty to experience something that was so crucial to my healing from my past and making me the person I am today. We are going to be doing all sorts of projects - building houses and community gardens, helping with clean up and hopefully something with another agency at a soup kitchen or school. We are also going to have a whole lot of fun - this is the first time I am staying past the volunteer days just to have fun - and we already have a four hour bike tour in the Ninth Ward booked as well as tickets to see Rebirth Brass Band! We are so, so fortunate to have raised so much money to get us there - and we can't thank everyone enough for making th...

We are getting ready to head to Matty's Aunt's house for the annual O'Shea Easter Brunch (note the picture of the awesome cupcakes I made!). There will only be seven of us this year (yes, I said only, read on), but I can't wait to see everyone and eat some of Jane's amazing cooking. Easter is a very important holiday for us Catholics, and even more for us Catholics over on Quint Avenue. I present to you, an Easter story: Two years ago today Matty and I went to Church together for our first time. I was a pretend Catholic (having never been baptized or through Catechism) who hadn't been in a Catholic Church in a long time, and had never been with another person since moving to Boston. Matty had been away from the Church for a while for a lot of the reasons young Boston-bred Irish Catholics stop going to Church. We both decided we wanted to go together, and since our schedules were pretty crazy back then (Matty worked nights, I worked bankers hours), Easter turned ...