ONE YEAR AGO...

Our wedding rings

Yep! Today is my one year anniversary!


My sweet darling spouse is 8000 km away...but we both went to Mass today, and so were together at the foot of Our Lord's cross, recieving the same body & blood of Jesus!

and of course, we are bonded together Sacramentally, and no amount of physical distance can diminish that bond!

This last year has honestly been the best year of my life. The blessings that have flown from the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony have been breath-taking. God is truely so so generous.

I genuinely don't know why people live together before marriage, what a cheap cheap pathetic imitation of love it is; a mere shadow of the truth.

I know I have lamented about this before, but it because I have seen and experienced first hand the great graces that come from this Sacrament that I genuinely pity those Catholics who abandon it and do so much damage to themselves by fornicating and living perpetually in mortal sin.

ESPECIALLY Catholics, because they have been given the great gift of being members of the Catholic Church, Christ's BODY, and they are ignorant of the treasure they have, and are throwing it in the mud.


It distresses me so much because I know a number of Catholics who are living in this state, and I think it is such such such a shame.

God created us...so He knows what makes us truely happy.

So living in a way that is contrary to that can never bring true happiness. It is impossible.

In romantic relationships our hearts all seek uncompromising & unconditional love, ceasless dedication, total fidelity, untiring service...and only in the permanent and unbreakable bonds of Matrimony can that love be cultivated.
You are given the graces in the Sacrament to nurture that love and to grow daily in that love, in imitation of Christ!
and it is HARD WORK!
Which is why we need to grace from God to do it!

BUT IT IS SO WORTH IT!!


Merely living with someone and having sex with them will not give that relationship, because the life-long committment and the Sacrament is not there. The slightest obstacle, the most insignificant difficulty is a legitimate excuse for separating....and bam! Broken hearts galore.


My entire relationship with Chris has changed since we have been married!

It's of a totally different quality now than it was a year ago!

Now it feels so...permanent and dedicated and committed. We're going through life TOGETHER, no matter what.

If things aren't going right, we will change so that they go right! Because we are in this together, and I want him to get to Heaven (& I know he wants me to get to Heaven!)

and that is a fantastic feeling.


Without the grace that comes from the Sacrament of Marriage, those jewels of help that come from God, a romantic relationship can't flourish to become as holy as it COULD be!

and so my heart pains for those Catholics who are willfully missing out by believeing the lies of Satan, who is doing his best in our world to damage the Sacrament of Marriage; that most Holy Sacrament which is a reflection of the Holy Trinity Itself.



I feel like I've changed so much as a person, and in my maturity and relationship with Jesus Christ in the last year.

I am so grateful to God for the grace and blessing of meeting and marrying Chris, I can't even put it into words, and I am utterly humbled God's kindess to me.

I've also come to realise, more than ever before in my life, that a deep loving personal relationship with Christ is the centre, and the most vital aspect of our human existance.

All other relationships, with friends, spouses, children etc, are an imitation of this one.

Our relationship with Christ is the one which will feed all the others, and make them beautiful, peaceful and joyful and fruitful.

If you put time and effort into your relationship with Jesus, making it pure, genuine and loving, then all other human relationships will fall into place.
and you will be given the graces to deal with all other relationships.

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Anyway, you know I love photos...so for fun, I'd like to reminisce about my wedding day...

Here is the first post I wrote when I got back from my honeymoon

Here is a little post with some random wedding pictures

and below is my wedding story, which I have updated with lots of new photos!


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Sunday 30th July 2006....

*photos to go with the story: click HERE make sure you do view as slideshow for a much better viewing!*

The day started bright and early at 7:30am. My first thoughts of the day were "woohoo! I'm getting married today!!" and the smiling started!

The Nuptial Mass was set for 1pm.

I got up, had breakfast and jumped in the shower. By 8:15am I was ready for the hair-styling to begin. One of my Italian Aunts is a hair-dresser and so she was doing my hair for me. It took a good three hours to turn my straight hair into a bunch of curls and waves, and glue-in a dozen pearls:

By the time my hair was done it was around 11am (T-minus 2 hours) and my 3 bridesmaids had arrived and as had the professional photographer.
The house was a flurry as my dad was running over his speech, my brother was getting ready, my mum and my Italian Aunts were in and out of the shower, my cousins were taking photos and sorting themselves out and our 2 family friends were helping with last minute preparations! Yes, the house was busy!

Despite all this I was pretty calm! Extremly calm actually! I was very excited about the day ahead but not really nervous at all!

My Aunts helped me fix on my wedding veil and I got into my dress for a couple of round-the-garden photos with the bridesmaids and my family My brother & I

At midday (T-minus one hour) the 1946 Rolls arrived to pick up the bridesmaids and bring them to Church.

As I still had an hour to go and I didn't want to ruin my dress by sitting down in it, I took it off and hung around in my dressing gown. At about 12:20pm I started getting a bit hungry and so I had some chocolate and a few sips of coke!!

Over the next half an hour our family friends and my cousins headed off for Church. At 12:30pm I knew that Chris was starting to pray the rosary at Church and I was wondering how that was going and how he was feeling!

I heard afterwards that it went really well, he led every decade of the rosary himself, despite his nerves!

Chris praying the rosary at Church

At about 12:45pm (T-minus 15 minutes) I started feeling a bit nervous!! Eeeek! In 15 minutes I'll be heading off to Church to GET MARRIED!!

My dad joked with me "It's not too late yet, you can still run away...!!" but my initial gut reaction was "No way! I *want* to marry Chris!!"

At about 12:55pm my mum and Italian Aunts were finally ready and they headed off for Church, after helping me back in my wedding dress.

I stood in the living room with my dad and I went over my vows again and we joked a bit about me growing up!! "This is it! I'm GETTING MARRIED!"

At about 1:07pm (T plus 7 minutes...well, I was the bride! They expect me to be fashionably late!!) my dad and I looked at each other, both took in a deep breath and I said "Let's do this thing!" and we headed out to the Rolls!




I arrived at the Church and saw my bridesmaids waiting for me outside! I adjusted my veil so that it covered my face (which I had almost forgotten to do!) and walked into the porch of the Church.

As I stood at the back of the Church and saw all the guests my nervousness immeditaly flew away! Oh look! There's so-and-so!! And look! There's cousins/aunts/uncles! And there are my friends!!

And all I could think was "COOL!!!"

Seriously, I had the best time of my life walking down the aisle! It was such fun! Seeing my family and friends, and all the people who had come for Chris & I just made me so happy!! Chris was standing at the front and had his back back facing me for about half of my walk down the aisle so I just looked at various family and friends in the congregation grinning at them!! And then Chris turned around and my heart flipped over!

Aaaaahh! It's my Chris!! I could feel my grin intensifying and my eyes locked in on his!
We're about the get married Chrissy!!!

It was beautiful!


The rest of the Nuptial Mass was so so so wonderful!

Chris & I said our vows well, neither of us forgot any of the words but my voice felt like it was about to crack on the 'till death us do part' line!

"I Antonia ....... do take you Christopher......to be my lawful wedded
husband. To have and to hold from this day forwards. For better, for worse. For richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health. To love and to cherish, till death us do part."

Then when the Priest said "What God has joined together let no man put asunder" my first thought was "OH MY GOODNESS I AM MARRIED!!! I AM MARRIED!! CHRIS WE'RE MARRIED!!" and my face broke out into a grin (again!).

After that we had the signing of the register which in England is usually incorporated into the Mass.

After that, and in the place of the bidding prayers, we had our consecration to the Holy Family with the prayer Chris, our Priest and I had written.
This part went beautifully; after the prayer the congregation sang a Marian hymn while Chris & I walked to the side altars of Mary and St. Joseph (to the right and left of the main altar) and placed a bouquet of flowers to each as a gift.

I place the bouquet of flowers by Mary's altar, and Chris by St. Joseph's

After that Mass proceeded as per usual, with the exception of the Nuptial Blessing which was also very very beautiful.


At the end of Mass Chris & I processed out followed by our bridesmaids and ushers. Chris & I then went and hid in one of the porches of the Church while the guests left via another door and each was handed one of the little packets of rice my mum & I made.

Once all the guests were assembled outside, the doors of the Church were thrown open, Chris & I ran out and the 200 handfuls of rice were thrown over us!! It was awesome as all the guests had formed this massive semi circle around the main doors to the Church, so we ran out and were surrounded by family and friends!! It was gorgeously happy!
The 200 handfuls of rice proved to be as much as I had anticipated and Chris & I spent a good 30 seconds twirling in the sunshine laughing while about 3kg of rice was being thrown on us!! (it got in my hair, even a bit in my mouth!) but it was a lot of fun!


After that we were taken by the Rolls to the reception venue and had the wedding meals with all our guests and spent the evening chit-chatting with everyone!

It was such a fun day!



So HERE is a compliation of some photos I put together for my family in Italy who couldnt come to the wedding. Hopefully they will make a bit more sense now that I've explained a bit of the story! (I'd recommend to click view as slideshow)

PICTURES HERE
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