Early in our career we were blessed to meet and befriend a few seasoned folks who  helped us navigate  business, contracts, vendors, open houses, etc and figure out marketing in the era of land lines, yellow pages and brand spanking new internet.

Hill Country Events was one of the first businesses to offer tips about the wedding industry, bar service and alcohol policy as well give us best practices advice on length of events, vendor relationship building and working as a team with every event you work. Amy and Brad have literally poured their souls into their business, now turning 28 years old and I can say unequivocally, that we would not be celebrating our own tenure had it not been for their commitment to excellence. We have celebrated a lifetime of memories and milestones, weddings and baby showers. They will always be family. <3

Courtney’s Catering was one of the very first catering companies out to our venue and we hit it off right away. We enjoyed wonderful home cooking, Texas hospitality, and Southern warmth. We’ve had the honor of hosting 3 of their family weddings, we’ve watched babies become adults and adults become grandparents.  We grew up together in so many ways. We learned grace under fire, to pivot under pressure and ride the big waves when they came. Now we get to celebrate with Mark and Brandi and their upcoming 25^th anniversary in business – an incredible achievement and no one is prouder than we are!

Ame Soeur Events is a fine young woman of 20 now. This sweetest of businesses came along when Donna oversaw her daughter Sara’s wedding with us back in 2005 and we loved her servant’s heart then and we love it still. She and her team have carefully tended and brought to fruition hundreds of wedding dreams coming true. There is and will always be a special place in my heart for all Donna has done for Kindred Oaks over the years. From bridal luncheons and parties, weddings and a million overseen details, she has offered guidance, patience, and taught me more than she’ll ever know. She will be a sister for life.

Weddings are beautiful, full of joy and oh, so much work! Is it any wonder that Jesus’ first miracle was at a wedding! May His presence, His provision and His grace continue to bless you.

Thank you for being our village,

Elaine

June is here, and May of 2025 is gone forever. Every time one month ends and a new one begins, I think of the finality of that period in what is now history. I won’t see May again for another 11 months, won’t experience another birthday, Mother’s Day, celebrate most mornings with my doors and windows open to enjoy the unseasonably cool breezes nor enjoy many days of warm rain. And while the sweet moments of this particular May have been deemed a past not to be seen again, so too are May’s worth of the daily grind of worry over things I couldn’t control, wondering if I’ll ever feel like I am enough and a million other negative distractions I’ve let occupy my thoughts. 

On days when I’ve had enough coffee, the mind isn’t going in a thousand directions, and I’ve managed to spend some quiet moments reflecting on what God has taught me, granted me and what he has in store for me, I pay homage the same way to each new day given as a gift and watching another as it too, passes away. 

I’m sure if that makes me fatalistic or futuristic but in my heart of hearts, I think it just makes me content. There was a time I did not. Many years in fact. 

Time and again however, God showed up during and after the storms, mopped up my tears and calmed my spirit. And after what felt like a stack of losses, he showed me rainbows, gave me grace upon grace, cradled me in peace and eventually I found I could rely on His strength to get me through the days and not that of my own. If by chance you’ve been hurt by the very one I give credit for saving me, please know that it wasn’t he who disappointed but merely some who got in the way. I’ve been there, too, on both sides I’m afraid and I’m so sorry.

As one day fades into the next, I’m now more apt than not to bid farewell to what didn’t go quite right, give abundant thanks to what did and embrace hope for a new days’ mercy. 

Perhaps the deep dissatisfaction expressed so often in life today is due to the over examination of our own troubles. I’m certainly guilty as charged. There will no doubt be enough woe to mourn. The challenge is rise up still, greet the day anew and choose to see the joy within such a brief a time as this.

If this day should end before I get the opportunity to say thank you Lord, please know I appreciate the light you shine upon this fractured world. 

May is gone but June is here, ready and full of hope. Time to shine a light in the direction of someone who is tired of the darkness. 

Shine on,

Elaine

For close to 20 years, I’ve written about the juxtaposition of love, faith, family and marriage as it’s been inevitably interwoven with raising our second set of kids, also known as our small businesses. We have grown up alongside them and just like raising their human counterparts, the days have been long and the years so inexplicably short.

To recap quickly for those new here, in 2003 we birthed our first born, Kindred Oaks at our home and we were no spring chickens at the time.

Little sister Zuzu’s Petals was conceived in 2007, an oopsie baby if you will, but playful and determined. And then, just when we thought we were done raising babies, along came the midlife crisis child named Lincoln Chapel in 2018, full of strong will and lots of personality.

Kindred Oaks is now a 21-year-old adult having survived the terrible two’s, a rocky pre-adolescence as par for the course, and while almost causing her parents to offer her up for adoption during her late tweens (think covid), God’s word in Proverbs 19:21 became a stronghold. It said, ‘many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lords’ purpose that prevails’.

Zuzu’s Petals is graduation age and about to fly the nest and little Lincoln? At almost 8 years old Lincoln Chapel is living his best life oblivious to most of the chaos around him.

With that snapshot of our history as the backdrop, (most told through the years in our archives), it is our joy and honor to announce that we have been given the gift of being able to retire somewhat, after our last events in early May of 2026, after 22 years at that time, God willing.

Steve and I will continue to book weddings for the remainder of 2025 and Spring of 2026, still host open houses (see below) and then we will close the doors of Kindred Oaks after our last events are held. We will turn the venue over to a small non-denominational church, Cornerstone Community Church who has been worshiping at the venue since December 2020 when they knocked on our door.

In all seriousness, we took on the purchase, creation and building of a venue out of sheer innocence and the total grace of God at a time we least deserved the opportunity. We have always felt we were mere stewards of the land and the peace this transition has afforded us is a gift no human plan could have granted.

We will continue to own the Kindred Oaks property until after that last event and we’ll watch Zuzu’s Petals as she learns to spread her wings even further than she does today and hopefully soar on her own. She and Lincoln Chapel reside on a separate piece of property that abuts Kindred Oaks, and it is there that we will continue to raise the two remaining ‘kids’.

Jim Croce penned the lyrics to Time in a Bottle in 1970 after his wife told him she was pregnant with their first baby.

If I had a box just for wishes

And dreams that had never come true

The box would be empty

Except for the memory

Of how they were answered by you

We are so thankful to each one of you. You are intrinsic to our success and the celebration of this new season. Good ol’ King Solomon, the wise one said in Ecclesiastes, “He has made everything beautiful in its time”.

With deep appreciation,

Elaine & Steve

The Sandwich Generation is not a term I was familiar with until recently and if the name is lost on you, then you must be on either end of what lies in the middle. The middle layer consists of older adults in their 50’s – 60’s who have adult children with possible families of their own as well as aging parents who they may or may not be caring for. I happen to be one of the fortunate ones who have independent adult children taking good care of themselves and my parents are also quite independent and need no caregiving assistance thus far.

When I think back on my grandparents, I envision a really sweet couple, married for 50 years and because I was just a kid, they seemed really old to me. Like they were born that way. There’s no way they grew to be that old, even though pictures might prove otherwise. Great-grandparents were just simply prehistoric and only lived in tattered black and white photographs.

Parents though, especially now that I’m in the middle of that sandwich, don’t seem to be that old to me, but my own grandchildren would surely disagree. I’m quite sure they’d refer to me as ancient already. What I love the most about this middle sandwich stage of life is that I’m witnessing a nurtured yet vintage love blossoming. My mom married her husband a little later in life, but 38 years in, and both now in their 80’s, their marriage has grown into a mature love affair of the heart with the same tenderness I remember witnessing between my grandparents. It wasn’t always that way.

To tenderize is to make tender by beating. Now, I recognize that that definition is more commonly referring to meat, but I’m here to tell you that no relationship gets to the ripe age of maturity without some bruised egos, and a fair amount of consumed humble pie. The trick is to love like Jesus would, ask for forgiveness often, and laugh at your own expense. Often.

I’m witnessing in my mom’s marriage, a beautiful resignation of will. She recognizes that she needs him as much as he’s also recognizing how much he needs her. They hold hands often, they laugh regularly, and they’ll probably bicker over how loud the tv is, for forever.

With some concerted prayer and grace from above, you and I might just reach that golden anniversary. May this year grant me a more generous heart, a more tender touch and a whole lot of gratitude for the opportunity.

Cheers to the New Year!

Elaine

Feelings are finicky emotions. Our very nature is mired in inconsistency. Joyous moods turn bitter with a one-word spin of the tongue and foul moods can brighten by a change of scenery or a savory dish. From the earliest days of betrothal, wedding vows were presented in public and before God as a statement not only of pronounced love and adoration but as a covenant that could withstand our selectively emotional pledge. It became a contract. It needed to be a contract, not to be broken.

We recently took a driving vacation and, on our way back through Louisiana, we made a pitstop to tour the Fort St. Jean Baptiste Museum to get a little history of the colonial days in that region. The Fort was established over 300 years ago and saw many marriages take place between the French Colonists. The diorama above depicts one such ceremony. A quote below the wedding re-enactment sparked my interest.

Henry P Dart, author of ‘Marriage Contracts of French Colonial Louisiana’ said, “It seems unnecessary to stress the value of these ancient contracts. They form an essential part of the social history of the Colony, for here we find the names of the great and the small, most of whom missed their page in the histories of the ear, but who nevertheless did their part, carried on and are still remembered by countless descendants in all parts of the world.”

A marriage commitment will alter the course of your life certainly, but future generations as well. We make assurances every day of one type or another, some more inflexible than others. We buy a car with the guaranty that we will pony up the monthly payments with interest, and we will forfeit the pleasure of that sweet ride if we neglect to hold up to our part of the bargain. But without a contract, we may or may not make that payment. Without the strength of a contract, the spoken word is only as good as who utters it. Used to be that a handshake meant something. Teddy Roosevelt coined the phrase “words are cheap but action is expensive”.

Marriage is more than just words. It is a contractual promise that says that even when I’m afraid or sad or downright and justifiably angry, that I will stick by you and figure out a way to make it work and work well. The sacrificing of pride becomes the fruit of our labor.

It is hard to conceive that our time will pass on to the next generation, but our commitments will remain as a testament of our history. Our children and grandchildren will know by our kept oath, whether or not we passed the test of faithfulness.

As much as it pains me to admit it, there have been times that my solemn vow was all that held me from walking out the door. I am glad that the foundation of Jesus was the rock on which I made that vow because He is unchanging whereas this girl is made of shifting sand. But He knows and loves me and so does my patient husband. Twenty-two years of grateful.

Words matter,

Elaine

With all the upheaval in the US race for president this year, it got me to thinking of parallel root causes of division in marriage that could offer some perspective on the ills of our nation as well.

I’m no therapist nor doctorate in human behavior but I’d wager I’ve been witness to more familial dynamics than most, in my career of planning weddings for couples and their families.

I’ve cringed at divorced parents who couldn’t stand to be in the same room as the offending ex-partner much less sit by them on the same row for 20 minutes to witness the human life they shared in bringing into the world, express their love and honor to another equally loved soul, and I’ve watched incredibly humble and loving human interaction between the oddest of fellows who had nary a thread in common but their newly wedded offspring.

I wish I knew the secret sauce, but I’d venture to say that those who have learned to embrace those they might oppose in opinion, seek to walk a road less traveled or reach across an aisle to explore a differing belief rather than hastily cast a stone in objection are the ones that enjoy a measure of tranquility.  

In my own 22 years of marriage, as anyone can attest, there are periods of stressful desperation and those of exhilarating joy but it’s the in-between years of ordinary life that sift out the disagreements worth fighting over and the ones the serenity prayer was written for; accepting the things you simply cannot change.

My mom was a pretty committed Republican and my stepdad an equally staunch Democrat when they married 37 years ago and not once did I ever hear chiding or sarcastic ‘I told you so’s’. They valued each other as partners in life more than the uncommon threads of political leanings and anyway, it made for interesting conversation. They each filled the gaps the other left open and they welcomed an opposing viewpoint without having the need to ‘win’.

Complementary was their union. The very word conjures up friendship and warm snuggles. A complementary person “serves and fills out to complete”. That is, we may have pockets that are so far, empty, waiting for another to complete, which is why the two become one in marriage. Each is a valued part of the whole.

I’m grateful we have a two-party system. It’s a privilege to be able to vote one into power but leaving the other to push enough of a boundary to force compromise. Two differing opinions doesn’t render one necessarily wrong and one right. Perhaps there is truth waiting to be understood in both. Together, both parties form our United States of America. Tension creates opportunity to unite and bond under common good if not taken too far. We would certainly work better if we humbly greeted another’s perspective in all things.

A good marriage is a two-party system of complimentary people who held each other in high regard. They fight hard to protect the unity and sanctity of marriage first because each portion by itself may be independent, but without its companion, it is a lonely, lopsided ride.

I have my own belief that God is where grace begins and there are a good many that don’t hold that same confidence and while we don’t have to agree or even understand, we can, and must respect.  

I hope we learn to embrace those not like us. Learn from those who are hurting. And aren’t we all. Lay down the agenda and stretch out your arms to take hold of someone who simply needs solace. We can do so, so much more united than divided. My heart, and yours, will feel better, too.

“America! America! God shed His grace on thee, and crown thy good with brotherhood, from sea to shining sea!”

In brotherhood,

Elaine

When I graduated high school and went on to college, I accepted the “lost and found” relics of my mother’s cupboard and brought with me to college, two very old black tin enameled cooking crocks. As a young married wife, I came to love those old things and I swore my mama’s ‘hungarian goulash’ tasted better served out it. I put quotation marks around the name because there was nothing Hungarian about it and the ground beef, macaroni, lots of cheese and tomato sauce, resembled something more like hash but mama had named it that and that’s all there is to it.

As woks became popular, my husband and I took turns with our first Austin neighbors of making weekly Chinese food and over the years, we swore the recipe was the same, but it every week we proclaimed that it was the best yet. Could be that we were more skilled in our labors but that old wok had taken on a seasoned flavor all its own. We were very careful not to clean with soap as it would strip what made the food so characteristically tasty.

To those who’s walk down the aisle is just a stone’s throw away, I can’t tell you how to keep sacred the hushed moments you currently share, for you will figure that out one anniversary at a time. The days are long and the years short as they say so don’t give up on those first forays in the kitchen, of burnt toast and spilled milk. It takes time to learn the rhythm of relationship.

Don’t despair if you don’t speak the same language right off the bat or you feel like you’re beating your head against the wall of stubbornness and pride. Lay down the phone and stop texting. Hug big, listen long, speak little and whisper how much you love to love.

Seasoning is a little dab of this and a little dab of that. Before you know it, you don’t need the recipe, you just know it, feel it, taste it even.

Enjoy the salt and pepper,

Elaine

My daughter and I share a pretty similar sense of humor and we get our funny bone tickled on a regular basis. She recently sent me a video one night that sent me sideways. The kind of unexpected joy that morphs into uncontrollable laughter. One of those moments that at first, was just an under your breath kind of mental haha, but then tiny audible heehees that you try to keep to yourself that turned into mostly silent tears that begin to stream from your face in hopes to not wake your husband, that finally erupt uncontrollably and now demands sharing but you can’t seem to get any words to come out to explain why you are acting like you are, that will make any sense to the man who is now wide awake and waiting. Waiting to hear and understand. When I replay it to show my husband, I was wrecked and trying to get to the bathroom while he was left speechless and not comprehending any of my hysteria.  Poor man.

Now understand that this might have just been me. It would never be as funny for him as it was for me. Some might call me simple. I do enjoy a good laugh. He said ha ha and rolled back over. Oh well, it was funny, I swear. I laugh at myself on a regular basis. It reduces the stress of aging.

Some folks are great at telling jokes. They remember all the details and have the timing down pat. I’m terrible at telling jokes; I can never remember them. It must have something to do with my visual nature. I love to banter though and to watch my sons bounce insanity from one to the other keeps me oddly, well, sane. They could seriously have a standup routine, but I’d die of embarrassment at most of what they’d come up with.

My husband snorts when he laughs. He also is the one who usually makes others laugh, even if it’s more of a groan. He’s more an observer and commentator of human behavior. I honestly think that laughter has brought us enough joy to overcome the sadness that is inevitable in life. Second only to faith, it has been one of the foundational glues in our marriage.

It is the counterbalance to heartbreak. Ask anyone who has suffered grief. Those going through that horrific struggle sometimes share a weird, morbid sense of humor only those in the midst of that awful time can relate to.

Men have a life expectancy of about 73-74 years and women closer to 80. According to Psychology today, women also laugh 126% more than men. Hmmm

“Laughter is wine for the soul – laughter soft, or loud and deep, tinged through with seriousness – the hilarious declaration made by man that life is worth living.” – Sean O’Casey

Enjoy this engagement season of your life and may God grant you His peace and the kind of joy that only laughter can bring.

Elaine

p.s. Here is the link that put me in stitches. Laugh at your own risk.