September 13, 2001                 Issue Number 2
   Hello to all of you! I hope you are staying safe in this sad time. I miss and am thinking about all of you.
   As you know, you voted for the cream-colored Vera Wang dress as your bridesmaid's dress. It was also my favorite, so I�m thrilled you guys liked it too! Just in case you've forgotten what you picked, here it is again. . .



   I have some sad news to share. Amy and my brother, Richard, broke up last week, and Amy will no longer be a bridesmaid. I will miss her being a part of the wedding and wish her the best.
   Just to let you know what else is going on. . . Alex and I are in the process of booking the band for the reception, and when we get that done, we�ll have made all the preliminary arrangements for the wedding. We�re hiring an incredible 18-piece big band that should make the reception very festive.
   This weekend, Alex and I were supposed to fly to Massachusetts with my parents so they could meet Alex�s mom and grandparents, but we have cancelled the trip. Currently, I plan to go to Dallas on October 12. There, I�ll have my initial dress fitting, we�ll order invitations, and register. I also hope to pick out your shoes then.
   In early October, Alex and I will visit Alex's Dad, who lives in Connecticut about 90 minutes from New York City. While we're there, we hope to catch a Yankees playoff game and Broadway show. I hope everything will be back to normal in NYC by then. At any rate, it's shaping up to be a very busy fall!
   Hope all is well with the rest of you. Please fill me in on what's going on in your lives.

                         Love, Lori 		           Gretchen Marshall Childress

Gretchen and I met working at the Black-Eyed Pea in Dallas during the summer after my freshman year at Rhodes (1992). I was a lowly hostess and Gretchen was the big-time waitress in a stunning green knit shirt. :) We bonded immediately since we were hired on the same day and soon discovered that our birthdays were only three days apart. This is a picture of Gretchen taken shortly after we met.

    Gretchen and I had a lot of fun that summer and even though I went back to Memphis that fall, we remained close. I knew I had a true friend when she came to visit me at Rhodes during my sophomore year during a Tri Delt date party weekend and got stuck paying for some guy she had never met and didn�t even get to go to the party (a last-minute decision by the sorority). I�m sure it was a less-than-ideal situation for her, but she didn�t really complain and we managed to have a lot of fun.

    Gretchen graduated from Texas A&M and followed her soon-to-be husband, Chad, to Galveston, where they live still. Always the nontraditionalist, Gretchen decided she wanted to get married in Las Vegas, which she and Chad did in October 1998. You should have seen Gretchen in her big white wedding dress running through Caesar�s Palace to get to the wedding chapel and going out on the town after the wedding. Talk about a celebration to remember!

For our birthdays in August 1999, Gretchen and I went to Washington, D.C., for a girls only trip. We had a terrific time � as you can see here � even if we did run ourselves ragged. We tried to see every museum in the city, and more. It was a great time and we bought each other birthday presents in the airport gift shop on the way back.

   Recently, Gretchen went back to school for her MBA, which she received this past May. Good thing she finished up in May because she had a little baby girl, Emma Dale, on June 24, 2001. Never one to leave things simple, Gretchen and Chad decided to buy a house just weeks after Emma�s birth and are busy moving in now.

    Gretchen is one of my favorite people. She is always happy and always makes me laugh. She has a great attitude about everything. I feel very lucky to have her in my life.
What do you want to read about? Let me know.

Read Issue Number 1 of the Bridesmaid Bulletin.