Southern Bride 2021

My one
and
only…
By: Kendra Norman Holmes
HHJ Managing Editor
Unlike many new brides, when Caroline Stanley was a little
girl, she never had fairytale daydreams about who her future
“Prince Charming” might be. As a teen, she wasn’t one who
wondered what her future wedding would be like. Instead, she
grew up just knowing, somehow, that everything in her life would
work according to God’s plan.
Many know Stanley as the successful pageant queen that she is
today, but they may not know her back-story. Although pageantry
is a big part of her life, it was never her aspiration. Looking back,
however, Stanley realizes that in order for many of the important
things in her life to have happened, she had to walk the path
that would lead her to them—and that path included being a
beauty queen.
“Competing in pageants didn’t begin with me,” Stanley
acknowledged. “My mom started competing as a teenager. She
eventually went to Miss Georgia, and she was first runner-up
for that.”
Although she found success on the stage, Brandi Rowland—
Stanley’s mom—never planned to groom her children for the same.
However, a frightening incident in the life of her firstborn child
made her change her mind.
“I had severe anxiety as a child,” shared Stanley, who is the
eldest of five. “It got to the point where one day, in ninth
grade, as I was giving a presentation, I passed out in front
of the entire class. Mom had to come pick me up, and when
February 2021
Southern
Bride 7