The Real Housewives of New Jersey star Dolores Catania is about to be a mother-of-the-groom!
Catania’s son, Frankie Jr., proposed to his girlfriend, Nicole Perricho, on Saturday, February 22.
Perricho, for her part, shared the engagement news via Instagram on Sunday, February 23, using Saturday’s date and red heart emoji as her caption. In the snap, Frankie Jr., 26, got down on one knee at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.
Frankie Jr. looked dapper in a black suit, while his soon-to-be bride opted for a white sweater dress with feathered accents dotting the sleeves.
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Dolores, 54, shares her son with her ex-husband, Frank Catania. (The exes, who divorced in 1998, are also parents to daughter Gabrielle, 29.)
The RHONJ star was secretly present during the proposal.
“Me incognito waiting for the proposal,” Dolores wrote via Instagram Story on Saturday, later sharing a video of herself waiting outside the church dressed in a winter coat, a pair of oversized sunglasses and a face mask.
Frankie Jr. and Perricho, who works as a nurse, have been together since at least 2023 and have managed to keep most of their courtship private.
Frankie Jr.’s family, meanwhile, has been offering insight into their lives since Dolores joined RHONJ season 7 in 2016 after appearing as a guest in the debut season. The Bravo show has captured Dolores and Frank Sr.’s post-divorce dynamic — and her current relationship with boyfriend Paulie Connell.
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“It wasn’t hard. It came easy after all the fighting,” Dolores exclusively told Us Weekly in May 2024 of her relationship with her former spouse. “I tell everybody, ‘You’re not going to remember the things you fought about. So, stop fighting [about it]; they’re not important. It’s just not, let things go and just move on with life.’”
She added, “I remember all the good memories we’ve had, the trips we’ve taken together [and] the holidays we’ve shared together. Those are my memories of me, Frank and the family after my divorce.”
At the time, Dolores also told Us that she wasn’t expecting a proposal of her own from Connell, 50, whom she’s been dating since 2021. (Frank Sr., for his part, is now engaged to Brittany Mattessich.)
“Isn’t that, like, a societal thing? It’s got to stop.” Dolores added to Us. “Why doesn’t everybody just ask, ‘What’s our next trip? What’s your next plan?’ Does it have to be marriage? Does it have to be [an] engagement? Happiness is the goal. Peace in our lives is the goal. We’ve had that.”
