Who Is Joanna Gaines' Older Sister Teresa Ann Criswell?
Many know Joanna Gaines as the HGTV design guru who rose to fame with her show "Fixer Upper" and later added to her franchise with "Fixer Upper: Welcome Home" and "Fixer Upper: The Castle." Joanna became popular due to her farmhouse-chic aesthetic, and fans grew to love her realistic portrayal of life with husband Chip Gaines and their five children. It's no secret family is everything to Joanna and she often gushes about her relationship with her two sisters, Mary Kay McCall, whom she affectionately calls Mikey, and Teresa Ann Criswell. In a 2016 Instagram post, she shared a pic of the three sisters as kids and another one of them all grown up. "Sister love. #nationalsiblingday," she captioned.
While Joanna may be the most famous out of the three, her sisters are successful in their own right. McCall seems to share Joanna's love of design and has a retro plant shop called Ferny's. Criswell, meanwhile, is also an entrepreneur and just like her sisters, she is multitalented.
Criswell is an author and a multimedia host
Besides her family, spirituality is most important to Joanna Gaines' older sister Teresa Ann Criswell, and she has authored several books centering around religion. In May 2022, she highlighted her book "12-Week Bible Study for Moms" on her Instagram feed and wrote, "Thank you for considering your shares and reviews — I want women encouraged to look to GOD for their EVERYTHING so that they can see GOD in EVERYTHING!"
When she's not writing about faith, Criswell talks about it on her podcast, "Oh...Teresa and Tristin Podcast," which she cohosts with her daughter Tristin. In a recent episode, they discussed Tristin's car accident, which left her with a traumatic brain injury. "There has been this fear of the Lord for a few years now, especially after the car accident. There was just this knowing and this healthy, beautiful awed wonder of God that you were not mine and I was not yours," Criswell shared with her daughter.
The podcast host passed on her love of God to Tristin and she has based her YouTube Channel, Triumphant Victorious Reminders with Teresa Ann, around her faith as well. Despite being very religious now, however, Criswell wasn't always as spiritual growing up and she clearly remembers the moment things changed for her.
Criswell had a spiritual awakening as an adult
Teresa Ann Criswell was raised in a religious household but it wasn't until she was an adult that she started her spiritual journey. In an episode of the "Labeled and Loved" podcast, the older sister of Joanna Gaines described going to bed depressed on March 5, 2003, only to wake up to an epiphany.
"Woke up the next morning at 6 a.m. with this touch on my shoulder, like a physical touch and as I wake up, normally if someone would have touched me as I was waking up, I would have woken up with a violent, just like, rage," she shared. "I don't know why, nothing had ever happened to me that would cause that. I remember waking up on March 6, 2003, with that touch and it was the most peaceful moment in my life." After that moment, Criswell started writing in her journal and realized what she had written were "praises to God."
Criswell credits her mom for raising her to believe in her faith. On Mother's Day, she paid a special tribute on Instagram and shared pics of her mom and her two sisters, Gaines and Mary Kay McCall. "Our beautiful mama! She is an example of bold, tenacious love. The way she has learned and taught us through the years how prayer leads us closer to knowing God. Her faith in God is beautiful and such an example to see God above all else. We love you mama! We are so blessed to get to be her daughters!"