M&M Wedding

Lots of stuff happened yesterday, so I'm going to list the various events below, mostly so I can remember them later for one of my scrapbook pages. I'll try to post pictures later this week.

We had a "free hot breakfast" where our favorites were the french toast and waffles. The french toast was yummy enough to eat without syrup. Other favorites were mixed fruit and bacon. My Mom and Dad were already there when we got there, so my Mom was available and willing to feed DS#3. We were all able to sit at this one big table that seated 10.

After breakfast, the kids all went to my sisters' room and watched the movie Enchanted. DH took a short nap with DS#3, and I wrote in my blog. After DS#3 woke up in a good mood, I took him to visit my Mom and then my grandmother's room (who I call Lola, which is Filipino for "grandma"). My uncle B takes really good care of Lola. He also loves to feed everyone, and he had bought some jugs of milk specifically for the kids. He also brought fruit and various Filipino pastries. DS#2 was with me, and he started out eating a mango, an orange, a banana, and finally, a "mamon" which is a sponge cake (very tasty and one of my favorites). Everyone else eventually ended up in Lola's room.

For lunch, we went to the local mall because it would be quicker and everyone could choose what they wanted to eat. My aunt and uncle (my Dad's brother) met us there and we all ate together. When we left after 1PM, we just barely had enough time for all of us to get ready for the wedding, which was at 2PM. Luckily, everything was located close to each other this weekend. This is different from previous family weddings here where it seemed like we had to drive an hour between the various places.

The wedding was beautiful, of course. My younger sister (the one who just turned 40) looked amazing in her dress, and she wasn't even part of the wedding. She remarked on how all of the bridesmaids were skinny and the dresses really flattered them. I told her that after seeing her in her dress, she herself shouldn't ever complain that she is fat ever again! I will definitely try to post photos of my sister in that dress! The bride looked amazing (and very skinny) in her dress too. The "best" part of the wedding was the father of the bride and the aunt of the groom singing a duet with the father of the bride playing the guitar. That was such a sweet moment.

Poor DH stayed at the back of the church or even outside the church for almost the entire ceremony. He realized too late that he might have been more efficient if he had gone back to the hotel room and gotten DS#3 to take a nap. The wedding was smack dab in the middle of nap time. After the ceremony, we stayed for the traditional family photos, including a photo of the extended family. It's usually a very impressive photo and each time the extended family just gets bigger and bigger. Ours was the last photo, of course, and we headed back to the hotel to allow DS#3 to get a nap since the cocktails didn't start until 6PM and dinner wouldn't start until 7PM.

When we got to the reception at around 6:30ish, we had some hors d'oeuvres and sodas--we were all quite hungry. We were seated at the same table as my youngest sister and her family were seated at the same table. We had plenty of time to mingle before any food was served. My Mom took the baby for most of the night. She fed him, she played with him, and eventually he fell asleep. When she had to go to the bathroom, she would hand him off to her brother or her sister-in-law's sister.

Some highlights of the reception include the following:
--The groom and the father of the bride sang a duet for the bride--so beautiful. The groom then sang two songs that he had written himself. DH and I were amazed at his talent.
--I told the boys that if one of them caught the garter, I would give them $10. DH guess correctly that I just wanted the photo op so I could scrapbook it. He was right! ;-) Well, DS#1 almost got it but it bounced off his fingers (and off the fingers of the guy standing next to him who really seemed to want it too), it fell on the floor where I saw DS#2 dive for it, but someone else eventually claimed it.
--DD and her two cousins danced the night away. They were on the dance floor when no one else was on the dance floor. Some of the time, my cousin's 18-month-old boy was out there too, relishing all the attention from his female cousins.
--DS#1 spent most of the time talking with his second cousin Z who is around 6 months older than him. Z's mom remarked to me that she is amazed that the two of them only see each other once every two years and each time they start talking and playing like the best of friends. At least this time they exchanged email addresses so they can keep in touch.
--There was a "money dance" where people would contribute in a basket to dance with the new couple. I was with DD when she danced with the groom. He is such a sweetie anyway, and she looked happy to be dancing with him. Unbeknownst to me, my DS#1 went to dance with the bride after originally saying that he didn't want to. I asked him who gave him the money to dance with her and he said, "We were supposed to give money?" He said this with a huge sheepish grin on his face showing his newly straightened teeth. Oh well!
--No Filipino wedding reception would be complete without line dancing to include "The Electric Slide". The boys actually went out there with me and it was a lot of fun once I finally learned the steps. My aunt talked me through the steps and then I tried to talk DS#2 through the steps but he never seemed to be listening--what a surprise!

We finally left at around 10:30PM. We all had so much fun that it was actually hard for us to leave, but DS#3 had been sleeping for a while already and we really needed to get him to bed. By the way, both the bride and groom's first initials are "M", so I thought it was cute when they left personalized M & M's candies on the tables for their guests. Tomorrow, I'll talk about today's events.