Wedding Weekend Madness (Brother in Law's CA wedding)

Mimi before the ceremony--

Our little family complete with Grumpy (no nap) baby. 

After 14 hours on flying, we arrived in Santa Barbara, CA for my brother in law's wedding.  He was actually married 1 1/2 years ago, but this was their "wedding."  He married a Philippine woman with a very traditional family.  The weekend was full of events and customs that were a little different than we were used to.    This was the first time the two families had met.  They had rented a mansion in Santa Barbara where both sides of the families stayed during the weekend.

Our visit was short (arrived Friday night and left Sunday morning), but we made the best of the short amount of time and fit in a lot of family fun.  We didn't' get to spend too much time with the bride and groom but the extended family got to spend lots of time with Mimilicious.  She didn't get much sleep, but she was loved and kissed to death.

Friday night she played and crashed. After she went to bed we all went and sat in the hottub and had a nice time.  It was really nice to relax in the hot tub after being on that plane all day.  Saturday Mimi woke up before dawn, we kept her quiet and went outside and saw the sunrise and I went running before the rest of the house woke up.  There was so much action going on in the kitchen all morning. I always loved the buzz of big family get togethers.  They scrambled 30 eggs (12 people) and made a mountain of waffles and people feasted and drank coffee all morning in their jammies.  My husband's family and us escaped the commotion for the early afternoon and took in downtown Santa Barbara, which was gorgeous.  Mimi got carried around the town by her aunts and uncles all morning (my husband is the oldest of 5).  When we got back I tried to give Mimi a nap before the ceremony, but there was too much noise and commotion going on with the ceremony preparations, so I gave up after 45 minutes of trying and just got her fed and dressed.  It was fun to get all gussied up.  I wore a wine-colored silk dress I got on cleareance from JCrew for $34.99 and my husband was the best man and wore a shirt and tie that matched my dress.

The involvement of our side of the family was a little disappointing.  With all their traditions, from food to traditional clothing, they didn't let us be included, so our family felt really left out. Even with Mimi...she was supposed to be a "flower girl." They said to just bring a white dress with us, but when we got there, they had 3 other flowergirls that had matching blue dresses, headpieces, and baskets, all form the bride's side of the family(see photo).  Then the didn't include Mimi in any of the photos.  Turns out Mimi was the "ring bearer." The inclusion of our daughter was so obviously an afterthought that I wish they hadn't of put me through the trouble. I would have been less offended if they just hadn't asked.  Afterall Mimi is only 1, she wont' remember.  I'll remember how they didn't want my daughter in their precious photos.  This was only the "icing on the cake" so to speak of how our side of the family was delicately ostracized.  You could tell my inlaws felt it too.  I won't dwell on this anymore, it makes me upset how the couple and the bride's family treated my husband's family.

In the end, we got to see my husband's family, which was really nice especially considering the passing of his grandfather last month.  The family came together and spend some really nice quality time and that's all that mattered.

With Aunti Al, who Mimi gets her middle name from

My husband with his dad and youngest brother

Mimi the "ring bearer"

Jumping on the trampoline in a dress :-)

Mimi in the kitchen with Nana and Aunt Al