Olivia's wedding (7/28)

 

Olivia got married on Sunday and it was truly a beautiful day!

Kelli assigned herself a few too many tasks to do and was a bit frazzled (to put it lightly). She decorated, she catered, she walked the bride down the aisle... And everything was wonderful—the food, the decorations—but it was a lot!

I was glad that I volunteered my mom, Josie, and myself to chop vegetables for her. We spent hours chopping onions and tomatoes and olives! But I wish we'd done more (because, Kelli did so much). 

We should have showed up early to help set things up, but then—I suppose—we wouldn't have had the energy to help out during the reception. I ended up in charge of the live stream recording of the ceremony (so family members too far away to attend could still attend), so I sat right behind my sister, which felt a little too VIP for my station. 

On a technical level, I have known Olivia for 18 years, but unfortunately we went through some years of estrangement when she went to live with her father, so I haven't really seen her since Kelli's own wedding (April 2013; though the process of reunification began about 6.5 years ago (Christmas of 2017—we had a video call with them!) our family wouldn't see the twins at any in-person events for a few more years and this was my first time seeing them again). I probably could have comfortably sat a few rows back, but...again...I wound up in charge of the video stream.

The ceremony was lovely! The service was offered in Spanish with an English translation, and Olivia was clearly very nervous and excited and happy (a quintessential blushing bride—she was so giggly (it was sweet)).

When the pastor presented them as a couple he also announced their baby as part of their family. The front row and the seats down the aisle (once again including me for some reason) were given these poppers to explode that revealed the gender of the baby—it's a boy!

(I took these stills from the video stream so they're not great, but they do the trick):

After the ceremony the photographer took some family pictures (that I hope we'll get to see). I snapped a few just in case it was ages before we got the pictures back. Here's Olivia and Isaiah with their siblings and nieces and nephews. My sister is in there, as well as Isaiah's mom, and my dad. We we really needed to have someone (besides the photographer) making sure all the right people were in the photograph.

My sister was excited because she had so many of her kids together again. Amy came down from Canada with her boys and it was her first time meeting the twins (I think), so that was lovely. The twins' father was Tongan and they were raised by him for several years, so they got to be very close to that side of the family, which I think is just lovely for them (although their absence was difficult for my sister, as well as our extended family). So in this photo are not only my sister's children, but also Eni's children. Eni was the twins' father's name. He passed away in November of last year. 

And then his ex-wife (the mother of the twins' siblings) passed away in December of last year. 

So this family has been going through it! It was so nice to see them together and smiling. They had a picture of their father up, and Olivia had a little picture of him pinned to her bouquet so that he was walking down the aisle with her (though my sister was the one to physically walk her down the aisle).

This is a picture of the bride and groom with just their siblings:

There were so many wasps at the venue! The backdrop you see behind those brave picture takers? Filled with wasps. The area where the yard games were set up? Wasps. Over by the food tables? More wasps!

Wasps were just everywhere! 

A little boy (the son of one of my sister's friends) was stung twice before the wedding even started. He was really brave about it, just holding ice over his stings. I asked him where he got stung and he showed me where. I thought about moving the yard games, but he explained that he was stung in two very different locations (both on his body and of the venue), so I couldn't really be sure the location of the yard games was a problem.

And then...there was the fact that the wedding backdrop was swarming with wasps!

Poor Rowan (Amy's son, only four years old) suddenly let out a scream of agony and started tearing around the reception tables yelling his little head off.

"That is the sound of a little boy who has been attacked by wasps," I said to myself.

It's not an...unfamiliar...sound.

I tried to corral him, but he did not want my help. He just kept batting my hands away, bellowing for his mother as he ran around in crazy circles. 

"Just...let's find Amy!" I shouted to my sister Josie. 

Amy was found, Rowan was caught and consoled, and the rest of the reception went rather smoothly.

Unfortunately, Rowan was stung three times on his little four-year-old leg. Fortunately, Amy had some after-bite sting cream in her vehicle because her older son Arthur had had a bad allergic reaction to some mosquito bites not too long ago. Unfortunately, Amy decided she had better just take the boys back to the airbnb to recover (which was probably a good call; Rowan was still rather upset).

Here's Amy saying goodbye to Olivia:

I chatted with her while I helped her change the boys out of their fancy wedding duds into play clothes, and helped her get them all buckled into their carseats. It was disappointing for Amy to not get to stay for the reception, I'm sure, but at least she had a fun day to look forward to on Monday (my sister drove up to Rexburg with Amy and her kids and they all went to Bear World, which I'm sure was a lot of fun—because we've been there before)!

Here's sweet little Ireland:

She was not sure what to think of me! We did become friend eventually but she was rather wary of me in the beginning. So was Oaklyn, to be fair.

At the end of the reception I was carrying Oaklyn around while doing a few things—like looking for Kelli's shoes, which she'd kicked off in the grass at some point in the evening and couldn't remember where—and Ireland ran up to me and slapped me in the thigh (probably because that's the only place she could reach). 

"Put Oak-la down!" she demanded.

So I put Oaklyn down for a little while and followed her while she toddled around in the grass...but then I picked her back up again when Ireland wasn't watching.

We had such fun entertainment at the reception, aside from eating and chatting. There was a mariachi-style singer (who sang along with pre-recorded music) and Olivia and her sisters performed a lakalaka.

I wasn't sitting in a very good place to film, unfortunately, since I was right behind the picture of Eni (whose portrait the girls had positioned so they could honour him with their dance)...but the portions of the dance I managed to get were lovely. Olivia was very graceful and expressive in her dancing, which was fun to see.

The bouquet toss was was really fun! My sister tied ribbons to a big wooden ring and then slipped the bouquet into the ring. Olivia held the bouquet aloft and then the single ladies chose a ribbon hanging from the ring and walked in circles around Olivia while she cut the ribbons one at a time (randomly) until only one person was left holding a ribbon.

Here's a video (with a sound-over because my video was flagged for the song in the background):

When it was time to clean up we were sure glad to have the expertise of Rosie and her friends (who came to help wrangle her children (Austin wasn't able to come because his father passed away last month and he felt he had used up too much vacation/leave for that, so Rosie came with her girls by herself) and to help with whatever needed helping with). Rosie worked for a catering company (along with her friends, and sometimes along with Auntie Josie) so she was very confident in diving in to start cleaning up and encouraging guests to leave. 

Still, it took us more than an hour to get everything cleaned up!

Here's a picture of me with my nephew Matthew, who was also a very good helper!

When we got home, my mom, Josie, and I spent another hour putting leftover food into freezer bags and washing crockpots and so forth! 

So it was a lot of work, but it was worth it for such a beautiful day. And it was such a good excuse to see everyone!

*****

I felt a little bit like my Auntie Arlene at times, forgetting I was in Utah. 

My aunt flew in from California for my sister Abra's wedding in Alberta years and years ago (25 years ago now??). She'd usually fly into Great Falls and then drive the rest of the way up because it's often cheaper to fly within the United States than to fly into Canada (but sometimes not!) and my grandma's house was midway between the Great Falls airport and the Calgary airport. 

Our house was much closer to the Calgary airport than to Great Falls, but I think my aunt probably planned on spending some time with my grandma (thus the tickets in and out of Great Falls).

Anyway, we were up the night before my sister's wedding, doing wedding prep stuff, when my aunt looked out the window and said, "Oh, wow! Whose car is that?!"

We told her it was our neighbour's car...and wondered what was so "wow" about it.

"They drove all the way from Alberta?!" my aunt exclaimed.

"You're...in...Alberta," we told her. "You came all the way to Alberta!"

"Oh, yeah!" she laughed. "I'd forgotten where I was!"

I kept seeing things like Utah license plates or BYU decals and would think to myself, "What are the odds?!" 

And then I'd have to remind myself that I was in Provo, Utah, so those things weren't actually very special to see. They were normal. (I usually stopped myself from exclaiming over them, though!)