California Wedding Part III

So...now ... the wedding! The bridesmaids were all at Becky's suite at 6:00 for hair and make-up. Since there were NINE, it had to be early. We were still asleep. The girls slept until 7:30 and we were one happy family. Crankiness would make the day more hectic than it already was going to be!

I took Anna to visit all the bridesmaids and the bride after breakfast.

Beth was the Matron of Honor, not a title any of us thinks sounds good. She tried her best to keep things moving along.

At 10:00, Anna, Mia and I had our hair done at the salon on the ship.

In retrospect it was a great idea to go to the salon. There wasn't really room or time for us in the suite and the girls would have been so much more tired before the wedding having all that attention from the grownup girls. And as it turned out, the makeup person called in sick the day before the wedding and Becky had to hire one off the Internet. Thank you, theknot.com!

The girls and I then went back to our room and watched Baby Max until it was time to leave. That poor guy didn't know what was up. Where is my Mama? Where is my Daddy? Why am I not at home?

The five of us left for the wedding at 12:30. We were under the impression the bus was also picking up the wedding party at that time. Yes, a bus was needed for a wedding party of 18, their dates, and bride and groom.

On the way to the church I got texts from Beth that the bus was no there yet to pick them up. What???!!! The wedding planner and I had a miscommunication about alcohol on the bus and she had sent him out before the wedding to get some! Not my idea! There was an event going on in the Queen Mary parking lot and the bus couldn't get to the pick-up place, after his little shopping trip. The girls could see him across the parking lot though!

After about four updates from Beth, I finally texted her I was just giving it to God. The next text I got from her, as I was trying to dress two flower girls and a ring bearer in the parking lot of the church, said that Greg had walked out to the bus and directed the driver into the parking lot and they were on their way. Okay, so my son-in-law didn't walk on water out to the bus, but he pretty much was the savior! Thank you, God, for reading my text.

Of course leaving on a bus, to a place that is at least 35 minutes away, 20 minutes before you have to be there, pretty much guarantees you will not be on time! I'm not sure how many people in the pews knew that the bus pulled up at 2:11 and the ceremony started at 2:14! We only had the church until 3:30 and we had a full Mass to get through. Poor Max was so distraught by this time that he would not walk down the aisle with anyone but Mama. In case you are new to my blog, that would be the bride!

The ceremony was sweet with no glitches. Some of it was in Polish, but most in English. Max sat on my lap through the whole thing, happy to see his parents get hitched. Anna and Mia sat with Sean and Dar. We had pictures afterward and then headed back to the boat.

I hired two babysitters to help with the littles. They turned out to be sisters which was great as they were comfortable watching all the kids together in our suite. Max never came to the reception. He was done for the day! Ben was out early too. Avery came up next and then Anna. Mia, the dancing queen, was last to go to the room.

The reception went smoothly as far as I could tell. At least nobody told me otherwise. The toasts were great, the band wonderful, the Polish polkas during the band's breaks were fun to watch and the food was yummy. We went back to our room after it was all over and the kids were all sound asleep. We kept Max in our room all night. He woke up once and I put him back to sleep on my chest in bed. He stayed that way the rest of the night. Grandparents can do that, you know.

Congratulations Becky and Arek! Can't wait to see all the pictures. So happy Arek is now an official part of the family!