Wedding Manners

The kids made it through Christina and Josh's wedding, and I have to say that considering what a wedding puts kids through, especially kids who can prove to be a bundle of energy, I have to say they did a really good job.



At the wedding Sofi was very excited about seeing the bride. Isaac slept. At least through the first half. That was about all Sofi could handle of the wedding too, and she became her typical sitting-through-church self. She was antsy, sliding out of her seat, looking for things to do, paper to draw on. But neither of them were disruptive, thankfully.

After the wedding we headed to the reception, and I assumed that during the trip (which took about 20-30 minutes) the kids would fall asleep. After all, the wedding was during their usual nap time and I could tell by the way they were acting that they were tired. Well I assumed wrong. I wasn't too worried about Isaac, because he'd napped in the morning and in the afternoon on the way to the wedding. Sofi on the other hand... well, to be blunt, I had no intention of bringing an unrested Sofi into the reception. An unrested Sofi is loud, pushy, and often spins our of control---literally.

So blunt I was, straight to Sofi's face. I told her that she had to take a nap, and she could either take one here in the car, or we could go back to the hotel. Thankfully this did not become a battle. She chose napping in the car, and I dropped Isaac off at the reception with my parents and Sofi and I drove around until she fell asleep.

I had my sister call me to let me know when people were sitting down to eat, so that I could wake Sofi up and we could go in. She called at 5:30, at which point I woke Sofi up and we joined the party.

This turned out to be an error in judgement on my parent, and if I'd thought things through a little deeper I would have known better. It's not that Sofi became a monster to deal. Quite the opposite. Again, considering what she had to go through at the reception, she was very well behaved.

I miscalculated because I forgot that at weddings, when everyone sits down to eat, no eats right away. There are speeches to be made. The father of the bride, the father of the groom, etc.

And the father of the bride, my Uncle Roy, well... Christina, the bride, is his only child. So of course he has six pages of notes for his speech. And considering that Michelle called me in at 5:30 and we didn't start eating until 7:30, and that Roy talked for at least forty minutes during this time span, I can only assume that those six pages of notes were set at six point font.



The above photo pretty much sums it up. Sofi is dinging her water glass with her knife, trying hard to have some fun, but doesn't feel much like smiling. Thankfully I brought food with me to feed Isaac. It wasn't long before Sofi was asking to eat his cheerios. And around 7pm Sofi had finally given up on food and was begging to "go home". But she wasn't throwing a fit, and she wasn't melting down. She was still trying her best to have good manners.

Finally the food came and we all ate, and Sofi was still asking to go. And we were about to when the dance started up. Sofi can't pass up a chance to dance...



but as you can see from the above photo, it proved hard to wait, again, this time for the dance floor to become available for everyone.

But finally it did and we all had fun. Sofi danced with the bride and the groom...





Isaac danced with his grandparents...



And after dancing our hearts and little legs out to several songs, Sofi and Isaac were truly ready to go.

And so, around 9pm, we finally did.

For more wedding photos, visit my Flickr page...