May 25 (part 1)

Caleb's parents were putting on a brunch the morning after the wedding and we were invited. Caleb and Candy weren't heading off to their honeymoon (Ireland and Spain!) until the next morning, so it was a nice time for everyone involved in the wedding to relax a little together after the rush of the wedding weekend.

The food was fantastic and we were, yet again, VERY well fed. After eating, Caleb took a group of us out to his parents' orchard and we spent some time chatting amongst the cherry trees. I got a picture of the guys with the house and orchard in the background. Caleb's parents live in a gorgeous neighborhood in Los Gatos and I believe they built the house themselves. You can only really see the top story in the picture, but I think it still gives you a good idea of what the house looks like.

Candy and Caleb opened their gifts after the brunch and it was fun to see everything that they received. Here we have them being a little silly with their new oven mitts from Crate and Barrel.
Nathan continued to get plenty of attention throughout the brunch and we were told many more times how amazingly well-behaved he was the night before. He just never ran out of smiles for people!
In the end, it was time to say goodbye to everyone. There were many people there from John's time in Philadelphia and even though I'd met some of them just once many years ago, it was still fun to see them again. We headed off to find a Walgreens (out of baby wipes and batteries for the camera) and then off for our afternoon trip to San Francisco!
Nathan and I in front of Caleb's parents' house. That's our rental car next to us.

May 24

Because John got some "guy time" at the bachelor party, we had made an agreement that I would get some "girl time" the morning of the wedding day. So before John and Nathan woke up, I went over to a salon about a block away from our hotel and got a manicure. As I was waiting for the manicurist, I asked if they also did eyebrow waxing. I had forgotten to bring my tweezers on the trip and there were some stray hairs bothering me, so I thought it might be a good idea. I'd never gotten anything waxed before, so I had no idea what it was like. Surprisingly, it wasn't too bad. It made my eyes water a bit when she waxed the bottom of my eyebrows - I assume because you're getting onto the thinner skin of the eyelid, so it's going to be a little more sensitive. Except for making the skin a little red and puffy where the hair was ripped out, they looked great. After I was done, I stopped by the grocery store and got some donuts to take back to the hotel for breakfast.

We met the guys at the church between 2:30 and 3 and went off in search of some food, as John and I hadn't gotten lunch. Then it was photo time for Caleb and the groomsmen with the photographer. Nathan and I just sat to the side and watched, but John did take some pictures of
Nathan and I. After a while, Candy and the bridesmaids came out from the powder room and more pictures were taken. Candy seemed very calm! John thinks it's because she's used to stress, being a grad student.


Nathan was beginning to get a little sleepy and cranky, so I took him in to the church to find a seat. I sat a little ways off to the side, so I could take Nathan out easily if he got fussy. But I nursed him before the ceremony started and he slept through the whole thing (again!). Everyone gathered outside for a group photo and then we all headed out for the reception.

John has trouble following direction when I'm telling him where to go, so we drove around the hotel about 3 times before I finally convinced him to use the valet parking. The wedding gift we had bought was extremely heavy anyway and I didn't want to have to attempt crossing the street with it. The valet was free for wedding guests; something that Robbie (the other groomsman) forgot about. He decided to park in the parking garage, tried to fit into a spot that was too small, and ended up scraping the end and side panel of a Mercedes-Benz with the front of his rental car. Ouch.

There was a cocktail hour before the dinner with an open bar and very yummy appetizers. After all the guests were seated, the wedding party was introduced (Candy had included Nathan and I in the introductions, which was very sweet of her to do!). We all sat at the same table and had the most wonderful dinner. Salad, filet mignon, champagne, wine, and then a fabulous cake (I have no clue how that frosting was so fantastic).

The speech by Yu (the best man) was hilarious. He had the whole room in hysterics. And then, Candy's sister Cindy (the maid of honor) had everyone crying when she gave her speech. She barely got the first word out before she started crying. Candy also cried when she thanked everyone and I ended up all teary again because of it. Caleb's dad gave a great toast - he said that he hoped they would approach their marriage as him and his wife had, by making God the center of it. It was very sweet. Caleb's parents are definitely an amazing couple and I enjoyed watching them interact. They have a great relationship.

There was plenty of dancing and Nathan loved it! We danced the chicken dance and Nathan laughed hysterically through the whole thing. I was next to Caleb's mom and she thought it was the funniest thing she'd seen. The bridesmaids were practically obsessed with Nathan, so they watched him while John and I took part in the couples dance. Nathan cried just once, and was the perfect baby during the whole reception. Everyone kept telling us how amazing he was. I agree!

It was definitely a party and it just went and went. Everything seemed flawless and so well put-together. Candy was just as calm as could be throughout the entire thing! We had the most amazing time and it was hard to leave. We were very definitely worn out by the time we got back to the hotel, but it was that good sort of worn out. Nathan kept surprising us with his great attitude and was still all smiles when we arrived back at our hotel around midnight. He had barely slept all day; I have no clue how he was so darn happy. Everything was such a blast and I'm so pleased that we were able to make the trip to be a part of their wedding day.

May 23

The best man (Yu) and the other groomsman (Robbie) were flying into San Jose that morning, so we decided to meet up with them for lunch. They were also John's roommates in college, so it was fun to see them. We all went out for authentic Japanese ramen. I'd never had it before, but it was very good. It came with seaweed, but John and I aren't huge fans of seaweed, so we didn't eat that part.
When we got to the restaurant, we were slightly confused by a sign that said, "Please realize that it is difficult to accept credit cards". Did they mean that they would take them, but it was hard for them? Or did they not take them at all? Turns out they didn't take them at all. We all thought it was a bit of a strange way to say that they didn't take them.
John ordered a traditional Japanese soda with his lunch and on the bottle, it actually warned the drinker to not swallow the cap!
After lunch, we headed over to Caleb's place to lounge for a while before we all had to be at the church for the rehearsal.

Once we got to the church, we had to wait for about 15 minutes while another wedding rehearsal finished up. During this time, Nathan became a fun photo op for quite a few tourists! He looked a little confused as to who these people were. I guess I should be honored that there will be many pictures of my baby being shown around China!

The rehearsal went well and Nathan slept through the whole thing. Everyone had a good laugh when Candy (the bride) was to repeat "For richer, for poorer...". She said, "For richer...." and then trailed off. Well, Caleb IS a lawyer! It was pretty funny.

After the rehearsal, Caleb drove John and I back to the hotel to get our car. We had all gone to lunch and the rehearsal in Robbie's car and John was going to be leaving straight from the rehearsal dinner to go to the bachelor party, so I needed a way to get Nathan and I back to the hotel. We quickly changed clothes, got our car, and headed to dinner.

It was a 12 (?) course Chinese dinner! I could only eat about half of what I was given, there was so much! It was absolutely delicious and we had a great time. They served half of a pig...with the head still intact. The photo below is of Yu (the best man) with the pig head. He tried to eat it, but quickly realized that the pig's teeth were still there and I think that made it a little unappetizing for him.

One of the guests at the dinner was a boy from England. I think he was Candy's cousin. He sat at our table (with most of the bridal party) and we all spent a good part of the evening making him say "Harry Potter". John said he felt bad for the kid, but I think he enjoyed the attention.

Nathan was beginning to crash, so I decided to leave with him a little early. I was a nervous wreck - I had to figure out how to drive a completely different car than I was used to, in a different state. If I got lost, I would be gone forever! Luckily for me, the restaurant was only 5-10 minutes away from our hotel, straight down the street. Even though I was full from so much food, I picked up some Wendy's on the way. I knew I'd be getting hungry in a little while (that's what nursing does to you!), but also knew that I wasn't going to feel like going out again. Nathan and I spent a very relaxing evening watching TV and snoozing in the big king-size bed. John came back from the bachelor party (they went to a club in San Francisco) around 2am and we all had a good sleep. The wedding was the next day and we knew we would need to be well-rested.

May 22

After having basically two non-stop days, we had a great night's sleep. We had no commitments or plans for Thursday, so we slept in and then laid in bed with the baby, watching The Astronaut Farmer on HBO (an ok movie; I thought it was bit silly though). Not getting out of bed for a while was great for me. For some reason, I always end up with extremely sore legs the day after a flight. It gave me the opportunity to give them a rest.
Once the bacon and bagels that John had brought back from the continental breakfast had worn off, we decided to find some lunch and something to do for the afternoon. The tourist book in our room mentioned a flea market in San Jose that featured 800 vendors, so we decided to check that out.

We got there around 1pm and quickly found a food vendor. I had a HUGE chili dog. It was very sunny, but very windy and we had trouble keeping Nathan covered from the sun. He was a great sport though. The sun was in his face at point and he began to cry. We were passing by these two hispanic ladies and one said, "Oh, don't cry baby. You'll make my milk come in."! John thought that was a little strange. I guess it is an odd thing to say out loud, but all I could think was that maybe she was having a little time away from her baby and Nathan was about to make her need to run home and nurse.

Nathan being very cute at the flea market.

Because it wasn't a weekend, only about half the vendors were there and most of them consisted of clothes and toys. I was a little disappointed for John - I was hoping he would find something cool and nerdy for himself. I, however, found a $65 pair of jeans for $10. We noticed that the toy vendors had a lot of Disney things.....or so we thought. As we got closer, we realized that the Winnie the Pooh backpack we thought Aiden would like was not Winnie the Pooh. It was "Hunny Bear". And the Finding Nemo fishing game was just "Fish Game". Hmmm....no copyright violations there....

We stayed for a little over an hour and then decided to find a Macy's so we could finally purchase Caleb and Candy's wedding gift. We headed towards Palo Alto for the Stanford Shopping Center. As we were leaving San Jose, John noticed a McDonalds and made a very quick U-Turn. You see, we both became slightly addicted to their new Sweet Tea. We hadn't seen it advertised here in Oregon, so we when got down to California, we had to try it out. It's a little too good.

Anyway, we got to the Stanford Shopping Center and realized that this was a shopping center geared towards the....let's say, "wallet heavy". The stores consisted of Cartier, Tiffany's, Burberry, Coach, Armani, BCBG, Godiva, Louis Vuitton....you get the idea. We had a lot of fun browsing and even had a security guard following us around while browsing in Cartier! We bought Candy and Caleb's gift (a very nice stainless steel microwave), had some pastries at La Baguette, and then loaded up on chocolates at See's Candies. We also bought Aiden and Nathan matching Stanford t-shirts (I'll post some photos of them together soon).

We finally decided to head back to the hotel. Caleb and Candy had some obligations that evening, so they weren't able to meet up with us. So we grabbed some Subway for dinner and then spent the rest of the evening lounging around, watching more TV. It was nice to have a slow day. The remainder of the trip would prove to be very full.