Tyler and Lei's Wedding

So, my little bro got married! He and his wonderful wife, Lei, got married on a beach in California with just a small family gathering to witness it. It was the most touching wedding I have ever been to.

But, before I get ahead of myself, lets go with the pictures, eh?

Friday night before the wedding we got to experience a special version of a Chinese Tea Ceremony.

This is a tradition in which the bride and groom serve tea to each of their elders in thanks for all their help in getting to where they are: ready to embark on their own life adventure as a husband/wife.

So, Tyler and Lei served tea/hot water to all of their elders, starting with her parents.

As you can see, this was hardly a "solemn" ceremony, but full of fun and laughter.

After serving her family, Tyler and Lei got in their "train car" and headed to serve the other family (who were all in the same room). So cute!

Lei's sister, Wei, was her bridesmaid, and helped with the preparing and serving of the tea.

Now the groom's family!

Lei's darling mother was also helping with the tea serving :)

We each had out turn at being served. 

(these didn't make it into black and white, but I'll include them anyways!)

More evidence that this was a rather... informal event :)

After serving to all their elders, each of us having a turn to present them with a red envelope of gifts and well-wishes, it was their turn to present a gift to the un-married and younger siblings... or in this case, Anna!

Handing her the envelope seemed... uneventful, so they topped it off with a bow

and a hug :)

Also floating around over the weekend was Tyler's wizard hat, because it makes everything an adventure!

Dad decided he was up for some adventure :)

Lei's mom also made this amazing quilt of pictures of Tyler and Lei from infancy to present day.

So well done!

She even left a bunch of white spaces for us all to sign our congratualtions and well wishes.

Here's Jeremy doing just that!

The next morning was pretty low-key. They just had everyone gather at a beach house they had rented for the weekend to house all of us (since we were all from out of town and the beach they chose to get married on was 2 hours from their place).

They didn't even want a cake! Luckily, Lauren made them one anyways- and it was a perfect fit for the two of them and their epic wedding :)

(Yes, that is a brain! And it is fitting because they work together as neuro-scientists, hehe)

Lei was a simply stunning bride!

When Tyler came up the stairs and saw her for the first time that day they both shed a few tears of joy. So fun to see them so in love.

We headed down to the beach, and somehow at noon on a beautiful, sunny Saturday- had the entire beach to ourselves as far as we could see!

We set up an impromptu aisle made of our flip flops, which worked rather well!

Here are a few more of my shots from the wedding:

(note: Grandpa was the grandmaster of ceremonies, if you will, and did a GREAT job - despite being super nervous about it)

Tyler and Lei had written their own vows and read them to each other.

It was truly beautiful and I felt priviledged to be a part of this touching exchange of love and devotion between them. They both had such obvious adoration of each other, and had a hard time getting through what they had written without tears.

This is all of us (bedsides the bride and groom, who were doing their couples portraits on the beach and Jeremy, who is taking the picture!)

Ard sibbling picture!

And with Mom and Dad

Lei's mom made these special bottomless sandals for us to wear on the beach- so pretty!

Had to snap one of Jason and Lauren! 

So good to see them :)

These boys have quite a history behind them, and it was cool to see them share this day as friends and brothers (in law).

After the ceremony and some quick pictures, we went back to the beach house for lunch.

Here's Tyler dishing up some wine with a handsome "I just got married" wink. 

Lunch was absolutely amazing! 

Beast meat, salmon, asparagus, potatoes, salad, compliments of Grandma and Grandpa Wainscott.

Tyler and Lei had also prepared a pinata full of super random prizes... including but not limited to a yodeling pickle, a tie dye llama-corn t-shirt, Bean Boozled jelly beans, mustaches, a super tiny harmonica, and finger puppets.

Note: the blindfold is the wizard hat!

Play it Grandma!

The finger puppets made for some great thumb wars :)

Ma'dame... you are growing a mustache!

The wizard hat continued to circulate, bringing adventure all along the way.

Anna made this had look good! And this is the last time I'll see her before she heads off for her own super adventure teaching English in Thailand for the next year!

Then there was the cake cutting.. and inside was (of course) red velvet cake!

As they cut it, Lei was naming all the parts of the brain :)

Sometime during the down time Jeremy, Anna and I snuck out to the dollar store and found a few things to decorate the "escape vehicle" with :)

Jeremy took it upon himself to empty all the root beer cans :)

Anna decorated the entire interior of the car with crepe paper, balloons, a cat and a bat paper figurine, and even a pregnancy test on Lei's seat!

When it came time to depart, we all walked them out to their car.

Good thing, too, because they needed some balloons removed to get in!

And they are off! They are taking a honeymoon to Greece in October, so we actually get to see them one more time before the weekend is over :)

Jason proved himself a friend to the environment and chased down several rogue balloons.

Sunday morning we attended a local Spanish-speaking branch for church, which was super fun. Then, before the wedding hoopla disbanded completely, we got to hang out with everyone at the beach house.

 Over the few days everyone was there Tyler and Lei set up a Vive system as a fun distraction for downtime. This is a virtual game where the person wearing the head gear and earphone wields these nun-chuck-like thingys and plays a game in a 3D virtual environment while everyone watches on a TV screen what they are seeing. We played fruit ninja and some other "hit-the-flying-flaming-balls-coming-at-you" game.

Long story short: totally worth "borrowing" the equipment from Lei's lab!

Sunday afternoon and evening we took some time to enjoy the beach and explore a nearby harbor.

At the harbor they were having a sidewalk art competition, which was super cool.

It was really cool to walk around and see all the ships right on the other side of a busy sidewalk that runs through and outside a large walking mall.

You can also see here that there was an art fair going on in the park center.

What a fun day to be at the harbor!

The sidewalk art was simply amazing!

Here are a couple of my favorites:

I tried to include Jeremy in this one so you could get an idea of the size of each entry.

Early Monday morning we headed back down to LA and flew home!

It was a whirlwind weekend, but we were both super glad we were able to be a part of this special event for both Tyler and Lei. 

Congrats to the newlyweds!!!!