Last Friday we left Chicago and started our progression to Valencia.

We left Chicago the last Friday in March and headed to Los Angeles for our nephew’s wedding. He and his now wife live in Chino Hills, but we decided to fly in and out of LAX because we preferred a direct flight and wanted to pick up and drop off our rental at the same location. The flight from Chicago was absolutely uneventful and after picking up our bags, we made our way to the car rental company and grabbed a way too large SUV. I am not sure what I was thinking when I booked it, but it was HUGE!

When we planned the trip we check the time to drive to Chino Hills and it looked to be about an hour. We checked again when we got off the plane and it was up to 1.5hours; by the time we got our bags it was 2 hours and when we got the car it had reached 2.5 hours – in the end it took nearly 3 hours to cover the 50 or so miles to our hotel. Ugh. Oh well.

Once we checked in, we had a quick rest then met up with our extended family. Our granddaughter and her parents (of course) were there and so were my mother, my daughter, brother, sister, cousin and various nieces and nephews. I always enjoy seeing my family, especially for such a joyous occasion. We headed to a very nice Indian restaurant for dinner. The dietary restrictions of our crew making finding a restaurant challenging. We have vegans, vegetarians, lactose free, gluten intolerants, nightshade allergies and carnivores (ME!). Indian food always is a good choice for our crazy crew.

The wedding was scheduled to start at 4 p.m. on Saturday afternoon in Temecula. The bride and groom arranged for a bus to take us from the hotel to the wedding and back. It is an hour drive Chino Hills to Temecula – except when you want to do it. The bus was scheduled to depart at 2:30, but they moved it up to 2:15, and we arrived at 4:00! I could not live in Southern California. Way too much time spent driving.

The wedding was wonderful. My mother officiated at the wedding (note to self – it is NOT appropriate to say my mom married her grandchild – and his wife) and the bride and groom both looked gorgeous and incredibly happy. The service was outside facing west in a vineyard. Just perfect. Sue spent the entire evening dancing, and I went along until I could find a graceful(?) way to retire.

At the end of a great evening the bus took us back to the hotel and we crashed.

Our flight out left in the early afternoon but given the time it took to drive from the airport and the warnings of huge TSA lines and needing to take a bus from the car rental place, we left an extra couple of hours to make sure that we didn’t miss our flight to Mexico City. As you expect, there was no traffic, dropping the car off was quick, we had no wait for the bus, and there was literally no line to drop our bags nor at the TSA. Soooo…. we had a few hours to kill before our AeroMexico flight took off.

All in all. A great weekend. It is so much fun when the entire family gets together, and I hope we will do it again soon for another joyous occasion.  Yes, young ones – I am looking at you – you know who you are.