Sister Wives Recap: Flower Power

Surely these Sister Wives paychecks cannot be enough to justify Meri Brown to stick around and mooch money out of her family to purchase a second home for her mother. She just needs to put her house on the market, file for divorce (oh, wait, done!), and move with her mom to BFE Utah to buy her family’s former homestead. Clearly, her bed and breakfast plans were extremely short lived. And what about Christine’s mom? Unlike Meri’s mom, Christine’s mother was willing to run the house in question as a bed and breakfast. Meri is over the moon that her mom wants to move into the home, and, even better, Meri doesn’t have to learn how to run a business of which she has zero knowledge. It’s a win/win…for Meri. This is a wet bar scenario on a much larger scale!

Once again, Meri summons Kody and the wives to her corner of the cul-de-sac, and once again, Robyn, Janelle, and Christine are unsure as to what to expect. Meri announces that her mother wants to move into the house, and Christine is thrilled. Her mom and Meri’s mom could run the bed and breakfast together. Meri then shares that her mom wants to move in and not run the business. Wait, what? Janelle is confused. Meri expects the family to chip in on the house and not make any profit off of it? Yeah, that makes Meri a tad nervous. It’s an expensive undertaking not to make any money. You think?

Meri justifies that if they buy the home without the bed and breakfast furnishings, it would be a tad cheaper. Christine declares Meri’s latest idea as dumb. If she wants a second home for her mother, can’t she find something a bit smaller? Kody is curious about how Meri plans to finance this endeavor. They throw around the terms “direct marketing scheme” and “social retail business” instead of pyramid schemes crazy leggings. Meri is doing well hocking the crazy patterns, but she isn’t keen on financing it on her own.

Kody suggests Meri buy the lot across the street from the proposed bed and breakfast site, but that defeats the purpose of Meri getting her grandmother’s house back in the family. Janelle is still baffled by what Meri hopes to gain from this meeting. Is she expecting them to foot the bill for her mother’s new house? Christine tells Meri that she should inform her mother the only way she can move in is if they still run the bed and breakfast for profit.

Robyn, ever Meri’s cheerleader, encourages Meri to keep working hard lulaselling the fabric of our lives so she can afford the place. While Meri is grateful for Robyn’s choice of words, she also appreciates Christine‘s brutal honesty. She claims to understand her family’s hesitation to finance something that will be solely her own… especially a home purchase. As the family exits in exasperation, Meri heads over to that wonderful wet bar to drown her sorrows. Okay, so she didn’t, but how awesome if that actually happened?

Meri invites Kody to take a day trip with her to see the house. Her sister wives have seen it, but her husband has not. Kody laughs -does he want Meri to have him pretend to support her? He knows she wants him to reinforce her vision, but he warns her it could have the adverse affect. Y’all know Kody is dreading this road trip. When Meri gets teary, Kody caves.

It’s a big win for Meri as it gives her a glimmer of hope for their struggling relationship. Kody wonders what the big deal is – it’s not like they are even trying to work on their relationship. He likens their situation to being a divorced couple who lives on the same block. Ding, ding, ding! That’s exactly what you are, Kody! He believes that the pair is bound by a lot of things, but love isn’t really one of them at this point. He hopes they can squeeze in a session with their therapist before this nightmare of a bonding experience. He doesn’t feel safe with his emotions. Give. Me. A. Break. Kody has been trading up on Meri for decades now, but he’s the one who feels vulnerable. Sheesh.

Because Meri’s downward spiral isn’t awkward enough to watch, we need to drag out some of Tony and Mykelti’s train wreck of a wedding. Christine is in a special sort of tizzy, and Robyn and Janelle feel special that the couple has involved all of the family in the wedding. Janelle muses that in most plural families, all the non-bio parents are just additional guests. Meri nods half-heartedly. Lady, if you’re going to show up to these sofa sessions, at least pretend to make an effort. You’re trying to get these people to help you buy a home in which they will have no ownership. Read your audience!

As Christine runs around in hurricane of wedding preparation, she takes a few minutes to opine on daughter Ysabel’s aggressive scoliosis, which is getting worse despite wearing a nightly back brace. This season can’t be solely about Meri’s escape or Tony’s Jedi mouth-mumbling mind control of Mykelti, now can it? Poor Ysabel now has to wear a day time brace, and she sobs talking about it – not just does it inhibit her ability to do things, but it is physically painful. It’s heartbreaking to watch her breakdown, and it’s even sadder when she discusses how she knows other people are dealing with harder issues. Christine hopes the day time brace will help so Ysabel can avoid spinal surgery.

In St. George, Christine, Aspyn, and the ladies in Tony’s family gather together for pre-wedding manicures. Not shockingly, Mykelti is as high-maintenance as ever, even when it comes to gel nails. As Christine brags about her growing Spanish vocabulary (“Donde esta el bano?”), Mykelti shares that Tony is more stressed out than she is.

Aspyn admits to possibly instigating an argument between the happy couple, and her sister shoots daggers at her. The fight stemmed from this ridiculous months long homemade petals project on which Aspyn tried to enlist Tony’s help. Christine laughs, stating that she and Kody had the same tiff over Mykelti‘s damn labor intensive fake flowers. Kody didn’t want to assist in making them either. Christine asserts that Kody loves to bicker as long as it doesn’t lead to any in depth conversations. Robyn counters that she often forces Kody to have uncomfortable, deep discussions. Christine is confused as to Robyn’s tactics, and Kody and Janelle joke that they have mastered the art of avoidance when it comes to their issues. Par for the course, Meri remains silent.

Christine is extremely nervous about singing at the wedding, and its sweet to see Janelle being so complimentary and supportive. Christine isn’t worried about messing up in front of her daughter, she’s concerned about looking foolish in front of the four hundred strangers her daughter and Tony have invited to this shindig. She is having one last rehearsal with the guitarist, and the actual performance is going to be epic. The guitarist can’t seem to get the correct key…according to Christine. She double talks about how talented he is but how she is not used to singing with a guitar – even though she wanted the guitar. Christine’s goal is to make Mykelti cry. I wish her goal wasn’t to crack my television screen with the high notes.

When they first talked about the handmade flowers, I didn’t get the gist. Mykelti has created (with the help of her poor mother and sister) every bridesmaids bouquet, every corsage, every boutonniere, every centerpiece out of roughly seven thousand hand sewn fabric petals. She hopes the pieces will be keepsakes forever. Aspyn can appreciate the sentiment but after spending the last three months of her life sewing these damn petals, she will likely be chucking her bouquet into the nearest trash can post-wedding. Christine can’t wait to gift Mykelti with the flowers she made from her wedding dress – they will serve as the the “something borrowed” tradition.

Mykelti‘s apartment is cramped with her family and friends as Tony and Kody attempt to fill up the bride and groom pinatas with candy. Most of the wives are still wary of the whole pinata idea. In this age of domestic violence, Kody feels it would be classier if they pair let the young kids hit the pinatas. There is just something weird about Tony beating the crap out of a pinata that is supposed to represent his wife. You think? After the pinatas have been filled, Christine gifts Mykelti with the wedding dress flowers and gives Tony his Irish wedding ring. Both are touched.

Before the big day, Kody and Christine along with Tony’s parents head to pawn shop Chris‘ house to go over the service and Chris’ wedding sermon. Chris explains that he got absolutely no direction from the bride and groom. He was just told to do something fun and outside of the box. Kody has an air of even more bravado that normal which is likely caused by the fact his daughter didn’t ask him to perform the service. As the grown-ups gripe about the rainy, cold wedding (outdoors in December…go figure), Chris segues into incorporating a frisbee since Tony and Mykelti met playing ultimate frisbee. Tony is desperately trying to hold his tongue. He finds the theme to be incredibly trite. Don’t they know marriage is serious? Christine unpacks the box of four hundred mini frisbees decorated with sentiments of love and pants wearing. Tony’s parents smile and nod about the entire situation. They know they have zero say at this point…the frisbees are already in play (literally).

To help fill up this ridiculous two-hour time slot, we’re treated to Robyn waxing poetic about the happy couple and trying to wrangle her sick kids with the help of her cousin/nanny and sister. The ladies worry about the dreary weather, and it is stressing out Robyn to the max. Her children have coughs, and she doesn’t want them exposed to the elements, but, of course, she doesn’t want to take away from Mykelti’s big day by putting the focus on her. Sure she doesn’t.

In Utah, Mykelti and Tony are cutting out paper hearts for the guests to throw in the air as they walk back down the aisle. Christine feels sneaky knowing those hearts will never see the inside of a tacky basket thanks to her frisbees. There is some teasing about the couple connecting, and Christine warns that any physical connecting needs to wait until the wedding night. Ew. Tony busts in to impart his advice about sexuality before bursting into tears. It is a huge big ball of creepy. Tony takes Kody’s advice to heart – he must be infinitely wise having done this four times already. Tony so wants to have more than one wife. Kody urges them to focus on each other, but Robyn emphasizes that she tried not to focus on Kody on their big day. She wanted to focus on everyone so as not to step on anyone’s toes. We get it Robyn, you’re better than your counterparts. As the family freaks about the weather, Mykelti tunes them out entirely. Rain, sleet, snow, hail, it’s her day and it will be outside. Get over it people.

The rain subsides in time for the rehearsal, but it is incredibly windy. No one can hear the instructions from a screeching Mykelti and that poor wedding planner as Truely gets blown across the reception space. Tony forgot to tell a few of his brosman to attend, so corralling the crew is even more difficult. I am the epitome of “always the bridesmaid, never the bride” having walking in roughly fifteen weddings, and I have never seen such a cluster. Mykelti is a drill sergeant, but she’s herding feral cats at best. The group is able to get through the rehearsal with minimal windburn. Mykelti is glad to have waited until December because it has allowed all of her siblings to be able to attend. Christine is tending to some last minute details.

That evening, the wedding party and their families head to the bowling alley. Madison is showing a great deal for only being three months along, and Caleb interrupts her conversation with Logan’s girlfriend to kiss his wife’s belly. The wives chat about how surreal it is to be grandmothers, but Meri hasn’t opened her mouth since the cringe worthy first ten minutes of this episode. That was a long two hours, y’all.

TELL US – WHAT DID YOU THINK OF LAST NIGHT’S EPISODE? ARE THE FLOWERS OR THE FRISBEES A BIGGER WEDDING FAIL?

[Photo Credit: TLC]

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