Note from The Ashley: Yes, this is a recap of last week’s episode of ‘Sister Wives.’ It is late but The Ashley had to post it because the sister wives did that horrific disco skit that was too ridiculous not to recap! 

 

Settle in with a big plate of street tacos and put on some disco music because… it’s Sister Wives time!

As we know, Brown Family daughter Mykelti is currently planning The Wedding of the Century with her mooch-of-a-fiancé, Tony. This week, we have taken a break from watching Mykelti and Tony become arguably the two worst people on this show (and that’s saying a lot considering the show also stars Kody and Mariah) to focus on someone else in the family for a change: married Brown daughter Maddie and her husband, Caleb.

On the last episode, Maddie and Caleb revealed to Kody and Janelle that they are expecting a baby. Kody reacted predictably to being told he was going to be a first-time grandpa: he made sure everyone knew he was too young for that, and then vowed to “one-up” his daughter by forcing Robyn, the only wife that doesn’t despise him yet, into having another kid.

It’s been a little while since Maddie told her parents the big news, and now she’s ready to reveal the secret to the whole family. The entire clan has gathered at Janelle’s house because Maddie and Caleb are down from Montana to celebrate Maddie’s 21^st birthday.

Well…almost the entire clan. Meri is noticeably absent from the festivities. Apparently, she’s taken to hawking leggings online in her spare time (as you do) and is away on “business” at some sort of leggings convention…or something.  (So, basically, Meri is trying to get her groove back by going into business selling stretchy pants. You make that money girl, and you buy that bed and breakfast! You don’t need no man!)

The family is all gathered in the living room so Kody decides this is a great time to give Maddie her birthday gift, so he can collect the full amount of praise and attention for his gift selection. He has purchased Maddie and Caleb matching watches that each have the entire New Testament of the Bible written in microscopic print on the back. He’s sitting there, looking like The Godfather, as everyone praises him for buying such a thoughtful gift.

(To be honest, everyone probably just expected him to gift his daughter a framed portrait of himself for her birthday, so this is a real step up.)

Kody uses the opportunity to explain to us how he doesn’t care if his children follow a different religion than he does.

“Even though Madison believes in the Book of Mormon, she has embraced Caleb’s faith which is evangelical Christian,” Kody tells us. “The choice of who you marry is more important to you than the religion in which you choose to live.”

Meri, Janelle, Christine and Robyn: you have failed miserably at this. Sorry.

“We always wanted our children to have a relationship through Jesus Christ with God and that is regardless of what religion they chose,” Kody says.

Finally it’s time for the big reveal. Caleb tells everyone it’s time for him to give Maddie her present from him. Everyone excitedly watches to see what Caleb has gifted his young wife, but Maddie surprises everyone by unzipping her fashionable gray hoodie and revealing a “baby on board” sign that’s been pinned on her stomach.

The whole family is ecstatic. Everyone is screaming and hugging and crying; everyone except Mykelti and Tony. They are both sitting there like two moochy lumps on a log, with sour faces. You can almost see that Mykelti is doing her best to not roll her eyes while the camera is on her. They are both clearly upset that Maddie has dared to conceive a child during the planning of The Wedding of the Century!

(I wouldn’t be surprised if Mykelti orders up a life-sized piñata that looks like Caleb, just to take her anger out on it. After all, it’s Caleb’s fault for not keeping it in his camouflaged pants for a few more months! Now Maddie will get extra attention as the baby-bumping bridesmaid!)

But Maddie and Caleb are not done delivering big news. They then tell the family that are moving back home after Mykelti’s wedding because they “want to be closer to family.” That is, of course, code for “we’re freaking broke and need to live in Las Vegas so we can star on ‘Sister Wives’ and make that TLC paycheck!”

Maddie tells us that they are really excited to be moving from their house in Montana to a single room in Janelle’s house.

“Because we have to finish school and the baby is due in May and we would love for the baby to be around family,” Caleb adds.

Little do Caleb and Maddie know, though, that Kody has been thinking about moving the family back to Utah. Kody and Robyn really want to eventually move back to Utah, but Christine is adamantly against it.

“When we moved to the state of Nevada, we sued the state of Utah,” Kody explains. “We won in federal court but our lawsuit is currently in the court of appeals. So, we are not ready to move back to Utah but we hope someday we can.”

Janelle agrees with Robyn (for once) and thinks they should move back to Utah so they can once again be in a land that accepts the “four wives for every man, no matter how obnoxious he is” mentality.

Christine, however, flat-out refuses to ever move back to Utah, a state she says has terrorized her and her family her entire life.

“Too many people in Utah have a problem with plural marriage,” Christine says. “I’m done, I’m not going to move back there.”

It’s interesting that Christine, the only adult that was raised in a prominent plural family (her grandfather was the founder of their church) is the one who is against moving back to Utah. How will that work if Christine chooses to stay in the Vegas Cul-de-sac of Broken Dreams, while Robyn, Kody and Janelle all move back to Utah. (By that time, of course, Meri will be jet-setting the world, bringing leggings to the masses, so she’s a non-issue.)

Since we’ve spent enough time focusing on someone else in the family, it’s time to shift the episode back to Mykelti’s wedding. We start out with Christine about to take scissors to her wedding dress and hack it into pieces to make it into flowers for Mykelti’s wedding.

She’s very emotional about the entire thing. She is all choked up as she tries the dress on “one last time.” If only she didn’t have to chop up her own wedding dress to make decorations for her daughter’s wedding.

Oh, wait….

Christine emerges in her wedding dress and, to be honest, it looks like a white sateen nightmare. She’s swimming in this monstrous roll of white, shiny sheet-like material and admiring herself in the mirror. We find ourselves rationalizing that, “Hey, it’s her wedding dress; if that’s what she wanted, then who cares what we think?” only to find out that both Christine and Kody hated the dress, too.

Kody walks in and says, “What are you doing in that really loose dress? Did you fit that when we were married? You’re so tiny now. You look better.”

It’s one of the only times we hear Kody deliver a sincere compliment to one of his wives.

Christine regales us with the romantical tale of the days before her wedding to Kody. They said they were friends for three years before they got married.

“Christine flirted a lot with me and I fell for it,” Kody said.

They were engaged for one month before getting hitched. Apparently, Kody agreed to marry Christine and then high-tailed it to another state to be with his other two wives. The “happy couple” hadn’t seen each other for a long time when they reunited to get married. Christine’s mom made her horrible dress and she didn’t even have time to try the “gown” on so it didn’t even fit her correctly.

Kody even admits that he was not into it at all on the day he married Christine. While that’s somewhat depressing, Kody and Christine actually have a really sweet moment while talking about their sad wedding day. Kody apologizes to his wife, and they have a loving little conversation. (Does anyone think that, of all the wives, Christine is by far the best suited for Kody, personality-wise. They are both so extra.)

“Our wedding day was a little bit sad,” Christine said. “We just did not make a big deal out of any it.”

Anyway, Christine finally takes off the dress, grabs a pair of scissors and cuts pieces of lace off her dress to make flowers for Mykelti’s bouquet. So, to review: poor Christine has to pay for Mykelti’s ridiculous wedding demands, is being forced to sing in front of 400 wedding guests and had to cut up the one memento she has from her wedding day in order to please her daughter. WTF?

In order to get back at Mykelti, Christine has decided that she and the other three sister wives will be performing a 1970s-themed, choreographed dance routine at Mykelti’s bridal shower. (I mean, other than it being an act of revenge, what possibly explanation could there be for this?)

It’s going to be terrible. They’re going to wear cheap ‘70s garb and dance to “I Will Survive.” Even Janelle has agreed to be a part of this s**tshow because she feels bad that she told Mykelti the truth at first and stated that marrying Tony was a horrible idea.

The sister wives gather at Christine’s house to practice their dance moves before the big performance. Christine is sashaying around the house like Abby Lee Miller, directing her sister wives as they pathetically attempt to perform Christine’s choreographed horrorfest.

They dig through a pile of wigs, costumes and accessories to find stuff to wear that will hide their identities sufficiently.

The next night, Garrison is returning after four months of military training. Kody and the family are having a barbecue at Janelle’s house in his honor. Garrison returns and everyone is so excited to see him…except Meri, who is once again absent. She tells us that she was actually at home but she “missed the memo” that Garrison was returning early and didn’t go over to Janelle’s house for the celebration.

Sure, Jan.

Garrison tells us he plans to go to college while being in the National Guard and then try and join the Army as an officer. He also says that he is not interested in living plural marriage.

Later, Janelle is renovating her house to make room for baby (and Maddie and Caleb). Naturally, Kody can’t keep his nose out of anything, so he hightails it to Janelle’s place to order the “background kids” to move the furniture around to his liking.

Janelle tells us that Maddie and Caleb can live with her so “they can get back on their feet.”

Um…why are they having a baby when they aren’t even “on their feet?” Just sayin’…

Maddie and Caleb aren’t planning to just stay a few months and be on their way, though. They tell us they will be living at Janelle’s place until they finish college. Of course, Janelle still has plenty of kids living at home, so there’s not a ton of space for the newlyweds, but she’s trying to make it work. She is planning on using her game room as a studio apartment for Maddie, Caleb and the baby. Naturally, that’s not good enough for Kody, who feels that the best solution is just to start plowing down Janelle’s walls so that Maddie & Co. have the amount of space “a married couple should have.”

You know another way a married couple can get the space “they should have?” By living on their own!

Janelle reminds Kody that starting major construction on her house is not feasible and not happening. Kody then demands that Janelle take away Hunter’s room since he is away in the military, but Janelle puts her foot down and says absolutely not. She says Hunter is sensitive about things like that, so finding out that he now lives in a tent in the backyard because his knocked-up sister and her husband are now inhabiting his room is a no-go.

Kody is disgruntled, and starts wandering the halls grumbling about how he never gets his way.

No fair!

Finally, it’s time for Mykelti (and Tony’s) bridal shower. In case you hadn’t heard, Tony is Mexican, so they’ve decided to make Mexican hot chocolate for the bridal shower.

“It smells awful,” Christine says as she stirs a bubbling pot of creepy looking brown water.

Maid of honor Aspyn planned the bridal shower and she’s very stressed out. Christine decides the best way to help her daughter is to just run around the room screaming. Oh, and they pipe in some stereotypical Mexican mariachi music to play while Christine is running amok because, in case you hadn’t heard, Tony is Mexican!

The bridal shower guests begin to arrive and all of the bridesmaids give Mykelti their favorite love story. One of the bridesmaids gave Mykelti the book 50 Shades of Grey.

Christine, that naughty little minx, tells us that she’s familiar with the book.

“Everyone should read it. It’s a notable read,” Christine says.

Tony’s mom and assorted female relatives are in attendance at the shower. They are all huddled into one corner, smiling politely and most likely chatting in Spanish about how crazy these white people are. Well, amigas, you ain’t seen nothing yet!

With that, it’s time for the moms to do their 1970s dance routine. No one seems to know it’s coming, so the shower guests are all just chatting and enjoying their food and hardly notice that the sister wives have all slipped out of the room.

The music starts playing and everyone looks startled. (The guests who have attended other special events with the family most likely know what’s coming and have their phones ready to record whatever musical theater nightmare is about to happen. People on YouTube love that kind of crap, after all!)

Christine takes center stage (because she’s pulling the “bio mom” card, she tells us), and the other sister wives filter behind her wearing ridiculous costumes and wigs. Janelle looks like she’d rather have another six kids with Kody than be there, but she’s trying.

The sister wives hustle, disco duck and funky chicken themselves across the kitchen floor while Mykelti first looks disturbed, then laughs (it’s best if she just accepts her fate). The other guests seem to be enjoying the dance, while Tony’s family looks unsure of what’s happening. They are probably wondering what was slipped into that Mexican hot chocolate to make the white women do something like this.

Mercifully, the dance ends, but the embarrassing moments just keep on coming! They start opening presents and Mykelti is gifted lingerie by her future mother-in-law and other in-laws. It’s awkward.

“Tony’s Hispanic side of the family, all of them gave me lingerie,” Mykelti says.

The sister wives are all shocked that Tony’s family bought thongs and lacey negligees for Mykelti. (Just the fact that we had to see a thong that could potentially contain any part of Mykelti’s nether regions is enough to make me wanna throw up my Mexican hot chocolate, but it is what it is…)

“Do you think it’s cultural?” Meri asks.

Yes, Meri. All Mexican people purchase undergarments as presents, regardless of what the occasion is.

Janelle realizes that a lot of people (who aren’t even Mexican!) buy lingerie as bridal shower gifts.

“I think we’re just prudes,” Janelle replies.

The bridal shower is finally over, but, down the street, the hills are alive with the sound of Christine screeching a song out.

She is practicing for Mykelti’s wedding and, despite the fact that she tells us she’s had ten singing lessons,  she’s really, really terrible. To put it in perspective: if she were to audition for American Idol with that song, she would for sure make the blooper reel. She would legit become the next William Hung if she were to sing “She Bangs” for the crowd.

Anyway, Christine’s singing coach is a lying witch. She tells Christine that she’s so good and that she’s improved so much. In actuality, though, I think Christine actually got worse since she began the singing lessons, if that’s even possible.

At the end of the episode, all the adults come over to Christine’s house to look at the life-size bride and groom piñatas that Mykelti and Tony demanded.

Kody says that demanding giant piñatas that most likely cost several hundred dollars is part of Tony’s culture. (In case you hadn’t heard, Tony is Mexican!)

“Tony has a real emotional connection to cake and a piñata,” Kody says as if that explains it. He tells us that Tony can’t celebrate anything without beating on some paper mache and snarfing down a cake buffet.

Christine also tells us that they are incorporating Frisbees into the wedding ceremony because the couple met playing Ultimate Frisbee. As Tony and Mykelti leave the ceremony, the whole audience is going to throw Frisbees over them. Hopefully one smacks Tony in the face.

Until next time, kids!

To read our recap of the previous episode of ‘Sister Wives,’ click here!