Venue

Picking the venue is a tough job. There are lots of questions to be considered. DO we want a hotel or restaurant? Do we have lunch or dinner? Does the place have a room in the correct size? What food do we want (Chinese vs. international)? What about drinks? Does the hotel offer a room for the night? Is the cake included? Is there a trial dinner, if so for how many people? What about decoration and flower arrangements? ....

Here are some venues that made it into the final round:

Grand Copthorne Waterfront
Hyatt
Four Seasons


All look nice and offer about the service we are looking for. Next we have to go and look at the places ourselves.

ROM date :)

:D hooray!

24th december :) a wonderful christmas gift, as Dan says :)

i wonder who shall be our witnesses? at least mum /dad will be one of mine. They say so it wouldnt' seem like a runaway wedding hahaa :)
funny

:D

ROM

some stuff for our registry

:) prices

• weekday: 128

• weekend and PH: 198

• popular dates: 298!!! what a jump!! (that includes all the double dates, 8th lunar month 15th etc)

filing dates starts from 3 months ahead :)

and for witnesses: anyone above 21. :) so all those who wanna have a chance of a lifetime to do this meaningful event :P please contact me!! :)

wedding packages part 2

after a long search. my final decision has come to use the professional photographers.

:) quality of photos was our main deciding factor, after all this is the only one that would stick with us forever. And mind you, people do remember wedding photos :) (and the food too)

Jacky Studios which by mere coincidence moved over to my neighborhood (that giving it an extra brownie point for being fuel-friendly) provided what I deemed to be a package that most suited my needs.

It was quoted to be 2988 (plus additional charges only for new gowns)

this has the album + 5 gowns +makeup and stuff plus the actual day gowns and coat. This suited our needs as we did not plan to have the car and all those additional stuff.

the photos are simple but stunning.. he is a pro for a good reason :)

here is a list of ideas we kinda want for our photo album

1) nature :) those that can't be found in singapore
2) classic - cafes, wine galleries (sepia tone)
3) the court house
4) silhouette

some wedding photos we found on flikr :)

wedding shopping part 1

After noting that i had only one week left in Kuching, I decided to finally go shopping for bridal packages here with Christina. She was of great help besides driving me around :) THANKS CHRISTINA

only managed to visit 3 places before both of us got too tired.. yes it was the whole afternoon from noon till 6pm. averaged 2 hours per place including travelling time (which was minimal).

we weren't too familiar with the places in kuching too so only sought those that were close to my place and were the bigger names in this industry

here's our report :)
hoice between
1) France and Taipei
rm 2999 (total after adding the extras: RM 3500 or so)

includes wedding day
- wedding gown
- evening gown
- coat
- bouquet for bride
- accessories for car
- mornign and dinner make up
- bride maid and best man attire

Extras:
- DVD 2 songs
-table top photos
- special landscape crystal frame
-
Album:
the usual prints + 2 framed options

Photo shoot:
3 wedding gown
2 evening gown
2 traditional gowns (i thought dressing up as a princess from the old China kingdom was cute )

men's matching coats
make up-hairstyle

indoor or outdoor scenary

But for the gowns i picked some so-called Designer gowns (definitely nicer) I had to pay Rm500 extra for the additional 2 gowns. They don't charge for so called Brand new gowns where i'm the FIRST wearer.

Rental of gowns (if i decide not to have the photography done here): 400 and above per gown make up is 100 plus


2) Prince Vogue
RM 2988 (around RM 3500-3600 or even more because of the gowns)

Wedding day is same as above EXCEPT no free DVD Table top, Crystal frame and no Bride's maid or best man attire

Album was about the same they did not allow me to take the brochure out :( so as far as i remember it was around the same except they have 24 poses so more poses than the previous

Photo shoot:
this one has one less gown than previous. the rest are the same

indoor and outdoor shoots

Extra: eyelashes extensions RM 18 per set of lash

They also charge for new gowns /VIP or Designer gowns. Designer gowns are 250-300 per gown and new gowns are additional charge of 200 or so too.

But after some discussion they offered to give me 1 free VIP gown and if we only choose indoor photos they throw in another gown.

Out of the gowns i have seen, the VIP ones are nice.. which is a problem because the VIP package is like 3988!!

Rental of gowns w/o package: Rm 1000 and above, make up is RM 100,matching coat is RM 80, Brides maid 180, best man is RM 80
------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Our verdict

1) France and Taipei
Service: 4
Photography: 3 (not as good)
Gown choices: 4 and better value for money

The sales person here, a guy was much nicer. He did not push us into signing the packages and offered some flexibility to bring our gowns to singapore. This would be a plus as I would not have to find a gown in singapore

2) Prince Vogue
service: 4
photography: 4.5 very nice
gown choices: 4 however it is very expensive. unless we get the VIP package where i have access to all the nicer gowns.

must say that this particular shop seemed very experienced in selling their products. The moment we got it, they swarmed upon us (all had matching blazers and shirts). They were very professional in terms of explaining the packages and helped with choosing the gowns for me which saved me alot of trouble. However, they were very PUSHY. had to try to wriggle my way out of signing for the package without prior consultation with my mum and Daniel. They kept using the excuse that the prices are on a hike and I only had 3 days to decide.

Noted that I did not write about the last shop because comparing all these 3, the last one had been eliminated from my choices. They had nice staff but minimal gown choices and their photography was exceptionally lousy.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------

next.. to singapore?

The knot website

hello i'm back :) and i've finally looked into this webbie.
Firstly you have to sign up like any other website , which is a bit of a hassle but I suppose that's the catch if you need a personalized account

here's a screen shot of the budget tool. This webbie offers things from checklists, budget planners, offers for wedding gowns/locations/e vouchers
however it's a US site!! so obviously the gowns etc aren't of much help.

but for a rookie like me, the online checklist and budget planner is such a great help to start.

and GUESS What, they have a free website for online RSVP, invites and such with a personalized webpage address!


:) the online notebook is a big plus, coz you can save all ur online inspirations ie dresses, floral, decos w/o having to keep printing it out and keeping it on a scrap book (think: green!)

ok that's all for now. will try to allocate at least 15 mins a day to look at this website and start the real planning.

for those who have any ideas/contributions, please let us know! esp if you know of any wedding fairs etc going on so we can go attend :)

E wedding plan

oh my gosh.

its really less than a year.. :)

but there are tons of stuff to do!! where to start?!!

1) date.. yes this is the biggest headache.. due to traditional chinese customs and some how my parents are procrastinating it :(.
- so plan is to go back and get a temple to help or ask god ma

2) venue - when teh date is settled. Lunch has been decided

3) ROM - looks like we can only book it 3 months prior so the mad rush would be in jan.. oh Dan, it'll be ur call.. i'll be stuck with my head between the books

4) and thanks to GOOGLE, there's this nice webbie that has been recommended by many

gives you a check list on what to do prior to the wedding.. a wedding planner :) http://theknot.com/?MsdVisit=1

not sure how relevant it would be but, can't be too bad :)

ok then.. ARGHGGHG talk about being stressed..