Jocie Lilin

Thursday, February 16, 2017

Wedding Preparation : Errands to complete on eve of Wedding Day

Photo taken on the eve of our wedding day, when i had settled in my bed preparing to rest for the big day. I was too exhausted after running around the whole day that it didn't take me too long to fall asleep. Finally after a year of preparation for the wedding. The planning process was fun though exasperating at times when i couldn't see eye-to-eye with Jeremy on certain issues. More endless heated arguments as the wedding date approach nearer, I guess it would be a more meaningful wedding planning if the overall planning involves two of us instead of me planning and trying to coordinate most of it myself. There are some pros and cons but when one person is heavily involved in the whole planning, it kinda defeat the purpose of having a wedding to celebrate our joy, i will only be filled with anger and resentment. (Excluding the part when i look good in my hairdo/makeup/gown).

I guess it's a good thing that i am still capable enough to make decision. Nearing our wedding day, our first video was not ready yet, i was busy with other stuffs so it took me really the last few days to complete my 1st video for the wedding dinner. Initially I wanted to do a childhood montage, but then as i went on to work on it, i find that childhood montage is too norm, and common mistakes newly wed do was to create a childhood montage that is too lengthy probably because they get too enthusiastic with their cute baby photos but they forgot that guests do lose their focus after awhile because there is nothing interesting besides just showing photos after photos in a video. This is only applicable if you want to save some cost by DIY your own childhood montage, there are many ways to produce a video, some would show their proposal video (provided if the guy has make the effort to plan a beautiful done up proposal) Or, some newlywed choose to play their behind the scenes photo shoot process as their 1st video before march in, some other creative ways could be filming the process when the newly wed learn a new thing together, for eg : taking up a dancing class together for the first time just to perform in front of their guests after the video is played and their 1st march in. But this takes lot of time, effort and commitment for a couple which could be meaningful because it symbolise a couple entering a new phase of their life stage, it's both effort to maintain the marriage just like it takes both to make the performance work.

The list goes on and on, i can get very creative and wild with my ideas but i know this doesn't work on our case. I am willing to try if the groom is enthusiastic enough. But too bad it didn't happen.

I didn't use childhood montage as our 1st video eventually, but i could flash some baby photos of us in this post!

Little Jeremy.

One look and you will know he is super naughty when he was a kid. Haha

My gong face.

That's me at the zoo! Haha

I went to google for some simple, easy to use video editor tool, hoping to find something that would be suitable for our first video before the 1st march in. And i found this, Youvivid! Link here. It cost me less than $50 to purchase the video after editing so that the watermarks can be removed. I manage to complete it days before my wedding like 2-3am in the middle of the night? Haha

This is the video for anyone who didn't manage to attend my wedding, i added those texts and contents + photos and choosing the right song for it. Effort put in for this video.

There were some other outstanding stuffs to do such as confirming the actual day & evening banquet dinner schedule. I think i am already quite amazing to do the entire wedding without a wedding planner, without having the chance to meet up with the brothers to brief them on what to do when it was supposed to be Jeremy's job to do so. He took damm long to get back to me his brother's contact number when i had been asking him to give me, so the meeting up session before our wedding between our brothers and sisters did not happen at all.

If you compare a team vs a single person. A team functions better compared to a person doing most of the work.Thus despite having some screw up on the actual day wedding, i think i still did a pretty good job. Miscommunication and poor planning on groom side that screwed up our wedding, though I admit i do overlook some of the stuffs to do because i was too busy but during the last few days, i realised i was beginning to care less. sometimes when there are more people helping out, they might point out to your things you might have missed out and you can look through again and do further check before the damage, but unfortunately i don't have the luxury to sit back and think through all my preparations. Time flies super fast in the last few days of the wedding!

I think anyone who read this will be astonished the first time i met Jeremy's brothers was on my actual wedding day, even though he told me he has brief them separately before the actual day, however, i like to emphasise to all groom-to-be, bride-to-be, it is very important to communicate in one meeting where the sisters & brothers are all present (though it might be challenging if they have conflicting schedules) Because what the groom brief to the brothers might not be what the bride brief to the sisters as well. This mistake happen to us because everyone was being a brother/sisters for the first time. They was not very sure with the process and partly also even if you have communication, you need to reiterate many times to ensure the info has been conveyed through to avoid miscommunication.

So it was quite nerve-wrecking for us, early morning we went to collect our ROM certificate, it took about half an hour for us to finish the process with the pledge taking at the ROM venue.

Next i decided to get some fresh flowers for my hairdo the next day, even though Jeremy sister told me that she could get for me, but i still feel more assured when i get it myself when the item i needed is directly associated with me, so it was an impromptu decision but we manage to go FarEastFlora wholesale flowers @ upper thomson road as i did some quick research on my phone and found the place to check out any fresh roses they are selling!

Pretty roses that i didn't know which one i should buy!

Colored baby breaths!

This was the one that was very close to my invitation card roses color!

Even though i am not using all the roses on my hairdo, i couldn't decide which one is better, so i purchased all this 4 bundle since they are not too expensive for my MUA to choose which is suitable to use for morning and dinner on my wedding day.

Had to keep these roses in my room with the aircon so that they can last till tomorrow!

Rested awhile before i had to start tidying up my room for the last time, changing out the curtains, my bed sheets to new ones, moving all the unsightly furniture temporarily to other rooms such that the room looks spacious and neater for photo-taking. Keke. Cannot stand unsightly furniture especially when the place will be used for photo-taking.

Beside that, i change my room light bulb as well for the lighting for the actual day, showing my actual day photographer the furniture layout beforehand to ensure everything looks good! After that, Jeremy came to pick me before we had to head back to our bridal studio to collect our gowns and to meet up with the driver that we engage through our decor vendor, im-perfections that was going to be our chauffeur on actual day to decorate the car.

A day before, Jeremy had move our 3 big A0 poster, 2 big album, 1 table top frame, 1 small album to our banquet venue office first as we had our preparations to do. Beside that we also arrange to have a site recee with our decor vendor to explain to him how we would like to arrange all our decoration for the evening reception area.

Our cute duffy after her grooming, we went to pick her and limei at the salon before going the bridal studio! She had to look good for our wedding too!

That's my sister in the background as we thought it would be quite fast, but it took quite long so i get Jeremy to drop her at the nearest MRT station for her to rush with other errands first.

Most of the time was wasted at the bridal studio because we had to do one last fitting of the gowns before we collected, and my gown was loose again, for the KUA especially, even though they have already altered twice, but it was still quite loose but i thought it would be too troublesome to alter again, since i still look ok without looking too oversized, so i didn't request them to alter again. But the girls tried to fix my dad's suit because they was worried it might not fit as the sizing has been altered for others before and it took quite some time to rectify it. We met with our driver at the bridal studio as he drove the car for the bridal decorations. We hit it off quite well and he was giving us ideas where we can go to take photos on our wedding day after the tea ceremony and that he don't mind bringing us around.

Our bridal car that we booked as a package under our decor vendor, im-perfections.

This was my wedding floral bouquet! It was so beautiful when i first saw it, each and every single roses was so fresh and pretty! I thought my floral bouquet was the nicest out of the other bouquets that belong to our newly couples that had not collected theirs yet. hehe

No filter used, and so pretty that i had to take a few more photos of it!

By the time we finally collected our gowns/suits and Jeremy sending me back home, it was already 9plus, Jieying came to my house, Kangrui came later and PC was due to reach my house in the morning after her morning flight from her training. With the help of my sisters and my aunt, they went on to do some other errands while Ken help me with all this pink decor around my corridor, Jieying help me out by setting up the fairylight outside my room.

It might not look so nice because it is dark already, but i swear it was beautiful during the daytime, after this photo was taken, i thought it would be good if i had laid some pink carpet to complete the look. But too late for me to get any pink carpet. Haha.

Anyway do look out for my next post as i will try to provide all the necessary details for bride-to-be to take note while planning for your own big day!

Till then.

To read more on my wedding planning posts, click according to the post you would like to read below,

*Wedding Gown Selection Click HERE

*Tips before your wedding photoshoot and during photoshoot. Click HERE

*Our Wedding Banquet Dinner Venue Click HERE

*Our Wedding Invitation Card, Bridal Furniture & Ordering of GUO DA LI Click HERE

*Food Tasting at Orchid Country Club, Peach Garden Click HERE

*Selection of Wedding Photoshoot Photos Click HERE

*Why Taobao is the best place to buy your wedding essential items. Click HERE

*Filing for notice of Marriage/ Trial Hairdo & Makeup/Manicure Click HERE

*Errands to complete before actual day Click HERE

*Wedding Planning (Checklist of items to take note) Click HERE

*Actual Day Wedding (Morning Ceremony) Click HERE

*Wedding Banquet dinner celebration at Orchid Country Club, Grand Ballroom Click HERE

Wednesday, February 15, 2017

Wedding Planning : Registry of Marriage, Trial Hairdo & Makeup, Manicure, Issue with live band for wedding

Hello readers! Beside planning for the actual day, if you are doing your solemnization ceremony on the same day and not at the ROM venue itself, you will need to find a solemniser to be at the wedding venue. But before that, you will need to file notice of your marriage first. To do so, you can visit the ROM website url below,

https://www.rom.gov.sg/index.asp

The website will provide info that you need to know and if you do not have any preferred solemniser, you can select from their list provided.

Just make sure that the date to file can only be at least 3 month before the actual wedding date. For this task, Jeremy was the one to check how to file the notice of marriage and finding the solemniser. The one and only task.

After he has file the notice of marriage, make a payment of $26 , he went on to contact the solemniser before arranging to meet at his house. But i guess he didn't really check properly because when we turned up at the solemniser house, he was asking for a form and both of us was equally confused because i assume Jeremy should have prepared all the necessary documents before heading down. But he didn't. tsk.

That is the solemniser consent form. Luckily, the solemniser has a printer and he kindly help us to print out before we fill in all our particulars and after his verification, sign on the form and we can bring down this form when we was due to go down to ROM a day before the actual wedding date.

Based from our experience, our solemniser told us his requests during the meeting, such as he will need someone to pick him to the venue before sending him back home after that. *Do take note that not all solemniser will expect you to make this special arrangement, some will have their own transport and you will only need to inform them the venue and timing and ensure someone attends to him when he arrived at the venue. But well, i got to respect Jeremy's choice since he was the one who google and pick him out of the list.

Usually there is no fee required to engage a solemniser but a token of appreciation is the norm after the ceremony.

If you are wondering the market rate angbao to give, there is actually no market rate, and its up to individual to decide the amount, but for us, this solemniser that Jeremy found do have a minimum rate of $150 but Jeremy is feeling rich so he gave him $188 instead.

So one day before our wedding date, we went back to ROM according to appointment timing, the staff will do all the necessary verification at the counter with us and we had to say some pledge in front of a staff and the staff will verify our identity again as she kept looking at us while comparing with our IC. After that, we will have to bring the documents back and to present it at the solemnization venue for the ceremony.

Usually, this part (solemnization ceremony) may be valued as the most important aspect of a wedding, where the newlywed will give some speech, some touching moment, sobbing etc, but to me. This was the least interesting and importance part to me. It will takes about 15min if you don't get a naggy one. For us, i was trying to hold my laughter during the ceremony because the soleminiser talks very slow and times i can't get his cue when i thought he already finish talking but he continued again and i had to sit patiently while waiting for him to finish.

As i wrote previously in my other posts that my makeup artist decided to pull a fast one on me by telling me just 1 week plus before the actual wedding day that she can't do my makeup on actual day and asking if i am ok if she give me a replacement, But i was not happy until they could give me a free trial makeup and hairdo so that i could trust this new replacement makeup artist on my actual wedding day, so in the last week before my wedding, i was very busy running around and one of the days involving heading down to the studio after they promise to give me a free trial makeup for this new replacement makeup artist. But eventually i did paid extra to do a trial hairdo for me because i was more particular on hairdo. (Which was a wise decision because everyone kept complimenting me on my wedding day!)

This was the trial makeup, though i told her i don't really like this lipstick color and to change the lipstick color on the actual day. I was satisfied with the makeup, and we move on to doing the different kind of hairdo!

I requested more on plaits this time round after doing prior research again for the hairdo.

She added some accessories for me to visualise the look

This was suppose to be one of my actual day morning hairdo but with some modification after i use fresh roses on the actual day.

Another kind of loose plaited hairdo, she put the accessories for me to roughly visualise because after we have make the appointment which i told the original MUA that i will contact this replacement MUA but i didn't because i was pretty mad for landing me in such situation and even though its not this replacement MUA fault, but before the meeting, i had no wish to contact anyone of them.

But after meeting with this new makeup artist, Minnie, i prefer her over the original one and i guess maybe its a good choice afterall for this last minute change of MUA. We had more topics to chat and i told her i want to cover my arms just when i was thinking my hair is too short, she took out her wig and help me to extend my hair length. Tadah! Me with the extension wig. She told me she will do plaits at the side and if i had roses, it will be very nice on the actual day.Ideas! Which will never happen if you don't get a trial hairdo.

This was roughly how it look like if there are accessories on it. i was satisfied with this hairdo and thus choose it for my 2nd march in hairdo as previously i had requested for MUA to stay and change hairdo for me for my 2nd march in. I can still put it aside whenever i like so i can have two different kind of hairdo during photo-taking.

That's Jieying at the back as she took leave so that both of us could get our hair dye done in the morning before coming down to the studio for the trial hairdo and makeup.
This was another hairdo!

After we was done with the trial makeup and hairdo, the makeup artist is very thoughful to do a simple hairdo for me with plaits before i go back so that i don't look too messy with all the curls and already plaited hairs.

But i think she also had her fun of trying out the different hairdo for me since its rare that bride-to-be will request for trial hairdo that she try out more than the usual min number of hairdo on me,

It will never go wrong when you have a trial hairdo because you will know what is needed to complement the entire hairdo, which i only realised too that i need to find fresh roses after my trial hairdo for the actual day to complement the overall look

Usually, after the trial hairdo and makeup, one do not simply go back home wash it off.

The online blogshop, thestagewalk is located at the same industrial building so we went to check out their clothes before having our late lunch.

When you had a nice makeup, it's really easy to capture good angles while taking a selfie.

Flawless. i couldn't stop complimenting Jieying after her hair dye because she look refreshed with her hair dye with color!

The next day, we went to JB to do manicure as well! Usually i think many bride-to-be should be very stressed as the dates is getting nearer but i was rather chill while ensuring that i had time to prepare myself to look at my best!

I am not a fan of doing my nails, but since its my big day, we went to KSL and sit for 4 hours as the staff was patiently decorating my nails while i was getting restless.

Everything was almost finalised except for the wedding photo slideshow and going through the actual day morning and evening schedule with Jeremy. But the entire wedding planning was not a smooth sailing one even though we had 1 year to prepare. Shit happens.

Beside the makeup-artist issue, i had issue with my live band singer that i booked under Ivan &; Levine 2 months before our wedding when i booked her at least 1 year in advance, after listening to all the different covers by the different singers they had on their website and i decided to choose this singer, Boon Hui Lu.

Coincidentally, Jieying mentioned to her bf this singer that i engaged when it turns out that her bf knows and has worked with her before and warned me against choosing her because he told me she loves freedom and hate to be restricted so Terence company that he was working under had a hard time managing her.

Initially, i didn't want to judge her yet because everything looks ok from the day we booked her to perform on our wedding until there was an article featured that she has signed on to HIM International Music label as S.H.E labelmate in dec last year which means she has become popular and i was worried she might not be able to perform so i went to check with the coordinator to ensure that she could perform on our wedding day.

My intuition was right, initially the coordinator, Ivan told me it shouldn't be an issue if i had already booked her, he gave me a shock when i thought he didn't book for me until i went back to see the contract and her name was stated inside.

But, later on, he told me that she cannot perform as she is busy with her other commitment. To me, it was simply unprofessional of her to back out of this performance when it was already agreed upon. Ivan was apologetic about it and told us he could return us the deposit if we decided not to engage them. But that's not the point, i have already decided to engage the live band for my wedding, but with the singer backing out just because she got famous, turns out Terence is right afterall. She is someone that just couldn't be trusted. By the way, Ivan (the owner of Ivan & Levine) is actually friends with her which makes it even difficult for him to say her as a friend and had to clear the mess for her when there are other couples that is also engaging her for performance in Feb and being unhappy because she pulled out suddenly.

I thought this should be known to anyone who are looking to engage her for her singing,

in case if she do have other platforms for her to earn some quick cash, just beware if you are looking to engage her. Her credibility, i highly doubt no mattar how well she can sing.

Of cos, i also believe she is not the only one that can sing well, so i didn't spend too long complaining while trying to find another alternative replacement singer.

This was not easy as i spend days after days listening to all the singers available in their website, eventually after listening through most of the covers, i decided to heed his advice to select the singer that Ivan has recommend, which was pretty good! Her name is Felicia Kusumo, you can youtube her name as she did some covers and i can guarantee she sing way better in live than the covers. My guests was very impressed with the live band performance during the wedding and i heard some of our guests went to get from them their contacts directly as Ivan texted me after the wedding and told me my guests are very efficient in contacting them to get the quotations from him after Felicia's performance.