The wedding weekend is finally over..

I can't believe the weekend is already over! I've been spending all my waking moments (and sometimes sleeping moments dreaming) planning for our wedding and now that it's over, I feel a little lost. My married girlfriends told me this would happen... but the feeling really sucks. 

Well, the wedding did not go exactly 100% as per my plans, but I have to learn to accept the fact that one person cannot control everything. Yea yea, bridezilla me. 

I have been pushing myself too hard for the whole year that I fell sick just a week before the wedding and had to be hospitalized for the ENTIRE week until the day before the wedding.. So I missed out on opportunities to brief my bridal party on the itinerary & sequence, do last minute checks, etc... 

I was angry at myself for falling sick but now that I think back and reflect, I think it's a sign from God that I should slow down and not push myself so hard. Since I did not have the chance to slow down or take a break, He had to intervene and do something.. Who knows I might collapse from exhaustion on the actual days and had to cancel or postpone the wedding? So.. thank you God for all the blessings in my life and I trust that You will have a plan for me, better than anything I can ever plan for myself.

All the wedding pictures will only be ready in a few weeks when my photographer sent them to us. Meanwhile, here are some behind the scenes pictures from a bride's perspective.

Officially Mrs Brendan Chew!

We are married! Officially! Legally! Whoopeeee! I had so much fun today and though things got a bit rough right before the ceremony (messy coordination), overall everything went well! I am so blessed & lucky to have a very strong support system, Brendan, bridesmaids + Nat!

Our church wedding was held at our church, Lighthouse Evangelism Tampines and we had close to 280 guests who attended excluding my bridal party! That's more than our wedding banquet! Wow! 

My Sony camera was buried in one of my carton boxes so I don't have many pictures from today but luckily I have friends who are trigger friendly and they sent me many pictures of me walking down the aisle and also during the ceremony! My cousin Jane sent me many pictures and I am glad she did cos it will take weeks before I receive the official photos from our photographer.

I don't know why my sister is missing from the group picture.. Hmm.. I think she sneaked off to eat. LOL!!!

My sister stayed over with me last night and that was the last night I am staying in my rented room in Serangoon cos from tonight onwards I'll be staying with Le bf Hubby and his family until we buy our own place.

My bridesmaids did an awesome job during the gatecrash and the matrimony ceremony was so beautiful.. I cried while reciting my marriage vows. Couldn't help it.. But everyone was so supportive and they clapped to encourage me to go on! Awww.. :')

My mum brought Chloe home so I don't have to worry about her being alone in Serangoon, nor stress about her getting used to Le hubby's home because his dog is quite territorial and I don't have the time or energy to deal with it now..

I really need to get some rest because my medication is making me drowsy and my headache is coming back... tomorrow night will be our banquet dinner at Grand Hyatt! Thank God it's not today because I have no more strength anymore..

Good night everyone! ^_^

My wedding makeup trial & wedding nails

Updates!!!! It's almost 3am in the morning and I need to wake up at 4.30am to get ready. That's very little sleep if you do the math and I really hope I don't get dark circles or something! :(

Well, I was discharged from the hospital yesterday at 12noon and had to rush to do so many things!!!! The two main things are my makeup trial and manicure+pedicure. I couldn't do it earlier because, well.. I was hospitalized from Monday-Friday and didn't want to do my nails too early cos I am really clumsy. I couldn't do my makeup trial earlier because my makeup artist is from Penang and she only flew in on Thursday afternoon.

My previous makeup artist is a local and her services is bundled with my Silhouette package. I have 2 makeup session with her which I used for my prewedding shoot on 1st July and also our church wedding rehearsal on 20th Sep. 

I chose Sam Khor because she was Tabby's makeup artist during her wedding in Penang earlier this year and Tabby highly recommends her. Since I trust Tabby, I decided to engage her for my wedding weekend in Singapore! I booked her in April and luckily I did that because she is so busy!! She is one of the more sought-after makeup artist in Penang and I am glad she is willing to be my makeup artist in Singapore for my wedding.

We communicate via whatsapp on her fees and charges. After confirming her for the dates, I booked for her return air-tickets and accommodation. I only sent her pictures of my gowns and very very little sample pictures of what I want cos I was too busy with work and I trusted her to be good enough to do her magic and recommend what is best for me. Sometimes it's best to leave things in the hands of the professional and let them do their work without much interference.. 

Le bf dropped me off at the hotel for my makeup trial and rushed off to do other wedding errands.

I booked her a room at Holiday Inn Express, just beside Paragon because it's walking distance to Grand Hyatt, where our dinner will be held on tomorrow and very near my home in Serangoon via taxi. She's so happy that I booked this hotel for her cos it's new and has a very good location. I think she expected Hotel 81 or something.... LOL! That's how nice & undemanding she is. Well, I wanted her to have a comfortable stay so I chose this hotel for her. Lucky for me I had some discounts using my IHG agent rate! Perks of being a travel agent staff. :)

Here's my bare face. Tsk.. Sickly & pale and bloated from all the food they fed me at the hospital (I can't eat my medicine on an empty stomach so they always monitor what I eat.. cannot escape. And I had cheese fries craving! LOL!)

Look at all the stuff she brought from Penang! This is only a fraction of what she brought! She said she doesn't know my exact skin tone so she had to bring more stuff, but she will only carry two cases during the weekend. TWO!?!? T_T"

1st look for my march-in at church!

 Without tiara..

 With tiara.. (She brought a dozens of tiaras for me to choose!)

 2nd look for tea ceremony! 

She bought a new red M.A.C lipstick just for me. :')

 Love the hair!

 But from the front a bit like SQ stewardess (w/o the flower)

Added pearls for a nicer finish!

 Alternate hair piece instead of flowers..

We tried several more looks for the 1st & 2nd march in during the wedding dinner and I really love her so much! She is a perfectionist like me and it's either her best or nothing, which is so my style! Hahahaha! She's gonna help my sister do her hair and makeup later before me. She said she will do Joanna first so I can sleep longer.. so sweet right? :)

Afterwards I cabbed down to Ang Mo Kio to look for my trusted manicurist who was working in Boon Keng previously. I told her to do whatever she wants because I did not have the time and energy to research on wedding nails. Well, some of my friends whatsapp me many suggestions which I showed her but some were too time-consuming and I only had 3hrs to spare so we can't do those. I wanted something lacy and less flashy but Annie insisted on something more "bridal" and bling so it can catch the photographer's flash & lights.. Turned out really nice (but makes typing a pain in the ass).

Ok.. Time to crash! In a few hours I'll be walking down the aisle!! Wheee!! Hope my bridesmaids don't torture Le bf too much.. Hahahahahahah!!!

Discharged from hospital!

[Pic taken on 24Sep when I went out to collect my ROM cert]

I can finally go home!!! YAY! I am waiting for my hospital discharge papers and for Le bf (soon to be Le Hubby after tomorrow! Woohoo!) to come and pick me up!

I took leave and planned to have a week before our wedding day to do last minute preparations and also to chill but ended up in the hospital. Really upset about it because I cannot retract my leave and change it to hospitalization leave (some MOM law + HR policy) which really suck big time because I used up all my remaining leave for my wedding and I hospitalized for half of it plus have hospitalization leave to cover the other half. Bahhh!!

So, the doctors did an MRI scan and found no tumours in my head but the headaches refused to go away so Dr Andrew Phua had to inject the nerve in my head again just now hoping it can numb the nerve and let me have a pain-free weekend for the wedding.

In fact, Dr Phua injected my head yesterday morning but the effect did not last more than 12hours (which he finds strange because it usually lasts 4-6days at least), so he had to do it again this morning. Usually the recommended waiting time between the injections is at least a week, but he said desperate times call for desperate measures since we can't postpone the wedding... so we are all praying the 2nd injections can last at least for the weekend.

So since I have some time now I'll post some updates cos there's nothing much to do in the hospital anyways.

Yesterday was awesome because I had so many visitors! Whee! My mum, sister, Joyce, Yaya & Welly!

My sister bought Cheese Fries from Popeyes for me! I don't know why I am having this crazy craving for Cheese Fries lately.. been asking Le bf to tabao it every night for me. Hahahaha! My mum just came back from Hokkaido and brought a big bag of tidbits with her.. I thought they were all for me, but they are for Mama Chew. Kua kua kua.... Hahahhahaa!

Well, at least she let me eat one Hokkaido corn which I shared with Le sis! :) It's really good! The flesh is white colour and it's best eaten raw! Really sweet and tastes like water chestnuts.

 

Joyce & Yaya bought dinner over (Subway) but decided to order Popeye's because they were still hungry! There's an outlet just across the street but lazy Queen Joyce decided to order delivery instead. I think the operator must be wondering which crazy patient from Mt Elizabeth Novena is ordering fried chicken so late at night! Hahahaha!

 Party time! Yayyy!!! Cheese fries!!! :)

 My darlings and me with my "pale & sickly look" :(

Thank you ladies for coming to accompany me and cheer me up! Especially Joyce who had to wake up at 4am the next day to go to work.. Super touched! 

 After Yaya & Joyce left at around 10pm, I turned off all the lights and got ready to sleep when suddenly at 10.30pm, my nurse knocked and said I have a surprise visitor.. I was wondering "Wah Lao!! So late! Who is that???" because all my visitors will usually whatsapp me before coming.. she turned on the lights and I saw Welly!! Whoopee!

I thought he's in Batam (he shuttles between Singapore and Batam for work) but he's here! Sneaky fellow did not tell me he's coming so he can surprise me! So sweet of him! And he bought me cakes!

Hello Kitty cakes! Wheee!!! :) Thank you Welly!

I have packed all my stuff (excited & mad anxious to leave so I can go and run my wedding errands!) and realized I've kept quite a collection of Crabtree & Evelyn bottles when I was here.. they will give me a new set everyday even if I can't finish the ones from the day before so these are the brand new ones that I am bringing home with me..

I'll post more updates tonight if I have the time! :) Byee!!

Our Shutterfly wedding photobook guestbooks!

A few months ago I created an account on Shutterfly.com and designed two wedding guestbooks with the layout of a photobook concept. I wanted something unique and special instead of the usual run of the mill guestbooks you can buy in any gift shops.. something that can showcase our pre-wedding pictures and also let our guests have fun writing and signing.

My Hens Party! ❤ [14-09-2013]

2 weeks ago on 14-September 2013, my bridesmaids + Nathaniel threw me the best Hen's Party ever!

I mentioned before how much I dislike wild havoc crazy hen's nights so my bridesmaids have to think of a clean but fun Hen's Party for me. Everyone is so stressed cos I am usually the party organizer and they have to organize something for me in secret.. but they did a really fantastic job! I am so blessed to have such wonderful bridesmaids!

Pamela is the head planner and she is so sweet to rally the bridesmaids together and plan for my hen's party.

The night before Le bf stayed over at my place and we woke up to go for lunch before he drove me over to Aramsa Spa at Bishan Park. Pamela was supposed to come pick me up but there was a massive traffic jam and she kinda went by the wrong way so Le bf had to drive me instead. It was really funny cos Le bf was being grumpy about Pamela being Pamela and always so blur and not on time (his words), and she should have gone by this route not that route, blah blah.... and he could have just fetched me there himself in the first place cos it's very near my house and Pamela need not come all the way down to pick me up.. blah blah.. Just harmless old man grousing. Cheryl was in the car with my little sister and I was whatsapping them and we all were like "HAIYO! PAM!". 

So we met at Aramsa Spa and Pamela was apologizing profusely to her korkor.. LOL!

Pamela & my sister walked me to Aramsa and signed me in and paid for the treatment before leaving me in the good hands of the spa people and left to go and decorate the hotel room for me.

I was shown to the ladies where I have to change into a bathrobe and lock my stuff in the locker.

Disposable panties & shower caps!

Ice water for kitty! :)

I explored the shower rooms & sauna room too.. Really outdoorsy!

Beautiful garden walkway!

After changing, my spa therapist led me to the treatment room..

Pam chose the treatment for me so I don't know what to expect.. She's super cute cos she kept reminding them to be nice to me cos I'm getting married in 2 weeks time. Hahahaha!

There's a private garden in my room with an outdoor shower and bathtub! ^_^

Really relaxing and I enjoyed myself a lot!

Meanwhile, they have been busy decorating the hotel room!

Nat cut so many of these "feathers" and stick them all over the room! Soo much details! The theme was "peacock" but I didn't get the memo. LOL! Only my sister wore a peacock print top. The rest main wore blue/purple.

Look at all the food!!!! O_O

Potato Party. LOL!

Home made pastries! 

These are the only "dodgy" stuff they made for me cos I wanted a clean party. Joyce's brother made the cupcakes and Joyce made the penises. Damn funny lah!!! Hahahahahaha! And somehow I guessed at the first try that it was made by her and she was so indignant and yelled "HOW YOU KNOW???". 

Cos I am smart. Hahahhaha! And she had the cheeky smile on her face lah.

All my bridesmaids (except Santi who is in Batam) and Nathaniel, my bride attendant!

With my 2 future sister-in-laws!

Queen gang Joyce & Yaya! Old time friends from Poly!

I don't know what she was asking me to do.. LOL!

We tried on the bridesmaid dresses and Nat helped everyone tie beautiful patterns and designs cos it's a convertible dress. I wanted to get those bridesmaids gown but it's so hard to find one that everyone likes (I have 8 bridesmaids) and also their sizes are so different! So they voted on the colour and I bought these convertible dresses as they are sorta free size and they can wear it in whatever way they want. :)

Afterwards we played some games and had loads of fun! I love girly sessions like these! 

No alcohol and he's already high. Wahahaha!

Thank you darlings for putting so much effort, spending time & money for my Hen's party! Love you all!