Zana's Solemnization

1 month before my wedding was actually my cousin's wedding! Can you imagine the stress? That weekend would be useful for our wedding preparations but of course, we dropped it temporarily so we can give our utmost attention to her wedding.

Zana's wedding is a standard 2 day event. 1 day for solemnization and 1 for the wedding event. Mak, Jhon and I had arrived extra early to help, just in case but Mak kept asking me to rest. But if mak cik/ pak cik suruh tolong, tak kan say no, right? kwang kwang



I love this picture but not so much of myself. Bad angle, why I look chubby? lol

Mak does what she does best, socializing.

The queen of the day. I like this outfit.

Zana with her mom.

Zana and her makciks. haha

Zana and I. hehehe
About 1 month after that, we would be switching places.

Is this what the groom was facing? Intimidating!

But not to him, I guess.

The nikah begins.

That's it for the nikah. We didn't take much photos because since our wedding was next, there were plenty of socializing on our part too. Paiseh, on people wedding, had to pass our wedding cards. Especially to relatives that we had not met for decades!

Anyways, the solemnization went smoothly with the usual teary eyed moments for the newly wedded couple. Yey! Dah kahwin!

   

Wedding Review: Pulut Affairs

Since day one, I knew what kind of wedding cake I wanted.

I wanted a pulut wedding cake.

I had no idea where to source one and if you had read an old post, Jhon and I were so lucky to come across Pulut Affairs at a wedding expo. I already had a rough budget of how much I was willing to pay for the cake so when I saw their display and that the cost matched, I booked immediately.

I didn't taste their food, I didn't even do a background check.
To be honest, it's the only vendor I jumped the gun only because my instincts believed in them. (please do not do this if your gut instincts are 99.999% always correct)

1 month before the wedding, Kak Lynn and I discussed about the final payment, procedures and color concept. Since my theme was gold, I want accent pieces to be of my favourite color, dark red.

What I like about her service was that not only they set up with knives and all, they also dismantle by themselves without us worrying about returning their stuff the following day. If everything is in order, they will give the refundable deposit. Kalau lupa, ingatkan eh? hehe

As for taste wise, no kidding, POWER GEDEMAK!

Their rendang is sedap gila lah. Those who had tried, wanted to tapao more while those who only tried after they went home were asking who was the vendor.

Alhamdulillah. I also got to try by the end of the day and memang tak cukup.

Like I mentioned in the previous post, I love the height of the cakes. It's not too short and not too tall. It's just nice so people can see the pulut and see our outfits.
Perfect.

I would highly recommend Pulut Affairs to anyone who wants pulut for any occasions. They do engagements, birthdays or any celebrations that could call for it!

Pulut Affairs
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Wedding Review - Pre-Wedding Photo Shoot by Versari Ade & Invogue Photography

We had engaged Versari Ade & Invogue Photography not only for actual day bridal & photography but also pre-wedding photo shoot. I believe these are completely different scenarios that ought to share separately.

If you follow closely, I actually had wrote about the behind-the-scenes bridal photo shoot. I was quite thorough on what happened on that day so click and read if you haven't. That post was bridal comment heavy for obvious reasons and it was only after I got our wedding photos I could really comment on Mr Lim's work.

Just a quick summary of Abg Hadi's Versari Ade's workmanship. Superb. In my opinion, his make up skills were to the T. I told him I trusted his work and let him do whatever he wants with his knowledge on what would fit me. He did, with wonders. He was friendly, nice and knows how to read the vibes of the client (me). I like story-mory and he is a man of many stories which I love but also knows to do his work silently.

Clothes were plentiful to choose from Arabian, Traditional/ Modern Chinese, Traditional/ Modern Indonesian, Traditional/ Modern Malay, Indian and of course western outfits. This is one of the reasons I love Versari Ade. I can have my old-skool photo shoot. People from the 80s and below will understand. =P

Now to the photography part.

Mr Lim from Invogue Photography (Versari Ade's in-house photographer), is a soft-spoken man who likes to make little jokes here and there. His natural demeanor makes couples like us feel not so shy especially in a setting in a studio where's it's just us.

After selecting photos for edit, it takes Mr Lim about 3 months to not only edit but also print 1 8R & 1 20x24 canvas and frame it all up. Unfortunately, the framing was slightly delayed for collection but we still managed to collect our photos 2 days before our wedding. Phew!

Like I said, the photo shoot we went for is not the trendy, picnic-artsy-vintage-dreamy type because we like it this way. We can always achieve the other types of photo shoot on any other day. Enough typing, here are some of the photos we had taken.

Traditional Songket which was a crowd favorite, even the Pinoys.

Traditional Indonesian outfit for my Javanese blood. I just love the head gear.

Cheongsam for obvious reasons.

Obligatory western outfit for our outdoor photo shoot.

We had to select 20 photos for our photo album but we also managed to choose more for personal copies. We could take all lah but it's excessive in terms of cash. In the end, we chose 41 more that Mr Lim also did some minor edit. 

We set up our big canvas framed picture at our guest book table (unlike the conventional near the pelamin on an easel because we didn't want to get one). I wanted more of a landscape picture than a full picture of us full blown because I am self-conscious and having a huge picture of my face is overwhelming. haha

 

And our table top picture frame at the berkat table.

We didn't showcase our photo album for the public unless requested.

So yeah, that's it.

We were so satisfied with our pre-wedding photo shoot from the beginning to the end. No regrets. No doubt, it was one of the items that was considered a want, not a need but it was something we both really wanted. It was so worth it in our opinion.

Versari Ade & Invogue Photography

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Nadia Aqilah's Cukur Rambut

Back-to-the-past post:
I have about 4 of such posts so bear with me while I randomly selit them here and there.
This occasion was on 22 March 2016.

I was informed that the flowers was plucked downstairs at the nearby bushes... haha shhh...

Sleeping Nadya with her nenek.

Mak, Kakak and I.
Refer to signature apple cheeks.

Technically, Mak, Jhon and I arrived late. It was because Mak was assigned to do roti kirai (without the curry). The ceremony starts at 10am; we live in Eunos and the location is at Woodlands. So you do the Math on what time we had to wake up and kirai? Nadya punya pasal tau! Mak and I had to take shifts to kirai a bucket load of kirai.

All for you Nadya!
She looks so different with the eyeliner that her auntie put on. Her eyes looked humongous! I wouldn't even have the guts to put eyeliner on a baby. I still stab myself in the eye once in a while.

Jhon testing 1, 2, 3...

One of our favorite uncle and auntie from my maternal side. Maybe that's why takes too many photos of them. lol

The bro buat hal sendiri.

Irfan's favorite uncle.

Seriously, unrecognizable with eye make up.

Alhamdulillah, the ceremony went well and smooth sailing.

   

1 Month Married

It has been 1 month since Jhon and I have been husband and wife.

The usual question was, "How's married life?"
We unanimously agreed with the word "Weird"

From the night we got married, I was telling Jhon, "You are my husband, you know?"
That continued 1 week later, during our honeymoon, after our honeymoon and up until now. It's just weird. I suppose we have been boyfriend-girlfriend for almost 9 years now so it's really odd to see each other as a different status.

We do spend a lot of time together after all these years so it didn't feel much of a difference. The only difference was we don't separate ways by the end of the day and having extra private time. It was unbelievable that instead of Jhon sending me home every single night, I am following him back home.

After all these years of protecting our family's reputation by being well-behaved (if you know what I mean), we kept asking each other if we were sure Mak allows me to sleep over? Is it really okay? We asked that even more so on the first time we had a room all to ourselves at Sentosa. Usually, someone is always staying in a room with us as a guardian (lol). We were laughing and asking, "Where's Mak? or Fizah?"

Other than that, my life as a wife is normal, I suppose. I knew way before getting married that my first order of business was to do Jhon's laundry. This man likes to collect dirty laundry as a side hobby I think. Lucky for me, I secretly enjoy doing the laundry. There's something about turning smelly things into fragrant and soft things that makes me happy. Yes, I always smell them before hanging the laundry and before folding them.

So how's married life so far?

Weird.