Wedding Preps: A Recap

I thought I'd write this entry for all the future brides out there wanting to plan a decent-sized wedding. I have so much perspective now that I have been through the wedding planning process. It truly was an amazing journey, full of revelations and lessons. Whereas before, I was resistant to the girly-girlness of it all, but I actually started to enjoy some aspects of it, especially toward the end where Tung and I were able to incorporate elements that are unique to us as a couple. That said, I have no issues with anyone wanting to elope or have a small, intimate wedding in a remote location. All the more power to them; weddings, after all, celebrate the fundamental of two people coming together for love. That is all. They shouldn't be complicated, don't have to be over-the-top (unless you want them to be), and should certainly be customized toward the couple's desires. But for those of you wanting to do it the "hard" way, here goes. May you find some use out of this entry.

It all starts with getting organized. Along with a checklist I printed out from "Here Comes the Guide," which I checked sporadically to make sure I was making at least monthly goals, I used a virtual checklist on The Knot, which is a good resource for inspiring pictures of wedding themes. It also has a seating chart software, which is a bit of a pain to use, but the end results are great visuals of how the reception room will be laid out.

It also helps to work out a wedding-day timeline as far in advanced as possible when you can start visualizing how the day will pan out. It's time-consuming to break down details by the minute, but this will be a good resource for day-of coordinators, family whose help you are enlisting so they know when to show up and what to do, as well as other vendors such as caterers, photographers, and videographers so they can anticipate events and get their equipment ready.

Another reference list to keep is the Wedding Contacts--caterers, vendors, venue points-of-contact whose names, addresses, and phone numbers you should keep a record of (speed-dial helps, too). This list can be given to a bridesmaid/maid-of-honor before the Big Day in case someone runs late or there are any last-minute requests.

Don't forget to track your expenses from the beginning if you're a stickler about budget or curious about how much things have added up to by the end. Most vendors require deposits on a specific timeline, so having this record for yourself helps you keep on top of things and avoid an avalanche of bills near the wedding date. The earlier expenses are taken care of, the less painful it will be when you're already stressing out closer to your Big Day.

Checklist from Here Comes the Guide, organized in a binder containing any wedding-related bills, contracts, and printouts.

Next, the venue tours. This was one of the first things we looked into after we got engaged, as venues book up quite quickly within a year or so. If you've got your mind set on a particular wedding date, it's a good idea to get your choice venue locked down. We took our time and toured 10 venues to get a sense for service, location, interior decor, package prices, and any perks. For example, most hotels would give you "points" for booking a wedding package that could be applied toward a future hotel stay, or simply offer a first-year-anniversary stay free of charge. Be sure to get on any sign-up list for points and follow up after the wedding to make sure the points have been applied. Our venue, the Hilton in San Jose, offers a complimentary stay on your one-year anniversary, the top tier of your wedding cake re-done for free at Cake Expressions whom they have contracted with, and points good for any Hilton in the world, one point per dollar spent on the wedding package.

Below are the venues we toured:

Cypress, Cupertino

Dolce Hayes Mansion, San Jose

Doubletree, San Jose

Embassy Suites, Milpitas

Freedom Hall & Gardens, Santa Clara

Palo Alto Golf & Country Club, Palo Alto

Villa Ragusa, Campbell

Hyatt, Santa Clara (by God, I loved this place, including the wedding coordinator who never commits a single typo in her email correspondences with me, but it was out of our price range).

Hilton, San Jose, our final choice.

Phew, tired already. Next great part, food tasting. Unfortunately, Hilton, like many other hotels offering wedding service, require a down payment for your wedding package before you can come in for your food tasting. If you have qualms and think you may bail at the expense of losing your deposit if the food quality is not up to your expectations, do the food tasting early. Otherwise, do it closer to the wedding so it's less likely the hotel will change chefs, and you get a rough idea of what seasonal fruits and veggies are being offered.

Johnny and Duong join us for food tasting.

Delectable desserts included in our tasting session.

I used whatever down-time I had to work on my wedding website, which I continued to update with relevant info for guests. I gave out the link to the website on the printed wedding invitations. Most wedding websites have embedded software that will allow you to keep a running guest list and any plated food options for the reception, but this is not advisable to use if there will be people in the party who are not tech-savvy enough to RSVP this way.

Most brides run out and do this as soon as they get engaged, but not being big on shopping, I was even procrastinating on finding The Dress. I had first thought to rent my dress as I didn't know what to do with it after the wedding (more on this below), but customer service wasn't great at the places I went to try on rented dresses, and some of the dresses look old from having been worn too many times. So, after some bad experiences, I decided to just buy the dress and not have to deal with the stress of picking it up only a few days before the wedding.

Hmm, could it be this one? Wrapped asymmetrical design with a lace-up back.

Or this one, with some nice beading details on the hem?

Or this one, whose beading contributes to a nice side-profile, striped design?

At David's Bridal after having given up the the rental idea, trying on a mermaid gown with a veil.

Tung's favorite pick, a simple A-line with a side brooch, without frills or fluff.

The Oleg Cassini gown retailed at over a thousand dollars that I tried on just for fun.

Finally, we have a winner! What I like most about this dress was the gold beading that gave it a bit more pop in pictures, the A-line trim, the smooth, satin fabric, and the lovely but not too over-the-top train trailing in the back. It's also a back lace-up, and I will probably never wear a dress this intricate again.

The bridesmaids had a go at dress shopping, too! They are such great sports, having made their decision on our first shopping trip. Liane and Stephanie modeled our two final selections after a morning of them trying on dresses.

The winner is the darker-blue gown on the left (though we went with the "Freesia" color to go with the wedding theme). Liane and Stephanie both liked the flowing, lightweight chiffon fabric for a late-summer wedding.

Don't forget to leave room for alterations a few months before the wedding day! Local dry cleaner's/alteration shops may offer better prices than the place where you bought your dress, so check around. Also look into tux rentals for the men in the wedding party. David's Bridal offers a discount at The Men's Wearhouse if you buy your dress there, and that's a good option for tux rental if the groomsmen are coming from out of town as they can get fitted and pick up their tux at any Men's Wearhouse near them.

When clothes were squared away, we took some engagement pictures. We did a session with my brother Johnny, and then another one half a year later with Michael Soo of Capture the Love Photography. Aside from getting comfortable in front of the camera and having fun as a couple, I used the engagement pictures on our wedding website and put together some photo books for memories, as well as a photo guest book on Picaboo for guests to sign on our wedding day. With the right photographer(s) who share your vision, engagement pictures could be a wonderfully fun experience, taking you out of the stress of wedding planning to enjoy a day playing as a couple and remembering how you fell in love.

Engagement picture by Johnny Luu

Engagement picture by Michael Soo. We played in his studio as he took shots to go with our martial-arts themed wedding.

Dramatic engagement picture by Michael Soo. I blew up this high-resolution shot to a 20x30" gallery-wrapped canvas that now hangs on our living room wall.

Along those lines, we also had a blast shooting our Love Story video with Johnny. We wrote a script to depict our background in martial arts, how we first met in aikido, and what happened on our first "date." Getting to re-visit the San Jose State campus brought back a lot of memories, and we had lots of laughs during the shoot for what turned out to be such a fun day. Our Love Story video is made more special by the thought that things are constantly changing--college campuses in particular--and the places we hold so dearly may not be around in the future for us to visit anymore, so commemorating them in a video holds a quaint charm.

Hair and makeup! I fortunately had the help of my best friend from third grade, Julie, to do my hair and makeup. She patiently went through many trials with me, testing skin care and hair products that would work best on me, to find the right look. It helps to print out the styles you like so that your Makeup Artist (MUA) and hair styler can replicate the look or suggest one more fitting for you.

Profile of the hairstyle we eventually went with.

Back view of the hair style. Julie modified it just a bit on the wedding day to accommodate silk Stephanotis flowers that I wanted to put in my hair.

In the middle of a hair/makeup trial on the morning of my bridal shower with Julie.

We got our wedding invitations printed at AP Printing in Santa Clara. This would be a great area for a DIY project that would save quite a bit of money, especially with Michael's and other specialty stores selling invitation kits, but we had to have bilingual invitations, and AP Printing offers Vietnamese. I had the invitations accentuated by phalaenopsis orchids and ordered custom address labels from Colorful Images that matched. We even got custom postage stamps from Zazzle, bearing one of the pictures from our engagement session, and I bought a simple rubber stamp and ink pad from Michael's to decorate the envelope with an embellishment. Be sure to weigh your invitations before sending them off; it's a good time to touch bases with your local post office to make sure the price of stamps aren't going to fluctuate any time soon (factor in how long guests may take to send you back their RSVPs. "Forever" stamps are a good choice here and are even offered in wedding designs). As soon as the RSVPs started rolling in, I kept a running guest list on an Excel file, along with their food choices, to always have a headcount handy.

Now, here's a funny thing I wanted to incorporate into the wedding. Since the theme is martial arts, I thought it'd be fun to do a customized wedding cake topper of me launching Tung in a "koshinage" hip throw to play off how we met each other in an aikido class. This idea stemmed from a Groupon offering customized bobbleheads. Had I known the company was located overseas, I probably wouldn't have gone through the trouble. It cost quite a bit to make, but the worst part was the time difference and hardship of communicating with the sculptors. It's hard enough to precisely write a description of any requested modifications, but add in a language barrier and it became a frustrating endeavor.

Mold of Tung's head for the sculpture.

Mold of my head for the sculpture.

The results came out ok, and contrary to my irritation of this having taken over half a year to accomplish with all our back-and-forths, the final cake topper did arrive in time for the wedding. They could've gotten me hunched over a little more to better portray the hip throw, and I had to add the embellishments on my gown by hand because it was too plain, but those are technicalities. Guests got a kick out of our cake topper, and it was one of the most photographed items of the night.

Final cake topper on cake, made pretty by the purple uplight our decorator put in.

Full cake with The Works: Cake topper, trailing fresh dendrobium orchids, silk daisies and rose petals, votive candles.

Engraved and decorated knife and cake server.

Next fun part: cake tasting! We took our bridesmaids out to a light dim sum breakfast at Dynasty Seafood Restaurant before the noontime cake tasting. The rules to dim sum are simple: If you don't speak Chinese, the staff will usually still assume that you do. Point to anything you want and be adamant about refusing what you don't, done by furious head-shakings and insistent hand gestures to avoid having an undesirable food item plopped on your table and stamped onto your bill. It's delicious AND entertaining!

Stephanie and Liane enjoying dim sum.

The sample decorated cakes at Cake Expressions, contracted to the Hilton San Jose. They have a Facebook page showing their designs as well. If you bring in a picture of your cake, they will recreate the cake top in your choice flavor for free on your first-year anniversary.

The crew at Cake Expressions. We ended up selecting two tiers of tuxedo-with-raspberry-mousse and tuxedo-with-strawberry-mousse. Our top tier was tiramisu.

Flowers were another thing I lucked out on as my mom is a floral designer. I printed some photos of sample boutonnieres and bouquets from online that I liked. We went to several floral wholesalers with her business license so I could have my pick of fresh, seasonal flowers.

The boutonniere style that I selected for Tung, consisting of a purple phalaenopsis orchid with a few stems of bear grass as an accent.

I wanted my bouquet with purple phalaenopsis, gerbera daisies, and green accents to bring out the purple. I gave my mom this sample found on The Knot for her to recreate.

Flower wholesale shopping with Mom. Love these quirky green moss-like puffballs.

Fresh gerbera daisies and their color spectrum.

About 5 months from the wedding, and time to start thinking about the wedding bands. This is actually less stressing than settling on an engagement ring due to the cost--but then again, these are the rings you will be wearing for the life of your marriage (hopefully, for life), so it deserves some planning and careful consideration. Tung wanted a tungsten ring right off the bat, and I knew I had to go with platinum as that is the material of my engagement ring. I do plan to wear them together and needed the metals to be the same to avoid erosion from a softer metal grating against a harder one. We looked online for styles and brought printouts to The Classic Rock, our choice jewelry store where Tung also purchased my engagement ring. The staff is really down-to-earth and friendly, and Jeanne, the owner, offers an objective and free diamond-education class even if you do not buy your ring there so that you could make a more informed purchasing decision.

Tung likes this style called "Ares" found on TungstenWorld. The Classic Rock was able to find a close match to the style through one of their catalogs. It may be pricier to buy rings at a jewelry shop rather than online, but it's nice to be able to try it on. A style you may like may not look as you envisioned on your finger.

I did not want diamonds in my band as they would be harder to clean than a solid band--plus I'm not allowed to wear diamond-studded rings during aikido practice. Yes, I'm a geek to be factoring this in when selecting jewelry. So I opted for a plain platinum band and, as an accent, had it hand-engraved all the way around, modeled after this design.

Our wedding photographers, 102 Photography, did a great job with our wedding ring shot. This was taken in my backyard after the photographers spent a long time arranging the green-tipped matches in a heart shape. I now have a heart-shaped burn ring on my concrete, but it was a nice shot.

Jewelry, shoes, all that good stuff with the details. My friend Karen's sister, Jen, is a jewelry designer who lives in Colorado and runs her own business, Anosia. She has designed jewelry for me before, so I had her custom-make my necklace, bracelet, and earrings with freshwater pearls and chalcedony stones for my "something blue." I opted for comfort first with my wedding shoes and got a white pair at Naturalizer. I'm not good on heels but had to get some "height enhancement" for the wedding, so the heels served as a good 4-inch boost.

Liane fiddles with my jewelry for the photo shot.

Bridal shower! My bridesmaids kindly took a Friday off to decorate my house and put together goodie bags and games for my bridal shower in May. It was a daisy-themed shower, so they put together games like "Pin the flower on the dress" and gave away pens topped with a silk daisy that they put together by hand. Sandwiches, margaritas, and "bundtinis" from Nothing Bundt Cakes accompanied an afternoon filled with fun and laughter.

The house all jazzed up.

Opening the bridal shower presents.

Ladies' afternoon!

I feel like no wedding is truly complete without an appropriate, Bacchean frolic into the American hazing custom known as The Bachelorette Party. Aaaand that's all I'm gonna say about that.

Getting ready for a ladies' night out!

Somewhere in between all this are dance lessons. Luckily, we know a couple who partake in (and teach a bit of) ballroom dancing. Waltz is their preferred style, but Tung and I chose the song "Moondance" to a fox trot beat, and they good-naturedly helped us choreograph our dance. We spent several weekends in an apartment in Palo Alto, counting out beats and getting the footwork right to learn a different way of moving together aside from martial arts: dancing.

Along those lines, we opted early on to get a DJ who could also act as an MC instead of live musicians. We went with Diego from DJ D, who is my friend Julie's husband. He regularly DJs at clubs, school dances, and weddings. We provided a song list for him with our favorite songs broken down according to when he should play them along the wedding timeline, and we met up a few times to discuss MC'ing cues. Diego did setup for us in 3 different rooms (ceremony room, foyer for cocktail hour, and reception room) and helped us with the projector setup for our Love Story to be shown. So nice to leave this stuff to the professionals and not have to worry about it on the wedding day.

Tung and I decided to get customized M&Ms for our party favors. We got two of our engagement pictures printed, along with our names and wedding date, in M&Ms matching our wedding color. We spent an afternoon with the bridesmaids weighing the candy on a kitchen scale and distributing them in little heart-shaped containers with a customized printed ribbon attached. Having people chip in their time for the "big ticket" items such as assembling over a hundred party favors, wedding invitations, and wedding programs really helped.

Customized party favors. The rule of thumb for favors: edible, or usable!

For each of our 15 reception tables, Tung suggested naming them after a destination that we have been to as a couple. Johnny helped design the table cards with a pictorial representation of the destination. For each table, we also had a separate card that states why that particular locale was memorable for us. That card was framed by 15 pictures captioned after all the destination tables to show a sense of cohesiveness. We also made a crossword puzzle for each table, forming clues from both Tung's and my hobbies, favorites, and interests to encourage the guests at each table to mingle.

Reception tables all set up.

Our Head Table was named after our honeymoon destination, French Polynesia. This is a sample of the cards Johnny designed.

We also had fun hand-making The Octagon for our money box, re-using the cardboard in which our canvas picture was shipped (so many resources get wasted for weddings, it's nice to cut down, re-use, and use recyclable products when possible). Playing off Tung's and my interest and background in different martial arts, this was another nod to our wedding theme. We used blue gift wrap paper and printed out the chain-link design and "TapOut" logo. Johnny also designed the "fight stats" on top of the box. From measuring, cutting, wrapping, and gluing, total construction time for The Octagon took over a week, in which time we spent on our family room floor, watching the 2012 Summer Olympics while piecing it together.

The Octagon, waiting to receive wedding cards on the sign-in table.

It was so meaningful to be able to write my own ceremony and vows for the wedding. I got to incorporate a few poetry readings and had good family and friends come up to read. My college friend Kate Evans, whom we asked to be our officiant, was also able to hand off some great resources from a friend of hers who is well-acquainted with officiating weddings. We went through several drafts, but it was all worth it in the end. The internet is a great resource to check out how people write up their own ceremony, but ultimately it comes down to what means the most to the couple as they stand side-by-side, reading off lifetime vows to each other in a commitment of love.

The week of the wedding is a great time to have some pampering done. Let me just stress that I don't usually pamper myself and have never gotten my nails professionally done a day in my life up to the time I got married. However, it does feel nice to lie there for a facial at Capricious and sit in a massage chair for a mani/pedi with French-style nails done at iBeautify. Shellac/Gel is great as I am hard on my hands, and that stuff's practically invincible. I got my nails done 3 days before my wedding, and they still looked great and chip-free on the Big Day.

One thing I didn't much consider up to the tail end of the wedding planning was budgeting for decor. This includes any party rentals such as uplighting, chairs, tables, and linens if the venue does not provide them. It also includes extra backdrops (say, for the Head Table and indoor ceremony decor). I couldn't believe how much it cost to simply rent these items, but in the end, our decorator at 1000 Fine Events did such a splendid job that it felt well worth the money. From the crystal-draped bare branches of manzanita trees during our ceremony, to the picture backdrop flanked by my parents' decorated flower vases, to the rhinestone accents on our Head Table draping, lighting and linens helped lend an elegant ambiance to the wedding.

Family picture with drapery backdrop.

We got to stay overnight at one of the bridal suites in the Hilton as part of our package. They had nice details such as a gift basket filled with cheeses, sausage, and other goodies and offered breakfast-in-bed the morning after. At the end of the night, we were greeted by the sight of red rose petals decorating our bed upon coming back to our suite.

Our bridal bed.

What a momentous day! It seems strange that a day 1.5 years in the planning can speed by in such a blur. After the wedding, I looked into preservation. I wish I had researched bouquet preservation long before my wedding day, as by the time I got around to it after the wedding, the bouquet was past the point of being freeze-dried. Hanging it upside-down on a tree branch did not help as the vibrant colors did not stay preserved. It's better to leave that to the experts if you want to keep your bouquet for years to come.

I did manage to ship off my wedding dress for cleaning and preservation. David's Bridal offers a preservation kit that is cheapest when bought on the same day as your wedding dress. Dry cleaner's also offer wedding gown preservation, so it's best to research prices before getting this done. I pinned Post-Its with notes to the particularly stained areas to call them out (even though this was not a required step), stuck the dress in the provided bag and box, and sent it off with Fed Ex. It took less than 2 weeks for the dress to be returned to me.

Wedding dress packed and ready for cleaning.

Finally, to wrap things up, I sent for an official copy of our marriage certificate. To request a copy by mail in Santa Clara County, you would need to fill out a form and get your signature notarized (I got this done for $5 at a post office offering notary services). It costs $19 for the copy, and you'll have to also send in a self-addressed, stamped envelope. There is also an option of picking it up in person after the certificate has been filed, and this way, the notary fee gets waived.

The marriage license itself must be requested before the wedding, and you have 90 days to conduct your ceremony. The fee for the license is $79 (for a standard, non-confidential license). It must be signed by the bride, groom, officiant, and at least one witness before getting sent in after the wedding.

We are officially married! Hooray!

Here's a 5-minute clip of our wedding highlights by our videographer, Jared Lee from Spotlight Digital Creations:
http://vimeo.com/49989672 

Stay tuned for the sequel to this story, the honeymoon. :)