Kitty & Terry's Wedding (1 October 2010)

Kitty and Terry are a couple who I've known before they became a couple (officially...) and they met each other by being pen pals first! How often does that happen? I think this is something very special for this couple. Not only do they complement each other very well, but they are just full of surprises!

They planned their wedding full of surprises for each other, and as their guests, we were privileged to be a part of these surprises and witness the love that they share.

As with all weddings, I met up with the couple to discuss what ideas they had - find out what they like/dislike, what made them special to each other and to family and friends who know them. Kitty's favourite colour is blue, so that immediately became something that I wanted to incorporate into their wedding. Blue is not a common colour for weddings, and especially for a Chinese wedding, where traditional parents want RED AND GOLD! So we compromised that we would do the church decoration with a hint of blue. For the banquet, as the venue was mostly in gold tone fabrics I thought it would be colour to do blue accents, especially since Terry's in the Police Force (surprise!), but because of the bride's parents, we didn't do that in the end - plus it might have become a bit too nautical/sailor-ish.


Kitty and Terry told me that they would also like to use feather boas as decorations! When I first heard that, I said, "Ok, let me think about that, we can definitely do something..."

The end of September was an extremely busy time for me at work as the company was going on a trip and I helped to coordinate the trip, at the same time I had to prepare for the wedding (thankfully, Kitty and Terry were fantastic and got quite a lot done on their own) and also do some last minute preparations for my trip to Seoul, Korea (again, thankfully, it was all pretty much planned over the summer by email with Eve).

So while I was doing my usual pre-wedding prep work at home, I didn't even THINK about taking photos as I was working... but I can show you the schedules and lists that I made for the last two weeks leading up to the wedding...

At our church, usually for Saturday weddings, they will have two large fresh flower arrangement on either side of the altar, however, as their wedding day was a Friday, there would not be one made in time. So, Kitty asked me if I can do one for them. I have to admit that I am no green fingered florist, only worked at a flower shop in Toronto, but thanks to my boss's encouragement I decided to give it a try. For the church decoration I was decorating the pews with light blue feathered balls that I made using the feather boas with chiffon swag. Terry purchased two arches from a garden centre that he wanted to use in the decorations too. In order to complement the feather and airiness of the chiffon, I decided to make two large arrangements with baby's breath - reiterating the circular/ball-shape and the delicate and light feel of the fabric. With fresh flowers, I had to keep them in air conditioned rooms all night! In my room! I arrived home from work the day before the wedding and opened my bedroom door to be overpowered by the fragrance from the flowers. Didn't know that Baby's breath actually had a smell.... Unfortunately I didn't take a photo of the buckets of flowers in my room.

So on to the day of the wedding...

Arrived at 7:15am at the bride's home and checked that everyone was on schedule getting ready and dressed. Met up with the groom and groomsmen by the area where their cars were parked. The photographers arrived to take some photos of the groomsmen at work putting decoration on the bridal car.

As the groomsmen and I were waiting for the bridesmaids' go ahead that all was ready, we realized that the groom had forgotten to bring the bride's bouquet! Aiya! I quickly rushed upstairs to the bride's home and thankfully there were fresh roses that was supposed to be used for the bride's hair - I quickly made a small bouquet (again, thanks to my training at Flower Accents!) and took some lace ribbon that I had for emergency and wrapped it up nicely and secured it with pearl pins. phwhee!

left to right: groomsmen and bridesmaids negotiating a price; groomsmen making excuses about not having enough money - need to pull out the red pockets they got as thank yous from the groom; Maid of Honor blocking the way to the bride!

The guys were met by a group of crazy bridesmaids who were determined to make it as painful as possible for the groom and his buddies before handing over the bride. The guys had to eat dried squid from a line hanging with their 'stinky' socks, they had to pair up and put ladies stockings over their head AND THEN slurp tofu, lemon juice and hot pepper through the stockings! Lastly, the groom had to rap his way to find his bride by pulling on a string - the father of the bride was at the end of the string unfortunately... This was truly the most hilarious (and painful for the groomsmen) thing I've seen, but they were all such good sports and I think they will all remember it!

left to right: line of stinky socks, ladies stocking challenge, rapping out his commitment

above: the lads TRYING to push their way past the bridesmaids

Terry has selected a red string, he's pulling to see if his bride is at the end of the string...


Who appears................................................................... His Father-in-law!

A big kiss for laughs!

After the tea ceremony at the bride's home, the couple left with their Maid of Honor and Bestman to go to the groom's home. I had to scurry off to church to finish up decorating and prepping for the ceremony. I had 4 large arrangements to make! It may not look like it's much, just make a ball out of baby's breath, but really until you actually starting arranging the flowers you have no idea how exactly you're going to accomplish the task.... Again, racing against time, so no chance to take a photo, plus I even took off my belt to be comfortable and there were bits and pieces of stems and leaves all over the place, very messy!

Other than the blue feather balls spaced out between pews, I also did chiffon swag. The arches were wrapped with white feather boas and with some extra yards of chiffon, I drapped the sides. For one of the arches, I left some parts of the top exposed to let light through.

At first, I thought that if we could not get fresh flowers or I didn't have time to make the arrangements we could just do without them, but when I see the photos now, I think that the flower arrangements helped to make the photo more interesting. If they were not there, it would just look like Sunday service.

With the groom being in the police force, his fellow officers did a simple sword drill at the end of the ceremony. Supposedly those swords are really heavy, but I didn't get a chance to hold one... :( hehehe...

After the ceremony and many group photos - both sides' extended families were present..., we finally headed across the harbour to the reception banquet venue. 1 Oct is a public holiday in Hong Kong and China as it's National Day (China's birthday), so there were fireworks scheduled for that evening and many of the roads near the hotel were expected to be blocked off. We quickly made our way to the venue, but thankfully there was no traffic and also there was practically no extra decorations needed. Plus the evening's activities were plenty so I don't think anyone would have thought about the decorations. :D

So here's what happened that night.

The groom and bride marched-in to the banquet with a sword drill, then after the normal toasting and speech, the first course was served. After three courses (there's like 12 courses/dishes at a Chinese wedding), the bride had a surprise for the groom. She got the flower girl to give the groom a present - a scrapbook she made, and while Terry was busy unwrapping the present she entered and got on stage with her saxophone! She serenaded Terry with "Nothing's gonna change my love for you". Terry, not to be outdone, sang a song for Kitty while pretending to play the piano... hahaha.... he even told me to tell the videographer not to zoom in too close...

Then Terry continued to surprise his bride and all the guests, he rushed out to change and re-entered the banquet venue with drums, cymbals, and a large entourage doing a Chinese Lion Dance! This was a total surprise! What's even better is that he got his dad and two brothers to help out as well. His dad was the one beating the drum, one brother was the back of the lion and other was the "child" who teases the lion. Great team work!

After that there was table toasting, and THEN, they presented awards to their parents and grandmas, as both Kitty's and Terry's grandmas played a big part in bringing up these two kids. Terry is known amongst friends and family to reject an offer to have dinner or stay out late because he eats dinner with his grandma whenever he can. Awww, such a sweet guy!

Terry surprised Kitty by having four friends serenade the crowd and Kitty with David Tao's 'Love is Simple'. The four guys put on wigs and sang their hearts out, enjoying all the attention. Terry, then, presented Kitty with an award.

There. That's it. The night was a success!

And I was utterly exhausted. :D




Coming soon: Korea trip with Eve and more photos from the first wedding (June) from the hired photographer... hope there are some good photos in there to share with you.