Our Backyard Wedding
November 05, 2016
So we have reached a point in our lives which most of our peers have passed. When we were away, our friends were either busy getting married or attending weddings back home. I watched how they have organised theirs and wondered why does it feel like putting up a show and start to question if the whole point behind the union of two has been missed. The bride is the main driver behind the show but I am not interested in any sort of grand or fairy tale like wedding, like some girls do. Further, I don't see a need to spend all that money and time to organise one when there are more pressing matters to deal with in New Zealand. Also, I don't like to be in a situation where everyone is looking at me. So nothing's taken off in our case after being engaged for three years.
My lovely colleagues prepared a morning tea for me along with balloons, confetti and even a little wedding veil hair band. I received a big card containing their well wishes and a $150 Queensgate gift card.
They printed a picture of this couple in traditional Chinese wedding outfit and laminated it. They used parts of a file (the two ends sticking out where you slot your papers through) to create this cake topper. How thoughtful and creative. I took the balloons and confetti back to reuse them as decorations on the actual day.
If there wasn't any catalyst (being family coming over for a visit) I doubt I would have done anything. Initially, I wanted to do it at the registry office but the dates were not suitable. I wanted to aim for the 5th as it would be our 9 years and 7 months together. Coincidentally, 5th of November is also Guy Fawkes Day. One day, on the way home on the train after work, I was looking up a list of wedding celebrants on my phone and decided to contact Gwyn. We were his first customers and he was happy not to collect a fee! The next thing to decide was whether to hire a venue and whether to invite anyone. Clearly the easiest would be no venue, no guests and no food. We bought our clothes at H&M Auckland but missed the chance to fix my hair as I had assumed Jin Jen would be open on a public holiday. One day, I was having lunch at Sushimaru and I know the staff there were Koreans so I decided to ask them if they know of any Korean hairdressers in town and was recommended Amore. We had our hair cut there and booked my hair and makeup appointment. That helped to fix the ceremony time. Three days before our wedding, I managed to engage Mel Waite as our photographer. Flowers were bought in the morning at the market. The kind seller even helped me tie them into a bouquet all for $21. Unfortunately, I ruined one stalk when trying to rearrange and the groom was furious. While I did my make up, he went to buy his shoes. We then headed back home, put up the decorations, got changed and the folks helped to prepare refreshments. Gwyn turned up 15 mins early I made him a cup of tea and we waited for Mel to come. She was on time and we were ready to start.
My lovely colleagues prepared a morning tea for me along with balloons, confetti and even a little wedding veil hair band. I received a big card containing their well wishes and a $150 Queensgate gift card.
They printed a picture of this couple in traditional Chinese wedding outfit and laminated it. They used parts of a file (the two ends sticking out where you slot your papers through) to create this cake topper. How thoughtful and creative. I took the balloons and confetti back to reuse them as decorations on the actual day.
If there wasn't any catalyst (being family coming over for a visit) I doubt I would have done anything. Initially, I wanted to do it at the registry office but the dates were not suitable. I wanted to aim for the 5th as it would be our 9 years and 7 months together. Coincidentally, 5th of November is also Guy Fawkes Day. One day, on the way home on the train after work, I was looking up a list of wedding celebrants on my phone and decided to contact Gwyn. We were his first customers and he was happy not to collect a fee! The next thing to decide was whether to hire a venue and whether to invite anyone. Clearly the easiest would be no venue, no guests and no food. We bought our clothes at H&M Auckland but missed the chance to fix my hair as I had assumed Jin Jen would be open on a public holiday. One day, I was having lunch at Sushimaru and I know the staff there were Koreans so I decided to ask them if they know of any Korean hairdressers in town and was recommended Amore. We had our hair cut there and booked my hair and makeup appointment. That helped to fix the ceremony time. Three days before our wedding, I managed to engage Mel Waite as our photographer. Flowers were bought in the morning at the market. The kind seller even helped me tie them into a bouquet all for $21. Unfortunately, I ruined one stalk when trying to rearrange and the groom was furious. While I did my make up, he went to buy his shoes. We then headed back home, put up the decorations, got changed and the folks helped to prepare refreshments. Gwyn turned up 15 mins early I made him a cup of tea and we waited for Mel to come. She was on time and we were ready to start.
The ceremony lasted about 20∼30 mins. It was all a blur knowing that this was once in a lifetime, I wanted to take in the moment but was nervous at the same time. His words moved me to tears and I had trouble reading out mine. We took some photos, got changed and went out to take some more photos. Mel was very attentive, patient and did her best to fulfill our requests. During the photoshoot she asked us questions to make us laugh so we can relax and look more natural. We said nonsense to each other and got her cracking at one point. She drove us to the Silverstream bridge and we had to navigate over stones along the riverbed; I was trying not to dirty my pink shoes. The next stop was Trentham Memorial Park. There was a big oak tree and she climbed up the tree to take some shots of us lying on the grass. She did a silhouette of us and the folks helped to toss the leftover confetti on us towards the end of the shoot at Trentham Memorial Park. As she drove us back home, she spotted a beautiful cherry blossom tree at Upper Hutt Baptist church and we stopped for a couple of beautiful shots. We had some more photos taken in her car and that was the end of the shoot.
We had something to eat, rest, cooked dinner and waited for night fall to set off fireworks in the park. It was our first time fiddling with fireworks and the inexperienced me did not plant them properly; they were shooting and exploding back at us! It was damn funny and scary at the same time. I didn't managed to catch nice shots of the fireworks as there was just no way to know which direction it was gonna go. This was the best one that I got.
On 5 November 2016, we are finally married after a very long engagement. Hip hip hooray!
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