San Juan Nepomuceno Church

Yeng's 2 must haves for the church where we will be wed.

1. must be airconditioned
2. must have a wooden door from where she can make a grand entrance.

My condition was that it should not be too big, as I didn't want it to look empty with our modest guest list.

Other nice-to-have's were:

1. looks rustic
2. lenient in terms of song selection for the bridal march

We actually spent one day driving around Manila to look at the available options and we even wandered into a couple of weddings. Some of the churches were nice. Others were so-so. Some had a very short distance from entrance to altar (sabi namin ni Yeng no chance to emote going to the altar), while some had glass doors (walang dramtic entrance). Some had strange requirements (reservations accepted only when the requirements are complete) while others had stranger terms and conditions (church has the right to unplug the music at any time during the march/ceremony). Some were farely priced while others were skyhigh (like wedding reception venue budget plus plus high)

To make the long story short, we will not be wed in Manila but in San Juan Batangas where there is only one Catholic church where weddings can be held: San Juan Nepomuceno Church.

Wooden door - check
A/C - not a chance
Size - big enough to be the only Church in San Juan Batangas.

One out of three is not really what we were hoping for, but you've got to take the good with the rest of it. Besides do we get props for getting wed in the church people remember more as the Juday-Ryan Church? Lol!

Here's what the facade of the San-Juan Nepomuceno Church looks like. The facade actually has a nice look to it, very rustic and old-world looking. If you look closer, you'll see Yeng in white waving her hands at me to hurry in.

Contract Reviews

Here comes the hard part. After choosing the suppliers and paying their reservation fees, its now time to pour over the contracts. This is hard work!

What's difficult is the need to balance how to protect yourself and your supplier from anything that could go wrong during your wedding day (you can only marry once) vs. appearing as a pushy and demanding client. Too much or too little of either could bring forth a disastrous and expensive event.

To all the married couples out there, did you even review your supplier contracts in detail or did you just sign and hoped that professionalim and etiquette will protect you from all possible blunders that could happen?

Still No Caterer

The church, reception venue and caterer are the so called holy trinity of wedding planning in the Philippines. Miss one and you have no wedding (well technically the church is all you need but a Filipino wedding just won't be complete without a festive program and a meal).

Yeng and I have already booked our venue and church but are still on the lookout for our would-be caterer. We've already tried a couple but we haven't really decided which one to go for.

The safest one, one we could consider in the bag, would be the catering services provided by our venue. We've already completed our food tasting and while there were some culinary keepers in the menu we tried, there were a couple that we don't mind swapping with other items in their menu. The advantage of having the reception catered by the resort is that we don't have to spend additional OOT fees and we the rent of the resort would be include the package. That saves us money, time, and the number of people we have to deal with.

One other option we are looking at is a well known restaurant from the metro. If we end up choosing them, they would completely complement our theme of having a Santorini sunset-inspired wedding reception. They would also be able to offer us additional items that would add to the grecian look that we are hoping for, FOC. They will be coming out with their quotation on Wednesday and hopefully we could go for some food tasting during the weekend.

Another option that was originally at the top of our list is another well known metro restaurant famous for its pastries, cakes and french macaroons. Yeng worked tirelessly to get a quotation from them and finally we now have one from them. Just getting one from them almost made us give up! Good thing Yeng persisted. We hope we can tweak it a little bit more to negotiate a cake or a dessert bar. Hopefully we could schedule our food tasting with them within the week as well.

Finally, the last but not the least, is a Batangas-based caterer that has managed to successfully break into the mainstream wedding catering business. The good thing about this catering group is that they would be able to provide us with free lights or a three tiered cake FOC. Also since they are based in Batangas, they have a no OOT per se. We've had our food tasting with them and though not super WOW, they compete quite well with other mainstream wedding caterers. Plus their desserts are a notch higher than most. I would say that with this caterer you get the right value for what you pay.

One thing we've learned through all this is that it's actually a lot harder to find catering for a small wedding than the more standard 150plus-guest-wedding. That combined with our out of town venue makes it doubly harder. Hopefully even with these challenges, we hope to get the best caterer that we can. One that will be able to feed and please our small gathering of hungry guests.

Where's Yeng?

You'll probably notice that for the past couple of days all the posts have been made by me. Well apart from what Yeng calls as my being a "groomzilla" which I still am contesting, the main reason why Yeng has been missing is because she has to do 15hrs additional OT this week. She also did 12hrs last week.

Even though she hasn't been posting, she accompanied me last weekend to meet up with a potential designer for my suit. We also went to a bridal fair last Saturday where we managed to book our Discovery Weekend. This week we haven't really done anything yet, though I'm meeting up with another designer this evening. This coming weekend were meeting up with Yeng's designers naman.

So yun, while she's working hard (and tweeting away - see far right), I've been grromzilla-ing for the past couple of days. Woot woot.

RedSheep - Video

RedSheep (http://www.redsheepphotography.com/blog/) is currently one of the hottest wedding photography outfit in the country today. Their photos have that unique look, their packages are well priced, they deliver well against their schedule and the photographers are very professional and yet very barkada-like in terms of their relationship with their clients.

Of course, I have to admit that Gujel, Puy and Chie were friends and colleagues of mine well before they entered the industry, so I may be biased. So just drop by their website to see for yourself. Also the fact that they are almost fully booked for 2010 says something about this group right?

Anyway, having said that, RedSheep is relatively new to videography (vs their photography ). But such is my faith in the creativity and professionalism of Gujel that by January of next year, Redsheep would be a household name in wedding videography as it is now in photography. Who knows our wedding might be a launchpad for their video outfit right (if they aren't video stars by then, that is)?

But as they say, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. And hopefully this lamb pudding would be one of our favorites come January 2011!

DIY Project #1: Save the Date

The nice thing about planning for a small wedding is that we can afford to do a couple of things D.I.Y. Not only would it be cheap (well sometimes not really since suppliers can leverage on economy of scales), but it's also fun and more personalized. Plus more bonding moments (minsan arguments din) pa for me and Yeng! Cool!

First off our DIY list is the "Save the Date". Though most of our friends already know when and where our wedding will be, we thought that sending out Save the Dates would still be appropriate for a destination wedding like ours.

Thinking back to our theme of sunsets, we played around with the idea of whites, blues and oranges. Yeng was really good in playing around with CS4 and once she discovered how to play around with brushes, designing the save the date just took off! We went through a couple of iterations playing around with the colors, fonts, even having flowers at one point. I had to find a "sun" that was acceptable to Yeng as she initially thought it would look weird. We even managed to come up with a little rhyme that we thought added a little bit of fun to the save the date.

We eventually chose this design.


The black iteration that we did.


Some test prints we did. The black was actually gorgeous too but we just didn't want to complicate our colors. Besides gastos din sa ink. Hehe.

Acuatico Beach Resort - Reception Venue and Hotel

Yeng and I went to Acuatico this Saturday for our food tasting. Yeng and I had a fantastic time chatting with the owner Ms. Monet Gusi. We had such a good time that by the time we finished our lunch, it was almost 3PM.

I found out that like me, Monet was also a "promdi" (she was from San Juan, Batangas and I was from Bay, Laguna) who attended UP as a full scholar (she had STFAP and I had DOST). We also found out that just like Yeng, she experiences the same "inconvenice" when she travels to really cold countries. Hinde ko na tuloy mainis si Yeng na weird siya kasi may kakampi na siya haha. We also met her son, Rafael. He was so funny and cute! I can just imagine him being the PR Manager of the Gusis by the time he reaches his teens. We also had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Noli Gusi.

It's quite inspiring that this very beautiful resort is owned by a young Filipino entrepreneur couple. Just goes to show what we Filipinos can do if we put our hearts and minds into something. World class talent talaga.

Here's a picture of Acuatico I took during our visit. This was taken from their dining hall. Nice noh?


For more info about acuatico, you can visit their website here.

5 Items off our To Do list

I never realized how big the wedding industry is in our country until we were faced with so many choices from one supplier to another. As Dale previously posted, we went to our first bridal fair last January, and boy was I overwhelmed with the number of options to choose from. After much research, debate and consideration, we've trimmed down our choices and booked the following suppliers:

1. Church:San Juan Nepomuceno Church - I had to give up my church-must-be-air conditioned requirement since this is the only church near our chosen resort. I will just have to pray that it's breezy during the ceremony. I'd hate to look oily and sweaty in our pictures!!

2. Reception:Acuatico Resort - Of all the resorts around the area, I would have to say that Acuatico is one, if not the nicest, resort there. Plus, the size of the resort is perfect for our intimate gathering. The only thing I don't like about Acuatico is it has a very small beach front. One step to the right and you're at Balai; one step to the left, you're at another resort. I hope there's not much guests in the other resorts on that weekend, hehe.

3. Photo:Pilar Tuason - After much consideration, we decided to go with Pilar. Don't get me wrong, she's great at what she does. She's famous for making brides look stunning in their pictures. The only thing that was kind of holding us back was, well, the fee. But see, having a great photographer is one of Dale's (a.k.a MyGroomzilla) non-negotiable. I'm sure this is a great investment.

4. Video:Guj of Redsheep - We've seen a couple of his work. We've seen him improve at his craft. He offers a high-definition video package with a fee no other videographer can match. He's Dale's friend. No more questions asked.

5. OTD:Rhona and Jets Battung - It wasn't easy looking for a coordinator. There's just way too many of them out there. After reading good reviews from fellow W@Wies and a good chat with Jets, we decided to get them as our OTD. I hope they'll make our preparation as stress-free as possible.

We still have a loooooong way to go. But having booked these 5 major suppliers is a big accomplishment for us. Hoping to get more done in the next few months.

Next on the list - caterer, stylist/florist, designer, HMUA (hair and make up artist).

Any suggestions?

Rest Day Today

After almost 1 week straight of meeting up with potential suppliers (having successfully reserved 4), Yeng and I take a break today.

Can't miss AI 2 nights in a row I guess.

______________________

Now, I was disturbed by what a supplier mentioned yesterday. As long as this doesn't happen on our wedding day.



Alay na lang ng itlog. At magdasal ng magdasal. At magdala ng payong.

Mood Boards and Sunsets

One of the earliest decision that has to be made in preparing for a wedding is the theme. It helps the couple choose the motif, the design of the dresses, the lay out of the wedding reception, the food, etc etc.

Yeng and I initially thought of having a white beach wedding. White always looks so simple yet beautiful, and its understated elegance is just stunning. But alas, Juday and Ryan beat us to using the theme, and pursuing so would just add to the similarities. Well yung church lang naman ang parehas, but I'd like to keep it that way as much as possible. Oh of course there's one more, Ryan and I are both good looking bespectacled gentlemen. Woot woot.

So Yeng and I decided to look for something else that was at the same time beautiful and simple. Eventually we decided on something that we both liked and thought would be an apt theme for our wedding.

Sunsets are beautiful if one but pauses to appreciate them. Just like how a wedding announces the journey of two people that have decided to navigate life together as one, the sunset is also a short and beautiful event that starts the journey of the moon and the stars through the landscape of night.

I once read this poem by David Harris...

...Just beyond the sunset
Someone waits for me
Just beyond the sunset
Lies my destiny...

...There I'll find the treasure
Of love eternally

On January 8, 2011, the sunset brings me to my destiny.

(Then we can start making those cute little baby stars...)

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As we didn't want to be overwhelmed by bright hues of orange and blue (remember the undertstated part?), we chose a particular sunset that we thought would be nice for a beach wedding. We wanted a theme where elements of white provide a nice clean palette for the strong colors of blue and orange. And where else in the world would you see white, blue and orange mixed seamlessly? Santorini and Mykonos of course!

Over the weekend we tried to cram in one A3 size sheet all the ideas, colors and elements we thought represented what we wanted during our special day. And here is how it turns out:



Now that I'm armed with a mood board, I think I'm a little bit more comfortable facing suppliers and their thousand and one questions. With a mood board, I don't have to talk that much. You know what they say, a picture paints a thousand words and having 24 images in one A3 sheet should say a lot.