Cake, Merriment and Another Wedding Dinner!

The day after the wedding, we decided to have both our immediate families join us for tea at home. We ordered pizza, bought some muar chee, put out the Raya cookies we got from our neighbour and the Piece de resistance: the pretty wedding cake that mom, sis and I worked on. The chocolate cake was fantastic. The others also really enjoyed the bottom layer fruit cake which mom made.

Soon after, we packed up and headed to KL in preparation for the second wedding reception for my husband's parents' close friends. His relatives traveled down too to spend the week with us. My mother-in-law made a lovely roasted pork belly, mushroom soup and stir fried some vegetables. The youngest grandaunt made some ginger chicken as well. Needless to say, we had much food leftover as it could have fed an army. :) We handed out framed photos of us to my in-laws and my husband's grandmother as a souvenir.

The Second Big Day: I just love the pink and pretty flower centrepiece! The view overlooking the golf course was magnificent. My in-laws had catered from Tai Thong which meant that the food was superb. I was so happy that this dinner, we didn't have to run around to change clothes and that there were fewer guests so we could enjoy the food more! :D We had some unforgettable performances again that night. My husband's youngest grandaunt, Aaron and Addie were gracious enough to treat us to their lovely voices again, we also had songbird, Pearly with her beautiful rendition of The Wedding (Ave Maria), and last but not least we had a very touching performance from my mother-in-law accompanied by my bro-in-law/emcee on guitar of a very meaningful Cantonese song.

A view of the entrance to the Room. We had a slideshow of our photographs outside on the registration table. The parting gifts were very yummy Beryl chocolates and the pretty heart-shaped soaps which we also gave away in our first reception. I just loved the floral arrangements.

We had a stunning unplanned grand finale of fireworks! We gathered at the window and watched fireworks light up the night sky. What a night to remember.... :)

Many thanks to our families, friends and amazing photographers for helping us capture these moments in KL and making the day so fun and memorable for us both!

The Day Part VII: The Dinner Part III

This is the seventh and final installment of the tremendously eventful night. After the champagne pouring, it was time for the speeches! The photographers got such a beautiful family portrait of my sister, bro-in-law and niece. My nephew was fast asleep by then. :)

The speech from the father of the groom translated by my mother-in-law. Very touching and inspiring. They recollected Ying's childhood and how it was not easy to see the results of educating your children. They also spoke about how Ying's persistence and focus in his endeavours inspires us. Lastly, they quoted from the song 'Welcome to the Family' which happened coincidentally to be our concluding lines as well.

The speech from the father of the bride. My dad spoke about marriage being like two ropes- stronger than one but three ropes is the strongest with God binding us together. He also thanked our relatives who travelled from far and near to grace us with their presence. Both our parents quoted from the Scripture and their speeches really blessed our hearts.

Handsome Baby Christian- such a good sport all night long. 

After the very inspiring and touching speeches, we went round table by table for photos. This is my babysitter. :) We sat her together with my husband's babysitter as well. It was a wonderful reunion.

We didn't manage to make it to every table unfortunately before we had to be at the door. However, I must say we achieved quite a feat, there being 40 tables, we made it to about 35!

My stunning parents.

After sending our guests off, we celebrated my husband's fourth grandaunt's birthday which fell on the same day (Chinese leap month)! It was such a rare occasion as all the relatives were present in the same place at the same time. Interspersed all around the world in Japan, India, Singapore and UK... everyone was gathered for the grand occasion which was why it was so meaningful to celebrate her birthday then.

 We had some lovely family portraits taken... too many to share here and after the event, we stayed back on stage to hang out with our closer friends. We goofed about and took many silly pictures together.

The photographer caught a shot of my pedicure. :) Yeay!

After all the festivities were over, we went up to the room and spent some time with our family before retiring   for the night. The thunderstorm came at 1.30am- well after the time it was supposed to. :) We slept so soundly that night. I couldn't have wished for a better wedding! Many thanks to our family, friends and photographers for making this entire experience such a memorable and amazing one. 

The Day Part VI: The Dinner Part II

[Ying again!]

During the first part of the the lovely 8-course meal, we had four performances by some very important people in our lives. First, we had a certain friend of The Wife's together with her boyfriend, professional singers (!!), who serenaded us with a lovely song, For Always. 

Look, even in stills, they look professional!

For the next item, we had a performance of a Chinese song, 給你們. A very dear old brother whom I hadn't seen in years, and who flew in all the way from Hong Kong (!!) with his family (!!!!) to attend our wedding, sang and was accompanied by my two (biological) brothers. The performance was really awesome! It not only featured a jazzy rhythm created by 1 biological brother and a guitar solo by another, it also reminded me of a time many years ago when it was I who accompanied the non-biological brother for a performance in Nottingham. 

L-R: Non-bio bro, bio bro 1, bio bro 2

Then, my grandaunt took the stage for a rendition of the Cantonese classic, 萬水千山總是情. Not only was this a hit with the old folks (who formed a great number of attendees), even the younger guests were left humming the song long after the wedding reception! At some point, her grandson joined her on stage for a little dance.

Finally, the professional couple took the stage for a second time, singing Two Words. This was a song The Wife wanted to sing herself, but could not even get through a practice without tearing up! [Awww... so sweet right!]

Some of our favourite photos of the night- moments caught on camera!

Sister-in-law with my super adorable niece-in-law- Abigeloo

Sister-in-law's mother-in-law and my cutie nephew-in-law a.k.a. 'Little Nut'

Niece-in-law entertaining herself

My brother-in-law a.k.a. 'Brother from Another Mother'

The Wife and I

After the performances, we left for a change of dress/tie, while the guests were shown a slideshow of the photos from the earlier wedding ceremony. The photos wow-ed everyone literally: we had many 'wow's when we came back in after the change of outfit! Unfortunately we missed the slideshow, but have since watched it numerous times :)

Then was the champagne-pouring. I must say, for anyone contemplating whether or not to include this in their wedding reception, you must! It was calming and fun watching the champagne flow down the nicely stacked glasses. Simply a beautiful moment!

My bro, the emcee was brilliant at the toast. He rallied everyone and revolutionised toasting. Instead of the regular 'Yam Sengs', we did things a little differently. :) Our toast was 'Xin Hun Kuai Le!' (Happy Marriage!), replacing the word 'Nian' (in Happy New Year) with the word 'Hun' (Marriage). What a good idea and so meaningful for us. 

The Day Part V: The Dinner Part I

Onto the dinner reception. I have so many favourite parts of the day. Every photoload brings out another amazing facet of the wonderful day we had. Couldn't have asked for more. I loved the dinner reception so much as well. So many amazing moments.This was the view of the empty ballroom. Super happy to have gotten the buntings thrown in for free thanks to a wedding going on the day before otherwise it would have cost a bomb to hire people to put them up. The hotel rep was super lovely to allow these to remain up for our wedding.

I didn't even notice this until the dinner was over! :) Very happy with how this turned out. 

I love the fairy lights.

We decided to use one of our favourite pictures from the UK shoots as the backdrop when the performances were not going on. It was taken in Covent Garden. We were having a laugh over crepes.

Menu- no typos I think! :D

Love the red daisies.

Again, our creative photographers! :)

The sun starting to set.

Heading down for dinner. 

The entrance with another of our favourite pictures on Westminster Bridge. Many thanks to On Ngen, Lou Yeah and the husband for their crafts in action. Colgate works magic on glass!

Pretty, pretty buntings!

This is one of my favourite shots which I had to have. Somehow the image of the sun setting and the coconut trees against the colonial design of the building, with the bodhi tree peeping out from above and the intricate details of the conservatory with its yellow lightbulbs just makes me feel very nostalgic and warm inside.

We had some time to take outdoor portrait shots when it was not scorching hot anymore. This was uber fun!

Love the sky and the blur image of the coastline. Thank God the haze had somewhat faded away due to the previous days of rain. When we arrived in Penang, we couldn't see more than 200 ms ahead of us on the bridge because of all the haze. It was the worst I've ever seen and yet no one was wearing masks unlike sometime during my high school years. I remember everyone was wearing masks and the haze was not even as bad then.

And we enter.....to flower petals flying at us from every direction. Haha! They gathered nicely on my train. 

And my photographer did not miss it! :) Thanks so much chienyuin!

And dinner is served!