GP and I pre-engagement. We were in a vegetarian cafe in ChCh, NZ – the place where GP was born and raised.

Hello all, ……. Yes, that line is from Fight Club to those who want to know.

Let me introduce myself! I am the eichanist and I’m currently planning a mini-destination wedding in the Hunter Valley with my awesome fiance GP. I have my own blog, the Wedding Rollercoaster, where I have posted most of my wedding-related posts (with the occassional offhand post about life).

This is my first PolkaDot Weddings post, so I am a little bit new at this. I’m an Australian-Chinese-Indonesian girl, who was born and raised in Sydney. I met my now-fiance GP about 2 years ago over the Interwebs and we’ve been engaged for just over 7 months. My fiance is Dutch-Kiwi and works for a little-known company called IBM. I’m a Criminology student, hoping to get into an Honours research degree.

We only recently got the date for our wedding due to cultural reasons, but now that we have one, we’re well underway to planning our dream wedding! I’ve learnt so far during this seven(ish) months that I need more patience and that I won’t always get replies when I want to. It took about 2 months for me to get an engagement ring and another 4 months after that until we got our wedding date. GP has been so patient with me and my strange cultural traditions, and I know for sure I’ve found someone who will always be there for me.

Now let’s move on to the less sappy.

I bet all of you are wondering what exactly I’ve done in the past seven months of my planning. Well, I’ve outlined it for you! So here’s the basic lowdown:

  • We’ll be having five each in our bridal party (big bridal party, I know. I typically get an ‘are you crazy’ look from other people…)
  • The bridesmaids dresses will be bought online. I’m a student, and I’m buying their dresses, so I can’t justify spending $200-$400 for each bridesmaid.
  • The groom and groomsmen will be buying their suits, as we’ve worked out that renting and buying cost about the same (and buying means newer, classier suit!)
  • We have our reception and ceremony space booked.
  • I’ve booked hair and makeup and will be getting my trial early next year. I had to ensure that the makeup artist could work on sensitive skin and had experience applying makeup to an Asian client (as about 95% of my half of the bridal party are Asian).
  • We’re in the process of getting both photography and videography booked. YAY!
  • I’m in the process of thinking about flowers. My fiance has told me he and his groomsmen do not intend to wear bouttonieres, which is great! I don’t have to think about it now, yay!
  • We need to find a new cake-maker because the one we wanted to use isn’t doing wedding cakes any more! 🙁 SAD. We want to have a cupcake tower, although I’ve been musing over a dessert buffet…
  • We both need to start losing more weight! GP has been fantastic and has lost more weight than me – curse you womanly fat!
  • I need to find a place to do manicures, pedicures, hair treatments and facials for sensitive skin.
  • We need to find a well-priced wedding band that does some DJ work in the Hunter Valley. I’ve found two, but I have to check their availability and I want to know how they perform.
  • GP has found a fantastic celebrant and we’ll be meeting her in the New Year.
  • I’ve been musing decorations for the reception, including centrepieces. GP is keen on following with our cherry blossom theme, and we both really like the look of ‘weeping willow’. We’ve found an awesome event decorating business in the Hunter Valley!
  • I’m getting my dress made by the wonderful Mandy Heng!
  • I need to start thinking of accessories that go with my dress. I already own a pair of shoes for the wedding, all’s I need to do now is figure out jewellery, veil, hairpieces, and whether or not I should wear a garter…
  • We’ve bought a tea set for the Chinese tea ceremony and we’re thinking about what we can do about the tea for the ceremony.
  • I need to start assembling the invitations! We have to send them out so our Out-of-Town (OOT) guests can book their flights and accommodation.

And that’s all I can remember. I’m sure there’s more, but I’ve been tired for the past few days! So my brain isn’t in a thinking mood. I have no pretty pictures to put up in this post. I don’t take many pictures of myself. And you can see why, as demonstrated above. I have awkward-face. Hopefully my next post will be more rivetting!

And that’s it from me for now.

Ta-ta!

Ms Gingham says: We’ll be looking forward to hearing all about GP and the eichanist’s AKA Eileen’s wedding plans! It looks like there’s plenty to keep them both busy! Phew!

Eileen says: “I am a Chinese-Indonesian-Australian getting married to a Dutch-Kiwi. We’ll be having our wedding up in the Hunter Valley and we’re planning it from Sydney. Although our wedding is still more than a year away, we’re trying to plan it now to save the stress later! (We’ll see how that goes). “