Project Wedding Blog

Planning for the Big Day:
Once we decided on an early Oct wedding, I immediately chose our theme colors of deep reds & oranges with accents of bronze and chocolate brown to echo fall colors.  Daniel and I wanted our setting to evoke elegance, warmth, and romance but, most importantly, we wanted to host an affair that reflects who we are as individuals and as a couple - one that is humorous/whimsical, emotional, fun, and filled with surprises (for each other and our guests).  We booked our venue and photographer on our own with relative ease but realizing we both had demanding work schedules as well as a large guest list (we invited 300+ guests), I convinced Daniel that we needed a coordinator.  Katherine of Custom Celebrations came highly recommended by friends and she was a God-sent savior for us!  Our wedding festivities would not have been as wonderful as they had turned out without her support and assistance.  Among other tasks, Katherine helped us to find and book most of the other vendors, accompanied us to vendor/on-site appts, and made sure we got hitched without a hitch.  :)  I was surprisingly calm and relaxed on our big day knowing that she would manage all of the vendors and ensured we were on schedule throughout the day.

Elements of Surprises:
Since the beginning of our relationship, Daniel and I would often surprise each other by doing thoughtful things for one another, booking unexpected weekend getaways, or buying little gifts and I wanted our wedding to be no different…apparently, so did Daniel.  During the ceremony, after I read my emotional vows, I had expected him to recite his.  Instead, one of his groomsmen picked up a guitar and Daniel announced that he’d serenade his vows!  I was utterly shocked.  So with the help of 1 groomsman on the guitar and the other 5 as his “backup” singers, Daniel sang a very emotional rendition of Plain White T’s “1,2,3,4″, one of the songs we chose for our wedding website.  I later found out that they started practicing during his bacholor party weekend!  It was definitely one of our sweetest memories from the ceremony.

Then it was my turn to surprise him at the reception.  Knowing that his favorite form of dance performance is flamenco, I arranged a flamenco dancer/guitarist duo to give Daniel and our guests a surprise performance during dinner.  He absolutely loved every second of it!  Also, I had learned about groom cakes from attending a friend’s wedding and have since thought it was an adorable addition to the cake cutting tradition.  Since Daniel’s passion is photography, my wedding present to him was a Canon SLR camera and I thought it would be fitting and special to surprise him with a groom cake in the likeness of my wedding present (with one of our engagement photos on the “screen” of the camera cake).  As you can see from our photos, the cake looked amazing and many of our guests were in disbelief that the “camera” was actually a cake.  We were so in awe with the cake that we didn’t have the heart to cut it until the day after the wedding.

In addition to surprises for each other, we also planned some special parts of the wedding for our guests:
–During the cocktail hour, we hired a caricature artist to draw caricatures of our guests as part of the entertainment.  We also displayed a Picture/Wish Tree on which we hung photos of our parents’ and grandparents’ weddings or dating days as a tribute to them along with our guests’ wish/sign-in cards.
–At the reception, instead of table number cards, we placed “date” number cards on each table with date & details of the first 26 dates we had, exactly as they were written by Daniel on the cards he presented to me when he proposed.  It was our way of getting the guests to visit different tables, hopefully mingle with other guests, and find out what we did on our dates.
–We’re both avid basketball fans so for our intro to the reception, we both donned our favorite NBA team’s (Golden State Warriors) jerseys with “Mr. Lee” and “Mrs. Lee” embroidered on our backs.  Our MC announced us and our bridal party members as if we were teams playing in a NBA game.
–During the reception, whenever our guests clang their glasses for us to kiss, we picked a couple from the guests and asked them to kiss, then emulated their kisses (one of the couples even did a chest bump before kissing!).  Then in lieu of the bouquet & garter toss (b/c most of Daniel’s and my friends are no longer single), we had a special couples’ dance, at the end of which only the longest married couple remained and we presented them with a bouquet and the garter.  Last but certainly not least, our special sweet treat for our guests was presented after the cake cutting when the hotel staff rolled out an ice cream cart along with a giant umbrella we had rented filled with Good Humor ice cream cones…we simply couldn’t let our guests have cake without ice cream!!  ;)  our guests were so excited and all came rushing at once that the 2 of us could barely keep up with giving them out.  I must say the surprised ended up being on us b/c we had no idea how much fun it would be to hand out the cones and that experience would be the highlight of the reception for us.
–To top off the night, during dancing, one of Daniel’s family dogs joined us on the dance floor with his bowtie & tux collar.  We were so pleased that Hotel Sofitel is a dog-friendly hotel and we had a 4-legged family member at the wedding.
–Throughout the evening, I also kept the guests guessing with a couple of wardrobe changes.  I wore 3 dresses total (the wedding gown, a modern-cut mermaid Chinese gown, and a short white party dress) along with 2 gorgeous custom-made hairpieces from one of PW’s favorite hairstylist/MU artist, Giao Nguyen.  It was so much fun having different looks for the same night!