We did it!  We’re married!  Man, the last few days have been such a whirlwind.  It really does fly by and time seems to pass so fast.  So many of our wonderful friends and family were there and I wish I had more time to talk to everyone!  Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for attending!  It meant the world to us to see everyone present.  All wedding-related activities were so much fun: the 4th of July BBQ, the rehearsal dinner, the actual wedding and the day-after brunch.  We were also incredibly fortunate to get such fabulous summer weather here!  It’s actually unusually hot—today it’s hitting the mid-90’s in Seattle and like over 100 tomorrow…..which is HIGHLY unusual for Seattle!  In either case, we were so happy to get such wonderful weather.  I’m writing now with 4 hours left before leaving for airport to being our trip to TAHITI!  I’m still packing and needing to prep the downstairs to get our floors re-done while we are away.  Meanwhile, I’ll leave y’all with photos from some folks that have uploaded pictures online already.  Enjoy!  See y’all when we get back!

Eugene’s Photos on Flickr


Pierre’s photos on Flickr


Amy’s photos on Flickr


Phoebe & Ray’s photos on KodakGallery

We’ve picked 2 flavors for the time being: Fine Dark Belgian Chocolate (triple chocolate with chocolate ganache and Belgian chocolate mousse) and Bananas Foster (banana cake with smooth caramel and dark run-caramel mousse).  I may switch out the Bananas Foster to a lighter flavor, such as Citron (white satin cake with English-style lemon curd, homemade with fresh eggs, sweet cream-butter, lemon zest and filled with lemon mousse) or Raspberry White Satin (white cake soaked in homemade raspberry liqueur topped with white chocolate raspberry mousse).  So hard to decide!  Let me know what you think!

We also finalized the invitations after several rounds with Jonathan and Whitney from Brown Sugar Designs.  I don’t have any pictures of the final mockups but I’ll post them soon–they’re a simple pocketfold design with inserts and I’m planning on buying a bunch of ivory-colored Chinese frog buttons to use as the closure on the outside of the pocketfold.  Next–need to buy a calligraphy pen and attempt to learn a bit of calligraphy for addressing the invitations.

This month, we need to get started on the registry!  Definitely Macy’s and Crate & Barrel..hopefully we’ll get around to it this weekend.

Been also narrowing down the honeymoon choices.  Right now, it’s between Belize and Tahiti.  They’re both equi-distant from Seattle and only 2 timezones away each.  Belize has beautiful, white, sandy beaches, superb diving (the 2nd largest barrier reef in the world next to Australia), lots of “huts on stilts” sort of accommodations, excellent food, pretty affordable.  Tahiti is a honeymooner’s paradise with a ton of over-the-water bungalows, clear waters, home of the large manta ray, luxury accommodations and July is the month-long celebration of Tahitian culture.  So hard to decide!

Speaking of vendors, we also met up with Jonathan and Whitney of Brown Sugar Designs a week and a half ago to design our invitations.  After the labor of making the Save-the-Dates, we decided to go the route of getting the invitations professionally done.  I’m really excited as their work looks amazing—they’re even cool like that and keep a blog.  We showed them some of our current color choices and a few inspiration words: “simple, elegant, modern, classy, chic, flowers okay, not too traditional, not too detailed”…and that was that!  We’re meeting up with them again this weekend to look at their first mockups…I can’t wait to see what they come up with!

Meanwhile, sounds like we have an appointment on Jan. 2nd at Mona Lisa Salon in Hong Kong to take our Pre-Wedding Photos (aka cheezy Chinese engagement photos).  It’s actually quite the cultural thing to go to a studio and take photos together in wedding attire (and no, not yours but rather ones that the studio has on hand).  Couples also sometimes will dress up in old-school Chinese silk outfits and take pictures drinking tea.  These photos then get printed out and blown up and are *typically* shown at the reception.  We probably won’t show off the cheese but it’ll be pure fun.  My mom’s super excited about how these will turn out.  I’m a bit apprehensive about how cheesy this is going to be…but alas, I know it’ll be fun.  Just roll with it I keep saying….

What do I want? I want to do a COMBINATION of a polaroid guestbook with….(drumroll)…a Photobooth!  Yup, one of those classic photobooths.  I just think it’d be a fun way for guests to express themselves and have fun.  I’ll still have polaroids as I can’t imagine my 87-year old grandmother climbing into a booth.

Photobooth Services seems to be the only place that rents photobooths in Seattle.  I wish I was in California to use the Red Cheese PhotoBooth services.  Not only are they cool red booths with a choice of color or black/white but a copy of each photo is saved digitally to give out to the newlywed couple later.  How cool is that?  Then again, I do like how vintage and classic the basic black & white booths are from Photobooth Services.  I emailed them today and they have booths available!  Should I splurge?

We just have to have the contract amended with some of our recent comments…then it’s just a matter of signing it and sending in our deposit.  Matt and I went up to Newcastle again today just to visit it one more time before making a decision—it was the first place we ever saw and we just wanted to make sure that it felt right.  It felt right.  We’re super psyched and just glad to get this part out of the way.  Plus, we’re really happy with our location and date—my mom recently checked to see if this was considered a good day for getting married according to Chinese horoscope..and it is!

Matt has now completed asking all his future groomsmen to be a part of his party (I haven’t even started!).  They will be:
- Brad Zinser (Best Man) 
- Aaron Tang (my brother) 
- Derrick Hachey 
- Tom Frank 
- Pete Winfield 
- Rick Winfield 
Now it’s my turn! 

Edgewater Hotel - located on the Seattle waterfront with gorgeous Puget Sound views (and a nice sunset).  The only outdoor terrace is a small patio that would only be used for cocktail hour.  Ballroom wasn’t bad looking with lots of windows that face the water.  Hotel has a rustic log cabin feel to it but more upscale.  Would be a good reception site but not a likely ceremony site. 

Fairmont Olympic - very elegant, opulent ballrooms.  We saw the Metropole, Spanish Ballroom and Garden Court..mostly impressed with the latter two.  The Spanish ballroom is definitely the nicest ballroom we’ve seen with soaring tall ceilings and elegant drapery.  The service, you can tell, will be outstanding based on the few people we spoke to.  There is room for a ceremony just outside the ballroom–but again, we would likely prefer to have the ceremony elsewhere and then the reception here if we were to do it.  Question is whether or not we want to have ceremony and reception be at the same place or not.  Another thing to consider: this place was $$$$.  But, very very nice. 

Seattle Tennis Club - private tennis club in the Madison Park neighborhood, right on Lake Washington.  The ceremony site would be on their North Lawn with a gorgeous view of Lake Washington and Mt. Rainier—although, facing east, it wouldn’t capture a sunset.  Considering our potential wedding party size, I wasn’t sure about the reception area—it would involve having people sit in separate rooms, which I found a bit odd.  So my only issue was that the ballroom area felt a bit small for the wedding party size we were looking at–for weddings under 150, it would probably be perfect.  Another thing to consider if that there’d be people potentially playing tennis during the ceremony.  Didn’t feel like it would be too private.

Woodmark Hotel, Kirkland - located at Carillon Point, there is a GORGEOUS ceremony site in an outdoor patio right on the water under a permanent tent fixture (much like Newcastle).  In that aspect, we loved the ceremony tent.  On the downside, the ballroom area seemed a bit small and okay looking.  Would have a nice sunset since it faces west and there’s a sense of privacy.

The Canal - this was the place that we barely saw…just wandered around outside as there was a wedding about to happen and the bride’s mother made it clear to us we weren’t allowed inside.  Seemed nice with a view of the Locks but couldn’t really see much.

Shilshole Bay Beach Club - this is near Ray’s Boathouse and Golden Gardens.  On the plus side, the view is outstanding of the Puget Sound and would definitely have an amazing sunset.  However, the interior wasn’t too classy looking as far as the type of reception site we’ve been looking for.  Thing is, I know with the right decorations and stuff, it would be possible to make it look nice.  Has potential to have an outdoor ceremony although it seemed tight.  Definitely has one of the best views and would be extremely private.

So now we’ve seen 9 places total and we still like Newcastle the best we think…mainly because we’re leaning towards finding a place where we can have both ceremony and reception…and we’re pretty happy with both types of facilities at Newcastle.  A lot of the other places we’ve seen, we could only imagine it being only a great ceremony site (i.e. Woodmark) or a great reception site (i.e. Fairmont).

Newcastle Golf – totally fell in love with this site.  Has a nice tent on the Prestwick Terrace where the sides can be rolled up so there’s a feeling of being outside.  Adjacent is a patio, perfect for before-the-reception-cocktails.  Then there’s the ballroom which is just a standard ballroom but is conveniently located all on the same premise.  This would be a great location for doing the whole shebang.  Plus, the view from there is absolutely amazing, seeing Lake Washington and Seattle in the distance.  There’s also a decent bridal suite that comes with rental of the ballroom which would be super convenient for pre-wedding preparations.

Columbia Winery – neat because it’s a vineyard; however, after seeing Newcastle, it really didn’t wow us.  There’s a decent courtyard to hold an outdoor ceremony and an okay conference room area where the reception could be held.  Really near a lot of traffic so the sound of cars was prevalent.

Willows Lodge – definitely more charming than the Columbia Winery with the gardens . The ballroom looked classier and less conference like than Columbia.  Our main concern would be the size of the outside ceremony patio area—looked a bit small. 

So at this point, Matt and I are completely in love with Newcastle.  I, of course, have some trepidation as I like to look at as many options as possible before selecting a place; however, we KNOW that we would be super happy with the Newcastle location.  Plus, there are no more dates available in August and only one in July–the 7th.  We realized later that that would mean 7/7/07, which we thought was kinda neat.  Just to play it safe, we think we’ll put this date on hold with Newcastle so we don’t lose it.  As of last week, they had another date in July and one in August—so those 2 got snapped up quickly!

Other places we may consider…

Seattle Tennis Club - on the water in Madison Park so there’s a view of Lake Washington and Rainier.  Has potential.
The Canal - at the Ballard Locks which is also nice.  Not sure what the inside is like.  May be small for a ceremony.
Fairmont Hotel - fancy hotel in downtown Seattle.  Would be a nice reception site but would mean an indoor ceremony. Would have to consider ceremony elsewhere to do it here.  Also $$$.
Edgewater Hotel - hotel on the waterfront of Seattle so there would be a really nice view of the Puget Sound.  Once again, not sure about this being a ceremony site. 
Shilshole Bay Beach Club - near Golden Gardens and Ray’s Boathouse, so the view would be amazing of the Puget Sound from here.  There’s an outdoor terrace as well and looks like Hawaii with the palm trees.  I’m told that the interior is ‘okay looking’ but the view is really what seals the deal.  Also, catering company that’s exclusively at this location is hard to work with–they’ll only meet between 10am-4pm during the week to even show the place.  Argh. 
Salish Lodge - another beautiful site with the falls, although the farthest from Seattle of all sites we’ve looked at.  For a wedding party our size, though, the ceremony would have to take place in their Centennial Gardens which doesn’t have a view of the falls.  The reception would likely be in the Falls Terrace and Potlatch Room with a nice view of the Falls.  Lots of dates still available.