Goodwood Park Hotel - What Do You Get From Your Wedding Package

Just the other day, I was browsing through my wedding photos and realised (to my horror) how little attention I paid to the wedding decoration on that day. I mean, after months of planning and deciding on the nitty gritty you'd think that you'd be fussing over the decoration on that day right? Nope that didn't happen. I guess I had more important things to attend to, as I should have rightly been.

So anyway, just want to share all these little nitty gritty detail that was part of the wedding evening. Good luck to all future brides-to-be :)

This is how the hotel looks like in the day. Do you see the entrance over there in the middle? That's the entrance to the Tudor Ballroom. It's not the hotel's main entrance to the reception, so there's a sense of exclusivity for guests headed to the Tudor Ballroom.

Up close picture of the entrance leading to the Tudor Ballroom. It's a nice spot for photo taking.

Inside of the hotel, right outside the reception area. Your guests can mingle here too if it gets too crowded in the reception area.

The sign board outside the ballroom

Entrance to the reception

Flower stand at the reception area. The theme we went with was Romance, hence you'll see decorations of white and pink roses with candles all over the dining area. Frankly I wasn't paying much attention to the flowers or theme because the choices we were offered were blah to say the least. But on that night, I thought all the decorations were quite tastefully done up.

This is the reception area. It's a good size area to let your guests mingle before they adjourn to the ballroom. The hotel even manage to squeeze a 2 piece jazz band in this area. But it got too crowded at one point and people started entering the ballroom. 

The 2 piece jazz band was part of the bridal package

The couch at the end of the reception room

The reception table

The high table decoration at the reception area

The giftbox was complimentary from the hotel

A photo stand was also provided

This is where you wait to enter the ballroom

Our party favor was a cutesy little bell. All party favors are useless anyway, might as well choose something pretty right?

Menu

Centrepiece for the dining tables

Stage decoration - The theme was Romance

VIP chair decoration

General look of the ballroom. Does not come with guitarist.

General decoration along the aisle. You can see the consistency in the theme throughout the ballroom. 

Something to note - they can't really accomodate a projector screen on stage because of all the decoration. So the only other option is to have it at the back of the hall. This is where we showed our video montage. Livestudio also used the same screen to project pictures of guests throughout the night. I am glad I hired them; they were a great hit!

Our "wedding cake". Okay the top layer is real (I think). I still don't get the whole cake cutting ceremony thing. Can someone enlighten me please? 

Champagne glass for the champagne popping ceremony. 

The rostrum where great (and inappropriate) speeches are made

The ballroom is not huge but you can still squeeze in a band. 3 piece would be the max I suggest. Also do hire a sound guy with good sound system. I don't think the hotel sound system is good enough, and the last thing you need is muffled singing.

That's all I think. Did I miss anything? Drop me an email at sanball at gmail dot com. 

Photo credit goes to Kent Wong, Livestudio and Valpixels.

One Year Older Another Year Wiser?

Had a surprise birthday celebration for the hubs. Special thanks to Law for hosting and Bee for baking the cake!

Here's a special birthday song from Law.. enjoy!

Missing Piece by David Choi

I've been following David Choi for a while now. For the uninitiated, David Choi is an Asian American singer/songwriter who started off covering songs on YouTube and subsequently started writing his own songs etc. He's got a big fan base in the US and all over the world, but sadly none of my friends know him. Okay, maybe 1 does. Come on you guys, get your ass off the couch and watch some clips online. Not the triple XXX kind please. 

Being Asian from an English speaking country, I rarely see good English production from my own kind. Sure there are a lot of good Chinese, Japanese and Korean shows/production. But when it comes to English, nada. So when I stumbled across a bunch of Asian American YouTube artistes like David Choi, the Jasyalee twins, Wang Fu Production, Jeremy Lin, Kev Jumba etc, I was hooked. And boy are they talented. Go check them out if you haven't already, I guarantee you'll be hooked too. 

Obviously when David Choi came down to Singapore, I couldn't resist going for one of his shows. I dragged the hubs along to The Beer Market. I was a little surprise and disappointed that it was NOT full.. really?? Oh well I had a lot of space to manoeuvre around. He performed all of 3 songs before he left. And I followed him to the carpark, like the groupie that I am and he obliged when I asked for a pic. He snubbed the other small kids. The hubs took a pic of us (YAY!). 

Well here's one of my favorite song. Thank you for the song David Choi!

I feel like a boat without a sailor
I go where the wind blows
Just moving around like a lonesome stranger
I got no home

In search of a treasure
Some place I don't know
It feels like forever
I'm making my way
Through the hills and deserts
I thirst for hope

I don't know
What I'm looking for
But I'll know
When I find it

There is a missing beat
Inside of me
The rhythm of my heart
Hits unevenly
There's a missing piece
Inside of me

Trying to figure it out
But it amounts to nothing
I want to realize
But nothing I find
Ever feels like the real thing
Can you empathize?

I don't know
What I'm looking for
But I'll know
When I find it

Chorus

I'm lost inside
A cold bitter world
I can't understand the need
It's makes it so hard to breathe
I don't know what I'm looking for
But I'll know when I find it

There is a missing beat inside of me
The rhythm of my heart hits unevenly

There's a missing piece inside of me

California Dreaming - Los Angeles

Our last destination was Los Angeles. On hindsight, I should have planned on coming here first as Coachella took place the weekend before. Yeah, I feel like kicking myself right now. Ah whatever. So we drove for another 4 hours before arriving to Tinseltown. 

SBUX - Can we have one of these please in Singapore please? 

After the long drive, we rewarded ourselves with an omakase at Katsuya @ Hollywood. Apparently, celebrities like John Mayer and Jen Aniston frequent this place as well, but alas none was sighted. 

We spent the next day at the Universal Studio before heading to Jeremy's place at Pasadena for dinner. 

Do you remember this? It's the city hall from Back to the Future!

Oh donkey! 

HE HE

The hubs love the Transformers

Pretty impressive show at the Water World

My buddy

Scene from War of the World

Also spent some time at my favorite mall in LA - The Grove! And guess who we bumped into? It was Mario Lopez,  hosting a show! What are the odds? 

Not sure if anyone remember the show 500 Days of Summer, but I remember watching it (with Joey in Bali... weird right) and liking it very much!! What I did not know was that the famous bench scene was shot at downtown Hollywood right across the hotel where I used to stay. 

And here we were.. we found it! It's at the park called Angels Knoll. And even though the buildings overlooking the park resembled very little from the movie, and the park stank of pee, I was still very excited!! 

This is a story of boy meets girl, but you should know up front, it is NOT a love story

This one is (:

And this is the end of our 2 week long vaca. It was time to head home.... 

Our road trip theme song: Mirror by JT
Road trip food: Almonds!