Renai Photography Review

Wanna know how we really feel about our photographer?? Watch the video above to find out more about Eddy Fong of Renai Photography.

I'm baaaaaack!!

A's Wedding Mixer!!

Wow, so much has happened since our last update. I guess should fill you all in on what's happened recently huh?? So here's what's been done wedding wise (in no particular order):

-Purchased my wedding shoes!!
-Met with potential printing company.
-Booked our wedding favors.
-Booked our videographer.
-Booked our D.J.
-Met with a surprise vendor.
-Started a third D.I.Y. project.
-All of our linen has arrived.
-Got the first draft of our Save the Dates from the graphics designer.
-3/5 of our bridesmaids got their dresses.
-Extended our reception an additional hour.

We also had our second wedding mixer (photo above with some of our family and friends). We all went to the Oakland A's vs. Boston Red Sox game and tailgate. It was so much fun with a good turn out. Lots of family and friends came and we had such a great time together!! Even my bridesmaid Nary came all the way from Sacramento!! She's such a sweetie!! Thank you to everyone who came (and for those who weren't able to make it, it's okay, there's always next time!!) Can't wait for the next one!!

The wedding is almost exactly 9 months away. So crazy!! We're looking to move in March/April so hopefully all goes as planned. We have so much stuff going on, we hope everything still stays on track because so far, we've been doing really good and getting a lot of stuff out of the way early. Fingers crossed for us!!

In other news, non wedding related, it's now Fall.. But boy oh boy does it feel like summer finally got around huh?? It's been bloody hot lately. Yucks!! However that may mean this Halloween may be a warm one. So for all the ladies who will be in itty bitty costumes, you won't freeze to death this year. Haha!!

Until next time everyone. Best wishes!!

A Family Filled Update!!

Recently my cousin Brit from Colorado came to visit us in California. Because of her awesome visit our other cousins from Sacramento also came on down to spend time with her as well. It was so great to see so many of them again!! We got to eat and hang out playing games at Dave and Busters in Milpitas, CA (see above photo). The last time we saw them was at my Mom's wedding last year. We love spending time with our family, they rock!! Cannot wait to see them all again next year for my Aunt Waneda's wedding in May and then again in July for our wedding!! Being with family is the absolute best!!

Speaking of family, Alex (Rey's cousin and one of our groomsmen) just had surgery last week and unfortunately he's doing worst than he was a month ago. As you may have read in my other posts he's in the hospital. We've been trying to visit him everyday and when I can, I sleep over at the hosptial so his Mom and Dad (our God Parents for the wedding) can go home to sleep. Alex is such a great kid. He's such a fun loving goofy kid. I can't wait til he feels 110% better and goes back to his normal self. It's not easy seeing someone you care and love be in so much pain. Rey and I are constantly thinking of him when we're not there with him. He's such a big part of our lives. If you can, please send good thoughts his way. He needs all the well wishes and prayers right now. Thank you.

Since the accident my neck and back has still been hurting me. On top of seeing a physical therapist, I was seeing my primary doctor once a week. It just wasn't helping enough so now I'm also seeing an acupuncturist and a chiropractor. For starters, let me just say how scared I am of needles. The thought of seeing an acupuncturist freaked me out beyond belief!! I was so nervous!! However after the fear subsided and the pinching of the needles went into my back I tried to relax and after about 15 minutes or so I was able to relax and found myself drooling. Haha!! I felt so relaxed after. It really is amazing. It definaltey made me want to sleep however I was really busy that day so I couldn't nap. I hope the next time I go there I have a less hectic day so I could see the acupuncture really can help my poor sleeping. I'm so sick of sleeping for only 2-3 hours (and in that tiny amount of time, I'm tossing and turning and waking up all the time).

The chiropractor visit was so interesting!! He ran tests on me and was able to tell me what exactly was wrong with me. So many of my disks, ligaments, and vertebraes are out of place. It's pinching my nerves which has been causing not only pain but for my legs to go numb often. There was a lot of other stuff he was telling me (how my vertebrae isn't bending/twisting at the degrees it should be, etc) it was over whelming. I even was able to feel something that was SUPER out of place!! I don't exactly remember what it was called but when he touched it on the right and then touched the other one on the left THEY DIDN'T MATCH!! The one on the left was totally dislocated (or whatever medical term he used). When he popped everything back into place the sound was crazy, and yeah some pops hurt more than others. When he popped my chest back, OMG I was huuuuuurting!! There's like 5 more pops he did that killed me, but over all it was alright. He said we've got a series of sessions to do to make my back straighten again because it's such a wreck. Ughh, I just can't wait til all this is ALL done and over with. Seriously, this car accident has put so much stress/pain/unnecessary bull crap into my life. I miss my old back. :(

I really miss being able to sleep. I miss being able to *REALLY* cuddle. I can't even hug Rey most of the time in bed because my body just doesn't twist like that. I miss being able to go out with our friends, play with the little cousins (I can't even lift them anymore!! And they can't even jump on me and play) and go dancing, exercising, swimming (esp. because it's summer time) and just doing everyday physical stuff. Everyone knows how wacky and goofy I am, and it's so hard to be that way when I'm hurting and unable to be my normal self. I'm trying hard to not let the pain get in the way of my life, but I can only handle so much A) it hurts and B) because I pay for it later at night when I'm trying to sleep.

Due to my neck and back pain, a lot of wedding planning has slowed down because I can't do as much because of the pain. I'm looking forward to when I can really do more DIY projects (so time consuming, tiring, and lots of physical work). At the moment 2/5 of our bridesmaids got their dresses. We love em and cannot wait til the other 3 girls get their dresses!! We are still on the hunt for a good (and affordable) videographer. So if you happen to know any, please send their information our way!! Thanks!!

We hope everyone has had a great summer. Fall is just around the corner, can you believe it?? Summer went by so fast, over all this whole year has just flown on by!! Pretty soon it's going to be Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, our birthdays, and then BAM!! Our wedding day will be here before you know it!! YAY!! We're getting excited!! My Facebook ticker reads 10 months XXweek/XX days. Haha!! I love it!!

Many blessings to you all!!

My New Wheels!!

Eeek!! I finally got a new (to me) car!! Here it is pictured above, and yes I do have two Buddhist charm hanging near my rear view mirror to protect me during my travels!! I'm loving my car!! It's so fun to drive!! Unfortunately I'm not driving it much because of my back/neck pains still. But it is fun to just sit in the car HAHAA!! Or even just look at it from the window, hehee!!

I'm really happy to announce my wonderful cousin Nary will be joining (and completing) our wedding party!! She's been my O.B.F. (Original Best Friend) and we share so many memories together. She was literally my very first friend ever and now she's one of my bridesmaid!! It means the world to me to have her beside me on the most special day of my life. If you'd like to get to know her more you can read more about her (and the rest of our wonderful wedding party) on the "Wedding Party" tab which is to the left.

Right now one of the things which we are working on is figuring out what linen we want. We're trying to figure out the material we want and also the color. Once we figure that out we can then start a few more DIY projects once a lot of the projects depend a lot on the color of the table clothes. Other great news about some DIY stuff we're doing is that Rey and I just finished up our *first* DIY project the other day. I'm remaining hush on what it is because I want it to be a surprise for all of our wedding guests, but I do want to say we're very happy with the way it came out. We only spent about $10-15 dollars on it when a lot of places are charging $120-200 for it!! Yippiee!! Gotta love saving money!! The way I'm seeing it is do one project at a time, just start early so we can take our time and do a good job at it so that way A) it saves us money and B) we don't get stressed off of it doing it last minute as the wedding comes along. So far so good. Rey has been very helpful and it's getting us more and more excited for our big day!!

This month has been kinda weird in the weather. I'm kinda bummed we haven't had that much of the normal "summer" weather. Let's keep our fingers crossed that next July the weather is warmer (in the 80's perhaps) once we are getting married outdoors. I want it warm, not hot and not too cold either.

Oh and I guess it's a good time to share, Rey and I have officially came to the conclusion that we're honeymooning in HAWAII!! Yippiee!! I'm really excited for us to take our "day after" (even though it'll be like a week after) wedding pictures in Hawaii with our amazing photographer Eddy Fong of Renai Photography. His work is so wonderful. Seeing our engagement photos still blow me away!! And some really cool news to share with you all, we have a bunch of our engagement photos actually show cased ON THE PHOTOGRAPHER'S WEBSITE!! Two of our photos are on the home page's slide show (once you press "enter") and if you go through his galleries a few more of our photos are sprinkled in there as well!! Go check it out!! It's so exciting!! And yes, there are a few engagement photos there which we haven't shared with anyone so if you go take a peek you'll see some "secret" photos we weren't going to share with anyone until the wedding. Hehee!! If you guys would like to see his work please go to:

www.renaiphoto.com
www.renaiphoto.com/blog

Hope everyone is doing well.

Happy 5 Year Anniversary To Us & The Official 1 Year Count Down Til Our Wedding!!

There it is folks!! Our many count down tickers remind us that not only is today our 5 year anniversary. Wow, how time as flown!! I can't believe it's been 5 years already!! Plus, this exact date next year we're going to be husband and wife!! The official one year count down begins today!! So very excited!! This is the beginning of getting elbow deep in the wedding planning!! The next year is just going to FLY on by!!

In other wedding related news, yesterday Rey, MOH Brea, and I all went to meet with a top secret vendor for our wedding. All I can say is, WOW!! We were so blown away and today's appointment just made us THAT much more excited for the wedding!! YAY!!

Domain bought!!

We finally bought our domain for our official wedding website for all of our wedding guests!! Whoo hoo!!

A Visit From Some of the Groomsmens!!

Hey everyone!! We have been so busy lately!! As you guys know, Alvin and Anthony (both Rey's groomsmens) have recently relocated. Alvin graduated last year from UCSD and interned as an engineer and now he's moved back down to San Diego because that same company has offered him a job!! We are so proud of him!! And Anthony came back from boot camp for the Marines for a few weeks. He's done so excellent there and is such a trooper!! We got really lucky because we got to spend the past 2-3 weeks with them!! First Anthony came back, and then Alvin came back!! It was so great just hanging out with them!! (photo above is of Rey and I with our Maid of Honor Brea, Best Man Nick, and Groomsmen Anthony at the bowling alley throwing up "W" for "Wedding Party!!" Hahahahaa!!) Both Alvin and Anthony are gone now and it sucks!! But luckily Anthony gets his phone and internet on the weekends (and will be coming home about once a month) and Alvin has his phone and internet whenever he's not busy working. :)

What else is going on with our wedding party?? My fabulous MOH Brea just left early this morning to Italy!! She went with her family (and a special birthday shout out to her Mom Mrs. Aguas!!) They were actually suppose to leave Wednesday at 2 pm (I think??) but because of the volcano there, their flight got pushed back to 10 pm. And then again to about 7 am on Thursday (today). She is such a great MOH, she called me before she left asking me to give her a list of things to do for the wedding while she's on vacation. She's so funny!! I told her to just enjoy her vacation, and that we can do wedding stuff once she gets back. However, she said she was going to be bored in the 16 hour flight, so we agreed she can try to do some wedding invitation wording mock ups. I'm excited to see what she comes up with once she gets back home!! She is such a great MOH, I am so grateful to have her by our side as we plan the most important day of our new life together. Brea is so eager and ready to help out in any way she can. She's definitely a great stress reliever for me. She's organized and totally capable of anything life throws at her. I know anything she does, she's totally going to nail it because everything she does, she does it with perfection!! We hope she and her family have arrived to Italy safely. They as a family (and all individually) are so kind and caring, they deserve the best trip ever!! We can't wait to see all their photos from Italy!! We pray for their safe return back home without anymore delays due to the volcano.

In other news, I'm graduating next month!! Whoo hoo!! Not a really big deal, but I'm still proud. :)

Until next time folks!!

First Wedding Mixer: Brides & Basketball

Last night we had our very first wedding mixer!! To read more about it, go here.

A Great Pick Me Upper.

I was having a really bad morning and a bunch of my friends on Facebook were trying to help me get outta my funk. Then comes along our photographer to perk me up. :) He's the greatest!! Here are a few more!!


I just love the textures of this photo!!

I love how in this picture it looks like we're all alone in this huge place. It was so busy there, with lots of people walking around. I don't know how he happened to take a picture right when there was no one there.

This photo photo really makes me laugh. I didn't want to walk down onto the beach (parts of the walk was really really steep!!) and along the walk down I saw sour grass (or at least that's what I call it!!) and I just had to have some!! I remember eating it when I was younger and I asked DF, the photographer, and his assistant to please try it. After much speculation they ALL finally gave in and the photographer just had to capture DF trying it out for the first time. Haha!! Look at my face and how concentrated I am trying to shove the grass into his mouth, careful not to poke his eye. Totally focused!! Hehee!!

We were good sports and part took in a bit of rock climbing!!

I knew Rey would like this because it has his car in the picture.

We just love all of our photos!! They are all so unique and are so artistic!! We only have a few more days til our 3 week wait is over and we get all the photos back!! So so so excited!! We hope you all have enjoyed our teasers as much as we have!! We are so happy that Eddy surprised us with teasers 4-5 times throughout the wait, and each time he gave us teasers it was about 4-5 pictures. We have a whopping 19 teasers to date!! Whooo hooooo!! And we love each and every one of them!!

Hope everyone is doing fabulous on this gorgeous Tuesday!! Many blessings!!

Such A Tease!!

I just woke up right now (didn't sleep til 6 am because I was still unpacking at my Mom's) and I just got the best surprise!! Our wonderful fantastic great perfect bomb diggity thoughtful (any other descriptive words to describe how great he is?!) photographer gave us MORE TEASERS!!

I absolutely LOVE this picture!!


And this next one is funny because it's an inside joke. I'm very dominant so I'm always the leader in the relationship. So here I am in the picture pulling him along. Haha!!


I could totally be a photographer's assistant. The photographer was very encouraging of us to think up of ideas, poses, and areas at the locations we went to for good unique shots. While the photographer and DF went on a restroom break I saw these bike racks and thought it would be a cool picture!!


And if you've ever been to San Francisco, you know the beaches here are ugly. Haha. I'm very impressed how great the photographer caught the beach in this picture however..


I love this photo!! It's so sweet!!

I told the photographer how much I loved my shoes and he ended up taking a photo of it!! You can't tell from this angle in this picture but it's not a round shoe, the part of the shoe is angled sharply and looks so cool!! I'll have to take another picture of it so you'll know what I mean!! I think this photo is romantic though.. Makes your mind wonder what we are doing that the camera didn't capture. Haha!!

The evening weather was gorgeous that night!!

We took this picture when it was already getting dark (it was taken at the same beach as the photo above. See the crazy color difference though?? The one above looks like straight up evening time!!) I love how his equipment was able to make it look like it was daytime!!

Well those are all the teasers I have for now. Again, we are blown away at these amazing photos!! Our first vendor we chose and put our deposit for was our photographer and we are 100% satisfied already from what we've seen!! Only a week or two left til we get the rest of the photos!! We're so excited!!

We hope everyone is doing well. We miss you all!! Thanks so much for hanging tight while I got more photos and also for letting me share!! I'll post more when I get the rest in 2-3 more weeks.. Unless our photographer wants to surprise us again with more teasers!! Haha!!

Come Support Us on Facebook!!

We seriously get a kick out of reading some Facebook pages, so I figured hey we should just make some of pages of our own!! So last night we did and if you know Rey and I then you'll understand why we made these pages!!

One is called My Significant Other's Other Girlfriend/Wife is His Stupid Video Games. Haha!! You know how Rey is seriously attached to his video games!! He's always on that freaking thing!! It's like his other Fiancee. Haha!! I know there are many other woman out there who know exactly what I'm going through, so I figured it's going to be a really fun page with funny questions every day for our fans to answer.

The other page we made is called I am HAPPILY ENGAGED!! Figured it was appropriate for the special moment in our lives. And I thought it would be great to be able to share with other engaged couples as well. We can share ideas with one another and see how everyone's planning is going along. Feel free to become fans and help my pages grow!! Thanks!!

Paranormal Activity Review!!

Wow seriously?? Where did this movie go wrong?? First off, it's like the Blare Witch Project. It's made to look homemade to give it a scary "real" feel. This isn't a documentary folks. I hate when movies say it's "based on a true story". It makes it sound real but its not. It may be that there was a couple who thought they lived in a scary house and they lived in San Diego however none of this stuff really happened. Throwing around the words "based on a true story" doesn't mean squat to me. After all, how much of it is real??

Second of all, this movie is SO SLOW!! I got warned it was slow in the beginning, but I never thought it would be slow throughout. I thought the end of the movie was the beginning because that's when it started to get a bit of action. In addition this same friend told me the ending scene was "the shit" and well.. They show the ending scene in the trailer so it wasn't really "the shit" once I already saw it. Literally everything in the trailer is the "big parts" in the movie. Just watch the trailer and ta-da!! It's the whole movie!! It was all very predictable. You could ask Rey, many times throughout the movie I whispered over to him what was going to happen next. Haha!!

No need to say I was deeply disappointed in this movie once I heard rave reviews on it. plus the "in demand" for this movie. The producers made it seem to "limited". I wish I would have saved my money. I don't even think this is worth renting nor seeing for free when it hits a TV channel. Ughh, so lame!!

1/5. So wack, however I did laugh a few times because I thought there was some stupid parts and also because the way the audience reacted like little babies over every little thing!!

Law Abiding Citizen Review!!

I often times find movies good, however I rarely find a movie that was worth the $10.25 x 2 for the movie ticket entry, then the $20 on popcorn and drinks, however I will say this this movie was worth it!!

Rey invited some of our good friends out and we went to watch this movie. It was sweet because he remembered that when I saw the preview for this movie, I had wanted to watch it!! So off we went to the movies. The movie was so good! It was very suspenseful!! Good action when you least expected it! Never once did I check my watch!! And I even groaned when Rey had to get up to pee because I didn't want him to miss anything!! The movie is so good!! In the beginning it goes straight into the story (and it also made me tear up! So heart wrenching!!), which was good because I hate a movie which lags and takes forever to get on with the story (Not to throw you under the bus Paranormal Activity!!). There were many moments in the movie where I didn't see what was coming which was great. I don't want to give away any spoilers but after the movie when we all walked out of the theater we all said what a great movie it was and how we felt like we got our moneys worth!! Go watch it!!

5/5!! Doesn't get any better than this!! Very suspenseful!!

Update!!

Hey everyone!!

Hope you like our new photo!! It was taken at his little cousin Ivan and Alex's birthday party!! So I made some new videos but I'm going to have to edit them and what not before I post em!! But hand tight they are coming!! I'd just like to make a little reminder that you guys can always *SUBSCRIBE* to my YouTube channel!! My name there is: dearmissie.

And a vague update.. Our wedding date may be changing.. Changing to a sooner date!! Can't spill the beans QUITE yet..

And I'll leave you with that!!

E.L.F. Mini Haul!!

Hey all!! Here's a video blog I did on a little mini haul I did on some E.L.F. costmetics!! Please visit my YouTube channel and SUBSCRIBE to me!! Thanks all!!

And please remember these videos are designed to my YouTube channel so any text or movement saying the information is to the right, that is directed to my YouTube viewers. What is to the left for YouTube is here below the video for my blog readers to see!!

Pandorum Movie Review!!

This was right up Rey's alley!! He loves futuristic type of movies. Eh, not so my style however I will say that this was a pretty good movie, especially for it being something not of my genre type. I was scared at least 2 times, hiding behind my hands, ha!! I don't want to spoil anything for anyone who hasn't seen it yet, but I will say... Why is it that the Asian character can never make it!? Gosh, come on now people!! Let an Asian character live!! Haha!!

The movie is a good length, not too long, not too short. It's got alright graphics. And it does make you think a bit, with a twist at the end. Over all a pretty good movie. Rey like this better than Surrogates, but I like Surrogates better than this movie. I guess it's because this type of movie his his genre and Surrogates is a bit more my style. This is def. a good rental!!

3/5 for me!! Pretty good for being a genre outta my box!!

Surrogates Movie Review!!

Good movie!! Bruce Willis is such a great actor!! This is a great movie with action and another reason why I liked it was because it had a good moral at the end of the story which is, humans are lazy!! Haha!! This movie is suspenseful, and makes you think throughout the movie (but not too much!!). I was tripping off the machines faces, the make up they did on the actors to make them look robotic was so neat!! But it's kinda funky how Bruce Willis' mouth barely moved in robot form. Haha!! You have to see the movie to understand what I'm talking about. Throughout the whole movie, I was laughing on how perfect the robots were!! The make up work was amazing!!

4/5 stars!! A very good rental!! Wouldn't be disappointed paying for a matinee!!

The Informant Movie Review!!

Not really knowing what the Informant was going to be about, I went in with an open mind, after all it was Matt Damon and he usually makes great movies!! Thinking it may however be action, I was deeply disappointed. This movie takes forever to get the basic idea what the movie is about. I'm assuming there were suppose to be funny moments, however I didn't laugh. If I look at my phone for the time during a movie, that means the movie isn't good. I looked at my phone several times to check for the time!! I wanted the movie to be over with. I even went into a light sleep, it was so boring!! Have you ever seen the movie Bug?? If so, then you know that Bug was the worst movie I've ever seen in my life. Well.. This movie is creeping up there next to Bug. This is the second worst movie I've ever seen in my entire life. I don't even recommend renting it for $1 at RedBox. Hell I wouldn't even watch it on TV for free!!

0/5 stars. This movie is horrible!!

Zombieland Movie Review!!

Alrighty folks, so for those of you know know me and my Fiancee Rey really well then you guys all know that we are movie junkies!! My soon to be Father in Law loves going to the movies so we go to the movies just about once a week, watching two movies at a time. Plus I watch movies at home all the time thanks to NetFlix and also my local RedBox!!

Rey and his sister Gen are zombie freaks and they've been waiting to see Zombieland for MONTHS!! So you bet opening day we went to go watch it!! (Sadly Gen couldn't make it, she was busy working.) All I have to say is Zombieland was way better than what I expected!! Zombieland > Shaun of the Dead It's hilarious!! I don't want to spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it yet, but seriously I suggest seeing it ASAP!! You'll get a great laugh!! The type of comedy really reminds me of that new type of comedy, not the old school stuff like Shaun of the Dead. It's hard to explain, you'll just have to see!! Reminds me of Pineapple Express, the Hangover, type of comedy!! Good times!!

I give it 5/5 stars for a light hearted funny movie!!