Photographer - CHECK

 

I'm so excited to book our photographer today.  I'm really looking forward to working with him.  I know he'll do a wonderful job of capturing all the moments on our wedding day.  To me, this is one of the most important aspect of the wedding.. after the cake has been devoured, flowers fade, all the guests has gone home... all Dave and I have left are the memories captured in these photos.

  

"A picture is worth a thousand words" and I hope it'll bring just as many smiles to see the love and happiness from our friends and families.

Welcome to the family Eric! Thank you for sharing our special day with us.          

10th year anniversary

Our 10th year anniversary!  I can't believe we've been together for more than 1/3 of our lives.  

It's crazy to think that just a short while ago, we were two little kids getting ready to graduate high school, trying to figure out how  to keep our relationship the same as we prepare to leave for different colleges.


We've been through a lot in the last decade: 
We survived being in a long distant relationship.
We've seen each other grow up, first graduating college then grad school.  Next, figuring out our true passion is to work with students to better their future. 
We became closer friends than ever, appreciating all the strengths as well as weaknesses.
And now, we're starting a new journey of engagement towards marriage.  I can't wait to see what the next decade has in store for us.  I'm sure it'll be filled with excitement but most of all... love.


We celebrated our 10th year anniversary by attending our wonderful friends, Sol and Janice wedding.  We came up to Torrance Wednesday night for the rehearsal and spent time with all our pals to help Sol celebrate his last night as a single man.  
  

Their marriage took place on 6/9 in the beautiful Wayfarer Chapel and the wonderful reception was held at Trump Golf Course.
 My absolute favorite part of the wedding is that  I can definitely feel the love between Sol and Janice.  


I wish them a marriage that is ~happily ever after~ because as they said on their wedding "I want nobody nobody but YOU!"               

NFP #3

Not only is today our 3rd class of NFP (luckily there were no other incidents in the parking lot) but what's more exciting is that Dave passed his CCNA! 

I'm so proud of all the hard work he's been doing besides studying for this test, working 3 jobs and still managed to attend all our wedding appointments and interviews with prospective vendors from San Diego all the way up to LA.   

The more we learn about NFP, the more I think .... what a wonderful dad Dave will be...when the time comes of course.  He has so many amazing values and characters that I admire... kids tend to be drawn to him already... maybe it's because he's so cuddly or because he's a big kid at heart but whatever the reason may be ... I am really look forward to our future together.  

Pre-Cana

Bright and early on a gloomy Saturday morning, Dave picked me up at 7:15 and we drove down the Diocesan Pastoral Center.  

*He was sweet enough to pick up some McDonalds and got all the good stuff - oatmeal, egg mcSausage, mcCafe, and sweet tea* what a great fiance!   
We got there and the parking lot was full!  Went down to the first floor and sign-in, got all our handouts, books, cds, and scantrons then found a seat 4 tables from the back of the hall and settled in for a long day.  The schedule said we'll be there until 4:30. 

First thing on the agenda was the "Foccus- Pre-Married Inventory- Couple Report" it included a minimum of 156 questions and more if you were living together, have different faith, or have been married before.  We were divided to different sides of the room and was given time to answer all the questions.  

I think every couple should fill this out prior to getting engaged because it's a great conversation starter of all the issues you should at least discuss prior to marriage.  Ask Dave about his answers... it's a great story!


After the survey was breakfast: fresh fruits, muffins, coffee, juice, etc. they brought in a catering company to prepare all the meals and snacks for the whole day.  

A professor from USD who is also a family therapist came and talked about strategies to work through arguments.  Then talks about what does marriage mean for the Catholic Church.  What are you really agreeing to when you say your vows.  

Lunch was chicken enchilada, rice, beans and chips. 

More talks.... 

Afternoon break was cookies and ice cream

Finished the day with a little intro of Natural Family Planning.  By 3:45 we were wrapping up and sent on our way.    


My favorite part was getting to spend the whole day with Dave. 

NFP #2

I think Monday hates us! 

1.  We just bought a brand new bottle of gummy vitamins yesterday at Costco, left it in the car today and it was completely melted.

2.  As I was driving to meet Dave for dinner, an empty moving box on the 163 flew into the front of my car and was stuck on there until I exited (it took out my left light!)  

3.  We went to Dumpling Inn but found out they're closed on Mondays.

4.  Dave was backing up into a parking spot for NFP and a lady suddenly opened her car door so Dave hit it! *sigh*

 

NFP #1

Monday afternoon, we arrived at the Diocesan Pastoral Center for our first out of four Natural Family Planning classes.  There were 6 other couples, some were already married, while most were engaged.  Our instructors are two elderly individuals who has been married for over 40 years, one a retired scientist and the other a retired math teacher.  With 4 adult children, they spent their time teaching NFP and Marriage prep classes as well as traveling.  They just came back from two weeks vacation in Hawaii... man... that's the life! 

 

The whole process was pretty interesting, it started with a review of anatomy and then we went into learning about the sympto-thermal method.  Overall, it's quite a commitment on the woman's part, she has to take body temperature every morning as well as chart observations daily.  The men are only there for moral and emotional support... Our next class is in two weeks!

For being so good, Dave and I rewarded ourselves with macha green tea and popcorn chicken after wards... nom-nom-nom!

 

Church - BOOKED!

The last few weeks has been pretty busy for both Dave and I.

I had IEP meetings up the wazzoo the whole month of March.   

Dave was sick a couple of weeks ago, as well as started on his 2nd part time job.  He did a huge data transfer (I dunno if this is the actual IT term) but regardless he's been working basically two 40 hours jobs.

Ever since our meeting with Father Michael who told us the church we were considering was EHH.  We haven't had any time to go look at any other locations.  Due to the Otay Shooting this morning, Dave's school was closed since it was only a few blocks away.  Luckily no one else was injured but it gave us some time to run much needed errands.

In the afternoon, we decided to continue our search for a church.  Dave had emailed me weeks earlier with a few church possibilities, I checked out their websites but nothing jumped out so I just pushed it aside.  Since we haven't found the a church for our wedding ceremony, we decided to take a look at these possibilities in person.  To my surprise, the first church we stopped at was like love at first sight for both Dave and I.  The view from the church parking lot is beautiful! you can see the entire west side of San Diego.  Inside was a perfect balance of wood ceiling (thumbs up from Dave) and beautiful stained glass windows (two thumbs up from Marilyn).    

I felt like we were reading the scripts from Goldilocks and the 3 bears: "it wasn't too big, it wasn't too small, it was just right, everything was just right"  Dave said this is IT within 10 seconds of walking through the doors.   We decided to go to the parish office and get for more info on how to reserve the date.  Since we are non-parishioners, Diane the secretary said our priest need to have a conversation with Father Steve before she can give us the paperwork.  We called Father Michael immediately and left him a voicemail, saying we found THE church and if he can get in touch with Father Steve so we can put down our deposit to save the date.  A few minutes later, Father Michael called us back saying he spoke with Diane and everything is good.  We asked him how he felt about our choices and he said it's perfect, not because he was bias or anything but he was the assistant pastor there 15 years ago.  How funny is that?  Everything seems to just fall into place, it's as though all the puzzle pieces is already there and we just have to put it in the right spot.      

We called Diane back and she wrote us into her book, we'll put a deposit down and get the paperwork in the next couple of days.  YAY! we just booked our church.