a purpose driven life

Posted on by

Just finished packing the first dhl box that will ship my stuff to Japan. How many boxes it will take, I’ve no idea yet. A European porcelain doll is in it (i wonder how we can display my doll collection in our apartment), DVDs/CDs, books, photo albums, gym clothes (yoga mat would have to be in the next batch), swimsuits, cocktail dresses.

Was about to close the box when I saw that the book The Purpose Driven Life was left on the paperbag where I kept some of my books. I bought this Rick Warren book during my long stint in Singapore some five years ago. I leafed through the pages until I came across my scribble on one of the reflections:
“made a life changing decision today – I accepted the 7 months assignment to Japan.”

That made me smile because that decision to go back to japan,straight from a Singapore assignment certainly was a life changing decision. That 7-month assignment lengthened to a 2.5 years assignment that totalled around 6 extensions. On my last extension, I was only asked about it less than a week before my flight back to Manila. So you see, my daily farewell parties were in full swing already.

But you know what? It was there in that last two months of my extended assignment when our (atsushi’s and mine) dream-turned-reality started to unfold. Totally unexpected, totally serendipitous.

So yes, accepting another Japan assignment was a life changing decision. Had I turned it down, I wouldn’t have known happiness as I have with Atsushi now.

But then again knowing how hubbie and I are soulmates, we would still have had found each other, albeit at a later time. I think and believe, that our fairy tale would still come to pass, even then.

Beloved

Posted on by

Eating alone during weekends can be quite lonely sometimes; making me terribly miss Hubbie even more so. Had a late lunch at Cafe Mary Grace earlier and the table I chose had this as a centerpiece:

This made me smile. And it certainly eased up the feeling of being alone, because I know, somewhere in Japan, my beloved is also thinking of me….

Okay, back to detailing conceptualization!

Entourage flowers by Dylan Gozum of Vatel Manila

Posted on by

As with all our other suppliers, I fell in love at first sight with Dylan’s flower arrangements. Almost always, his bouquets are a cluster of two or more different types of flowers and greens that’s prettily arranged and at the same time so out of the box in its creativeness. There are some bouquets though that’re composed of just one type of flower, which most probably has been the bride’s preference. And why I say so? Well that’s one really good thing with Dylan. He sends you his spec sheet to ask you all of your preferences and details about your wedding and he’ll work his art and magic from there.

Communication with Dylan regarding our flowers started way back in September. And I almost didn’t have him for our flowers. When I inquired, he told me that i’d be his 3rd bride for April 30, 2011 if in case I book. I was devastated by this because I thought it was his polite way of saying that he can’t accommodate me anymore much as he’d like to, i thought that he only caters to one bride at a time per day. A couple of weeks after though, something nagged at the back of my mind to go and clarify with Dylan if my understanding was correct. And boy was I soooo thankful I emailed him for clarification. Because yes, he can still accommodate me! Yey! Just recently, I heard that he can do 5 weddings a day! whoa! Yes, that’s how GOOD he is. Not to mention that his rate is really very  reasonable.

Now why is it that I was only able to finalize our contract only recently? On this matter, I really do commend Dylan’s patience and creativity. I wasn’t really particular in the type of arrangement. That’s more Dylan’s forte and I think it’ll be wise to leave him be on that. But as he had pointed out, I’m one unusual bride in the sense that I am very particular in the types of flowers he’ll use for our wedding because of the certain symbol/meaning that that flower may portray.

I really can’t help it. I am most sensitive with it. And so in the process I am giving him a difficult time because of the very small leeway that i’m giving him. He would include a certain flower in my entourage bouquet and if it’s not on my initial list, I’d research that flower’s meaning and then i’d revert back to him if I’m okay with it or if he has to look for another flower. And I assure you there was quite a lot of email exchange because I didn’t like the meaning of some flowers he suggested although really at some point, I was tempted to give in because the flowers he’s suggesting is really beautiful! I was really afraid that at some point he might be exasperated on me already but thankfully he persisted on and kept on suggesting another type one after the other after my feedback.

Dylan really is admirable. Even with my very stringent requirements (imagine, I told him not to use any yellow flowers because it means jealousy even if yellow is such a happy color and even if yellow would complement our orange-lime green wedding colors), he was still able to come up in mind an arrangement that I can’t help but gush over.  He’ll most probably be using below flowers for our entourage. Really, who wouldn’t be gushing over on these? ^_^  Yes, yet again, I’m all hoity-toity because of these.

Dylan warned me though that the flowers that will be used are subject to change depending on availability at the time of wedding. Given that and if in case it happens, I hope he’ll remember that I’m his uber picky bride and that he’ll ask for the meaning first before making a go on the bouquets. Hehe.

Here are some of Dylan’s creations that I so love! Believe me though there’s lots more!

my bouquet would probably look like this except that Dylan used snapdragons on this one. The name alone is a hint on the flower's meaning. 😀

the bride's bouquet is my favorite! favorite!!! mine has to be tulips though. Hubbie's fave flower. Mine as well.

And oh, you know what? Dylan is really such a nice person, even when our contact is only through email

9 years

Posted on by

Last Friday, January 28, I celebrated my 9 years as a Process Engineer. And indeed it is a celebration. For I believe that God has blessed me with a career that is truly fulfilling for me. Ever the drama queen that I am, that very day and now a Senior Engineer, I also submitted my resignation letter; sort of like my way of “coming to full circle”.

Today was my last working day in the office. When I got home this evening, it was only then that I realized that my last working day and my first day as a “freed” engineer (please, i’m not saying this in the pejorative sense) coincided with the last day of the previous Chinese Year (okay okay i’m not Chinese, just having some drama and trying to make some correlation here hehe). In some sense, it’s like i’ll be working on a clean slate or a clean drawing board this new year. A new year full of promise, full of hope, full of exciting things yet to come.

At this point you may be wondering why i’m posting this in our wedsite and not just on my personal blog. But no, wait. Today also marks the first day that I’m totally Atsushi’s dependent. Well, until after I get to find a job again, hopefully. And for somebody like me who has been a very independent person, who has totally relied on the abilities God gave her (and on the opportunities God gave her) to earn her keep, feed herself and help provide for her family, being dependent like this is a major crossover. One that I have to learn and yet to fully grasp.

And yes, this is part of what marriage is about. It’s about shaking you in your old comfort zone to bring you to a yet better comfort zone. It’s about shaking you from what you’ve been used to, leading you to better experiences, newer places, meeting new people. It’s about having faith – faith in God that what you’re doing and about to do is part of God’s beautiful plan for you; faith in your husband that he will love you, take care of you and provide for you; faith in the goodness of the people around you; faith in the future that something really good is in store for you.

And of course, yes, there’s love, great love.

——-

Feb 5: Was cleaning my workspace today. Found a lot of diskettes from a long-gone era. Haha. Gosh. Ancient.

Papa’s good food

Posted on by

I think it’s high time to feature Papa’s goodfood here in my blog. As Hubbie describes it, Papa’s  meals are so addictive. He found it so delicious that he gained 2 inches in his waistline in less than four days.

Drat though that I was only able to take a picture of one dish. But then again, maybe it’s good to feature them one at a time.

Papa’s Pancit (noodles). I always  request for this on my vacations back home. The pancit miki that Papa uses is so flavorful and devoid of that plastic flavor I seem to taste in other mikis. Papa tosses lots of ingredients on it that I think of it as a chopsuey sans the soup mixed with noodles. Yummy!!

3 months exactly

Posted on by

Our wedding is gonna be hopefully exactly three months from now!  🙂

I’m really all hoity-toity and giddy today because our invites has already been finalized by Lene! Why giddy? Because it’s soooo pretty!! And creative. And out of the box. I just love Lene Dee-Dragon! And we’ve attained what we’ve been aiming for – your not so usual travel-themed invite. Will share it here on our wedsite once we’ve had our invites delivered to our invitees.

So thankful for Lene who’s designing our invites free of charge, to Rey and Dee sisterhood for giving us a warm stay at their place and for MOH Kat who stayed with me in the Dee household to support and keep me company.

For now, I need to update the invitees list to finalize the total number of guests so as to estimate total number of invitations we need (plus allowance) to make as well as the number of reserved seat for each guest (no allowance) that we will put on the RSVP card.

Yet another ASAP item as well is that I need to update our “Tagaytay Hotels and Sites” page since, well, I made a reference to it on our invites.

We are also currently starting discussions for detailing on Reception styling. And you know what? I just love Detalye. 🙂