Dear Mr. Gund and Mrs. Hello Kitty

Dear Mr. Gund and Mrs. Hello Kitty:


We have received your RSVP to our wedding.  While we appreciate your use of technology by rsvp-ing online, sadly, we must reject your RSVP.  Despite checking and double checking, we could not locate your names on the guest list.  Perhaps Mr. Gund and Mrs. Hello Kitty have responded on the incorrect blog? 


My apologies.  


Sincerely,
Bob the Cat

RSVP Here

Please RSVP to our wedding by leaving a comment here.  Please leave us with your name, and the name of your guest(s), if any.  


If you prefer snail mail, please use the stamped response cards included with your invitation.  Please respond by December 31, 2009, if possible!

We are so excited to celebrate our special day with you!

Sample Sale!!

Monique Lhuillier is having a sample sale this Sunday in downtown LA for her beautiful wedding gowns!!  I'll be going with my sister-in-law-to-be Cindy, in an attempt to find her a dress for her May wedding.  I think things are going to get nasty because even the LA Times article says to wear comfy shoes and get ready to fight dirty!


How gorgeous would dress be as a wedding gown??

Thoughts...

"When everything seems to be going against you, remember that the plane takes off against the wind, not with it."  


-Henry Ford

The Great Shoe Debate

I'm been on the hunt for bridal shoes.  As my friend Laureen said, "You haven't decided on shoes YET?!?!"  Apparently, my inability to find shoes is blasphemous.  ;)


Is there such thing as the perfect pair?  Bridal shoes are a main focus of wedding pictures.  In fact, shoes for grooms, whether they are high-end Italian loafers or a pair of urban Converses, are growing as an important detail for weddings.  Gorgeous shoes are such a big part of our pop culture.  The whole MO behind Carrie Bradshaw were Manolo Blahniks.   J. Lo just released a song called "Louboutins."  There are even wedding blogs named after beautiful shoes.  


Following the footsteps of my dear friend Anita, who wore gorgeous blue shoes as her "something blue" for her own wedding, I wanted to wear fuschia pink shoes to match my wedding colors.  But, I have yet to find a pair that is the perfect shade of fuschia.  Take into account that I have a bum left ankle, my pair of perfect-fuschia, perfect-height, perfect-comfort appears to be non-existent.  


I had a short break in-between classes today and I went to DSW, a store that is not exactly known for its bridal shoes, but is within my price range (and it is a recession!!).  So I ended up buying these pair of heels.  What do you think?

Now that I actually bought shoes, let's run through the checklist:


1.  Fuschia?  Nope, these are a warm gold.
2.  Good height?  Nope, these are a painful 3 inches.
3.  Comfortable?  Nope, these straps dig into my toes.


But aren't they gorgeous??  The pictures don't do them justice.  Now I'm debating whether I should look for another pair of shoes entirely, or if I should suck it up for the ceremony, and then change into flats for the reception.


Thoughts??  Opinions?  Words of advice?

Engagement Pics - San Diego Edition

On October 15, 2009, Malcolm and I met up with our wonderful photographers, Ariel and Josh of Anika London Media, for our San Diego engagement pictures.  We chose Balboa Park for our pictures because there's such awesome architecture, and so many different choices of scenery for pictures.  Balboa Park, which houses 15 museums and the world famous San Diego Zoo (the only pandas on the west coast!), is 1,400 acres and used to be someone's home.


Ariel and Josh, who are husband and wife, were really great with us.  They gave really good direction, and they worked really well together.  Just as a side note, they are a really really good looking couple.  After our initial meeting with them, Malcolm and I looked at each other and said, "Damn.  They're both hot."

After we took pictures at Balboa Park, we headed over to Mission Beach to take pictures.  While Balboa Park was sunny and gorgeous, Mission Beach was foggy and the sun was really hard to see!  Ariel and Josh used camera/flash magic and got great pictures of us.

Stayed tuned to the wedding for more of the engagement pictures!  Ariel and Josh took over 500 pictures of us that day!

3 Apples

Audrey, Anita, Jeanne and I went to the 35th anniversary of Hello Kitty art exhibit held at Royal-T Cafe and Art Space in Culver City.


To commemorate Hello Kitty's birthday, Royal-T hosted various artists' artwork as well as Hello Kitty products, all for viewing to the public.  We arrived at around 7:30 pm, and the place was packed.  Not only were there tons of people, there were Hello Kitty products everywhere, there was a "real" Hello Kitty walking around taking pictures, and tons of Hello Kitty artwork.  It was interesting to see how far Hello Kitty has come since her kitten days.


None of us remembered to bring our cameras, so we relied on our cell phones.  I took a lot of pictures, but a lot of them are kind of grainy.


As a side note, anyone know the significance of "3 Apples"?


This is the event poster:

When you first walk into Royal-T, the exhibit was laid out so that in the beginning, you saw all the Hello Kitty products.  Among all those products was this Swarovski crystal-encrusted Hello Kitty by Kimora Lee Simmons.  I thought it was a very blinged out necklace.

Apparently, I was wrong, as demonstrated by Lady GaGa.

There was also the actual Hello Kitty dress worn by Lady GaGa in her photo shoot especially for Hello Kitty's anniversary.  The dress is strapless.

Then, there was the shot of Lady GaGa pretending to be Hello Kitty.  It was a bit frightening.

Moving back further into the space, we saw what would happen if Hello Kitty threw up.

After all the Hello Kitty products, there were art pieces created by various artists for the 35th anniversary.


I really liked this one by Tokidoki.

One aspect I did really like about this exhibit was that it wasn't all cutesy.  There were some ironic ones, scary ones, tongue-in-cheek ones, etc.  Here were the ones I liked.

This sculpture reminded me of Murakami's creations.  It was all very cool.

And finally, so cute!

So what is the significance of 3 apples?  It is supposed to be the weight of Hello Kitty!

Bridal Shower Preview

My lovely bridesmaids hosted a bridal shower for me this past weekend.  Not only did Wendy drive down from San Francisco, and Jeanie graciously allow us to invade her home for the shower, they all surprised me with a video chat with Malcolm, who is currently slaving away in Shanghai.  

Aren't these gorgeous??  Thanks to Debbie for the beautiful flowers.


Stay tuned...more to come!

As a rational and logical pet parent, I like to have Bob involved in all aspects of our lives, including holidays.  Especially now that Bob is getting older, we try to have Bob participate as much as he can.


For Halloween, Bob insisted on dressing up.  What else could he be except a chicken??  

High-Fiving Panda in Macau

Need I say more?

NYC Engagement Shoot

As mentioned before, Malcolm had the wonderful idea of having engagement pictures taken in both San Diego and New York City, to commemorate our bi-coastal relationship.


So for NYC, we chose photographer S.J., who is the sweetest, nicest person.  If we had met in a different circumstance, we would've been great friends.  She is definitely our type of people.


That being said, I'm sad to say that our engagement pics turned out to be so-so.  The subway one is quite awesome and amazing.  The rest were ... eh.  Having now gone through our San Diego engagement photo shoot (although we're still waiting for the results), I think our pics might have come out better if we had more direction from the photographer.  Sadly, there were a lot of double chins and half-closed eyes.


We spent an hour and a half at Central Park on Labor Day, taking pictures.  Here are the good ones!

And of course,

Hanging out with Boris in Hong Kong

Malcolm left for the far East yesterday morning.  For the next several months, Malcolm will be mostly in Shanghai to hang out with his Mom, visit relatives, and explore any business opportunities (i.e., high-end "replica" purse shopping for me!!!  Anyone want anything???).  However, Malcolm will be spending this weekend in Hong Kong to hang out with some friends and cousins.  


Malcolm is staying with his cousin Allen and Allen's wife Emily, and their adorable dog Boris in Hong Kong.  Malcolm landed just a few hours ago, and we had a chance to iChat this morning.


Please meet Boris.  He is a very sweet, snuggly, but very old doggie.  He is 11 human years old.  I think that means that Boris is 77 years old in doggie years.

Isn't he adorable??  While chatting with Malcolm this morning, I had a chance to see Boris walking around the apartment.  He is definitely a very handsome and well-behaved doggie.  But can you see what are on his hind paws??

Boris wears shoes!  I thought they were very fashion forward, but Malcolm explained that Boris has hip problems because of his age and the shoes help him with traction while he walks.  Poor thing.  But, I like how fashionable he is at the same time functional.

Here is Boris with his mom Emily.  Isn't he the sweetest?  Look at those hind paws!


I've asked Malcolm for more pictures during his HK trip.  Hopefully, he'll blog about his stay and activities there (hint, hint).  

Pumpkin Carving Party at Jeanne & Russ'

Jeanne and Russ graciously hosted a pumpkin carving party at their place!  Jeanne and Russ provided the main course (pumpkin curry), pumpkin carving tools, stencils for the pumpkins, and floor space.  Audrey brought newspaper so that we could get as messy as we wanted.

The pumpkins innocently waiting... unknowing of their future...

Malcolm wanted to show off his ... pumpkins.

But, before we started carving, we needed some sustenance.  Jason and Malcolm dug into the feast provided by Jeanne and Anita.  Jeanne warmed up some pita bread with humus, while Anita slaved over the hot stove preparing crab cakes and cheese/rice balls.  Coincidentally, they looked exactly like the ones from Trader Joe's!  ;)

Russ attempted his best Astro-boy flight over the group.  Not sure what Henry is doing.

Audrey and Henry, digging into their pumpkins.

Jeanne and Russ taping on their respective stencils onto their pumpkins.

Rather than choosing a stencil, Anita and Jason opted to create their own masterpieces.  

Anita hard at work on her pumpkin design.

Anita's pumpkin!  Can you guess what it is?

I was kind of Nazi about the pumpkin carving.  I let Malcolm help a little bit, but then I took it away from him again.  I apparently have pumpkin-carving control issues.

My pumpkin!  I mean ... our pumpkin!  Can you tell what it is?

Our pumpkin was of 3 wolves, howling.  Pretty cool, isn't it?

Anita's pumpkin: Hello Kitty!  Soooo cute!!

Audrey's pumpkin is a runner, just like she is!  Jason's was really scary.  

Russ's pumpkin is the pirate skull and cross-bones, Henry's is the smiley one in the middle, and Jeanne slaved over the haunted mansion.  Everyone did a great job!

As a p.s., totally unrelated to our pumpkin carving night, my neighbor has a ginormous golden retriever. He's at least 80 lbs, stands really tall, and is really just goofy.  This morning, he was outside, lying in the middle of the street with his owner crouching next to him.  I totally freaked out and thought that someone had hit him.  So I ran outside, and offered assistance.  Turns out, the dog had found a nice shady spot with cool breezes, and didn't want to go inside the house.  *Whew*  I think the dog and his owner were outside for another 10 minutes before the owner convinced silly doggie to go inside.


Isn't he cute though??