Busy busy!

The past 2 days have been rather overwhelming and stressful. Been feeling uncertain about what I'm doing and that I'm unable to meet the expectations set for me. Starting to think this may not be for me.

I must really think about what I need to do sigh. And how I must overcome my unwillingness to do what is required.

I'll give myself some time to figure it out. Maybe it's normal to feel like that when you're challenged. I gotta encourage myself!

On a lighter note, Gerald's back! Just had dinner with him at this awesome Indian restaurant at east coast road.

Smile =)

My photo inspiration today: Plants! I woke up and decided to snap some photos of my mum's favourite plants. They're all fruits of her labor.

I love how plants always have the ability to brighten up any place. That is why I've decided to bring a cute lil cactus to work! It's meant to cheer me up when things get tough.

Here are the pictures I took at my balcony!

Really really adore the second picture and its sepia effect.

It's amazing how easy it is to capture beautiful sights just about anywhere.

 

Words of wisdom

I just watched Neil Gaiman's commencement speech on youtube. It was truly an inspiring and heartfelt speech... makes me want to watch it all over again.

So many words of wisdom.

There were two things he mentioned that resonated well with me.

'Make your own art. Because the one thing that you have, that nobody has, is you. Your voice, your mind, your story and your vision.'

 It's true. Everyone's unique, with their own individual strengths, ideas, thoughts and what not. What makes you special is your ability to contribute in your very own way. What's the point of being someone who follows, thinks and behaves like any other? It makes no sense to be a replica of someone else. You won't be contributing anything new or original. 

And in life, it's important to:

'Remember to let go and enjoy the ride. Because the ride brings you to some remarkable and unexpected places.' 

Neil Gaiman spoke about how he worried so much about his work when he started to become successful. Looking back, he wished he had stopped to truly appreciate and enjoy his journey. He had an amazing ride but there were parts that he missed because he was worrying too much. 

I think everyone is guilty of making such a mistake. Sometimes we just get too caught up worrying about the little things and forgetting to enjoy the bigger picture of things.

That is why it is important to always remind ourselves to let go sometimes.

    

Lalala!

Gerald left for vietnam this morning so I ended up having some nice family time at Ikea in the morning.

And I got the flowers and vases I wanted for the girls! I spent a bit off time adding some ribbon details to the vases to make them more special. I used brown to be in line with our wedding theme. Really proud of my accomplishment haha. Now the next step is to get those customizable template cards printed off wedding chicks! Here's a snapshot of what I did!

And I've been really excited about the attire for our NUS wedding shoot. I've got just the perfect look in my mind, inspired by all things preppy. Think Blair waldorf and Chuck in gossip girls... Only nerdier. I gotta shop for my stuff in Bugis soon! Hope I manage to search for all the right items to pull off the entire style. Time to get my creative juices flowing!
 

 

 

 

Time together

My baby's going to vietnam for a school trip tomorrow! So we spent last night and today together. I'm so gonna miss him!

During our time together, we developed a new found love for chinchillas. We saw one at the amk pet lover's last night and it was soooo adorable. It was this grey chinny with really nice fur and the cutest pair of huge eyes. We were captivated by it's funny poses and how it looked like it was doing a wave dance when grooming itself. This encounter made us go on a search for YouTube chinchillas and started to make Gerald go crazy about them! Now he wants to have a chinny room in our new home hehe.

We met a potential pre-wedding make up artist today! She kinda forgot about our appt and ended up really late. Whilst she seemed pretty nice and seemed like she could do make up quite well, I'm not really comfy that she was late and doesn't seem to make the effort to update her blog with her latest works. Says something I think. Let's see how our next potential MUA is like! Hope to settle this soon!

Anyway, my baby bought the funniest, cyclops looking, ah beng shades today! I feel like laughing whenever I see him wear 'em. I shall end today's post w a pic of him and his epic shades!

*snap snap*

I've been reading Elsie Larson's blog - A beautiful mess. Last night, I was inspired by her photography tips on taking self portraits. One of her tips was to take photos using reflective surfaces like mirrors. She had an awesome idea to take a photo in front of a mirror, whilst looking at the camera in the reflection. I woke up this morning with the idea in my mind and decided to give it a go!

Here's the shot! I really like it.

Something else in her blog post called out to me. Challenge yourself to do something brand new. When I saw that, it reminded me that life is too short and we should all strive to try new things whilst we can. Why stick to routine when you can make life more interesting... More creative? And life is too unpredictable, you'll never know when you can possibly lose the chance to do so.

Capturing moments

Here's my shot of the day.

There's always a beautiful moment out there waiting to be captured.

Something exciting happened at work today. I was asked to think about ways to improve the productivity, effectiveness and interactiveness of management meetings. It got me pretty excited since I already have some ideas circling in my mind. This is an area that I feel is truly meaningful and impactful for organization development. Hehe heavy stuff eh. But something really worth thinking about.

Walking amidst the greens.

Yay to mid week!

My own quote of the day:

One of the best gifts you can give anyone are beautiful memories.

This thought just popped into my mind today when I was looking at my sister's birthday pics. I was just thinking about developing the happy photos for her to keep. Ain't the quote so true?

Picture of the day! My favorite treees.

The things you are to me

I'm hooked on this song by Secret Garden.

It has a beautiful chorus that sounds truly magical to me. The entire song is sung with so much devotion and bittersweet sadness. I can actually imagine someone singing this after losing the love of her life -_- Super emo song!

Here are the amazing lyrics:

The things you are to me

If I held in my hand,
Every grain of sand
Since time first began to me
Still I could never count,
Measure the amount;
Of all the things you are to me

If I paint the sky,
Hang it up to dry
I would want the sky to be
Oh, such a grand design
An everlasting sign
Of all the things you are to me

Chorus:
You are the sun that comes on summer winds
You are the falling year that autumn brings
You are the wonder and the mystery
In everything I see… the things you are to me

Sometimes I wake at night
And suddenly takes fright
You're my vaguest fantasy
But then you reach for me
And once again I see
All the things you are to me

Chorus:
You are the sun that comes on summer winds
You are the falling year that autumn brings
You are the wonder and the mystery
In everything I see… the things you are to me

Bridge

Chorus:
You are the sun that comes on summer winds
You are the falling year that autumn brings
You are the wonder and the mystery
In everything I see… the things you are to me
All the things you are… to me   

Happy 34th birthday!

Celebrated jie's birthday at the seletar restaurant yesterday! Lotsa awesome food and delightful desserts.

Really thankful for having such an amazing sister, who's such a good role model to many ladies out there. She's such a supportive sister, filial daughter understanding wife and super mum!

Wish you loads of love, good health and happiness jie!

Bliss! Love the happy expression on my granny's face.

Smiling for you Yi yi!

The classic blackforest cake =)

Mei mei looking so nostalgic.

Inspired!

Apart from sorting out some admin filing (yes, I've been very messy), I managed to do a lil DIY this morning! *feels so accomplished*

Let me share something before I show my DIY works. Hehe.

I caught a emotional picture of sherie when she just woke up. Look at those sad puppy dog eyes... I just love love her.

And here are my works! I wanted to do something to express my fondness for trees. I had some woody cardboard left so I decided to use it for my own mini signage or moodboard. I actually went to Microsoft word to look for a font I liked! I can't pretty words without using a reference hehe. I ended up using 'Harrington' cause it had a mythical, nature feel to it.

And due to Gerald's influence, I've developed a liking towards Secret Garden's Celtic music! When I listen to their pieces, I think of misty forests... Fantasy journeys, medieval castles, elves, bittersweet sadness. Everything I like! I get easily immersed in their melodic intertwining of musical notes... It makes me feel really really peaceful. 

Saturday brekkie!

Always feels good to have brekkie with your favorite person in the world.

Swenson's breakfast! Our first time ever.

Jumbo sausage = Calorie bomb!

I love you even though you always look dumb dumb!

Ham pancakes with very little ham -_-'

The hunt for the perfect dress

I went dress shopping with my mum today!

I wanted the perfect dress for my bintan beach photoshoot. Something unique yet laid back enough for the beach. Something white (though the dress I got isn't exactly this colour hehe). Something with the Island shop look.

To kickstart my hunt for -the- dress, I bought lychee milk tea from the 'Share Tea' kiosk at Wisma. It was so deliciously yummy! *drool* Definitely got me going throughout the day.

Here are some of the dresses I picked out:

Forever New

Zara

Daniel Yam

The winner? The 2nd and 3rd dress from Zara =D

Well I had 2 cause I couldn't decide between them! 

I will probably end up wearing the lacey dress since it's a lot more special and while it's a casual dress, it still exudes the 'wedding' feel with the lace details. 

The best part of the whole experience? I love how my mum accompanied me on my shopping trip (we spent 3 hours!) and handpicked the dresses together with me. And if people ask about the dress I chose, I can proudly say 'this is the dress my mum chose for me'. It just makes it a lot more meaningful. =)

Wedding adrenaline

I took leave this morning and woke up at 10am. It just feels sooo good to wake up naturally, without that sinking feeling that you have to go to work. Whee!

Felt so inspired to spend my day doing wedding planning! I just spent the past hour or so looking for past pre-wedding photoshoots done in NUS. It was pretty productive since I managed to come up with quite a few locations and ideas for our shoot =D Whilst surfing, I came across a photographer's posting about his PS for a couple at NUS:

"Its just sweet that a couple do not just want beautiful memories of themselves but rather re-create a part of their history for their pre-wedding" 

That's exactly what I have in mind for our pre-wedding. I want our photographs to tell our story, to bring out the sweet memories of our journey together. And as we go through our NUS photoshoot, I hope the both of us can remember and relive some of the best times we had together. It'll be a good reminder to us on how important we are to each other and that we have is truly worth cherishing and fighting for.

Do things you love

I missed publishing my post on 3rd of May! Here it is:

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I did 2 things that I absolutely love today.

1. Drinking Vanilla latte at Starbucks while pondering about random things.

2. Listening and singing along to the acoustic covers by my favourite Youtube group, Jayesslee!

On my way home, I wondered about how I can become so afraid and timid when I meet new people, especially those who seem to know a lot more than I do (i.e. lots of people hehe). During such encounters, I become flustered and lose track of what I'm saying. I frequently end up sprouting gibberish, confusing others. It's really an area that I must work on. But how do I do it?

I guess the first step is for me to really believe in myself and be confident in the way I present myself. No one is perfect and no one should be afraid to show their imperfections. Everyone makes mistakes and learns along the way. 

The next step? To learn how to stay focused and always think before I speak. I have a tendency to rattle on without being clear about the main point I'm trying to drive across. Time to learn from those who speak very concisely without beating about the bush!