Recap: Bridal Shower (Nov 22nd)

I was kept in the dark on most of the planning of the bridal shower. Jenn and others organized this part. I think we had about 13 participants (I think), and only 1/3 is from local, we couldn’t do it earlier than the same weekend. We were also logistically challenged, due to the morning ceremony rehearsal and the long drive back from Palos Verdes. We couldn’t do it at home either as there would be no one to set up the place and get the food ready (even if we catered)!!! So, Mimi Café was picked as the location. Part of the reason also because we will be dining extravagantly the entire weekend, a light lunch would be better fit for our figures in preparation to get into our attires.

Jenn and the gangs did a great job in organizing, giving the fact that they are all from out of state, and are not familiar with anything here in Irvine. They want this to be a surprise so they cannot consult me either.

We all arrived at Mimi Café around 1pm. The shower was called to order by Jenn soon after. We all ordered our lunches, and then the games began. The first one is for everyone to write down their own learning from relationships as advice to me. Vanessa made these lovely cards everyone used. The cards are then tied to a wreath and later on as a home décor display. That is a very creative idea. She certainly utilized her scrapbook skills and stash for this project!

The second game is to see how well everyone knows me. A list of questions were sent to me couple weeks before. Some of them are difficult even for me, as they are related to childhood memories. I am not so good in remembering details, PERIOD. I should try to post some of these questions later when I get home. The winner of this game gets a prize. And to our surprise, my sister, Brenda actually knows the most.

The third game is to see how well I know Tom. For every answer I get wrong, I have to put a piece of bubble gum in my mouth. What can I say? My mouth is not large enough to consume all those gums!!! And I have to say, I will need to challenge Tom on some of his answers. Oh gosh, I failed miserably in this game. And everyone had a good laugh, looking at me trying to chew all those gums!!!

Then it was time for opening gifts. I want to say thank you here for all the wonderful gifts I received from the bridal shower. Except for couple surprises, most of them are from the registry which I would certainly put to good use.

A Ukrainian cooking book from Nelinka (Tom’s oldest sister). Tom’s father is Ukrainian. Tom’s mother is German. That is why I got a book for Ukrainian cooking. It seems to contain good stories on culture and holidays. Both Tom and I are not so certain on this kind of cooking. Ok, after flipping through it, the dish that I think I may actually attempt to try would be like cabbage roll. I don’t think I would even think about making blood sausage!!! But it is a good intro to his family cultural and one day, I may just surprise Tom for a special dinner experience.

Fran read my blog and had added to my discontinued china collections. They are being shipped from Florida somewhere. I can’t wait to see them.

Then there is this erotic DVD Charmin got me. She claimed that is the reason she was late to the shower. I am not so certain, I joked that she is just picking it out from her own collections!!! Other than that, there isn’t any other naughty gift, which I think is a good thing!!! A bit of TMI here, I haven’t showed Tom the DVD yet, and I don’t know if I would or not. What if he likes it? What if he doesn’t like it? Let’s just leave it at that for now.

Once again, we left pretty quickly as we needed to get ready for the rehearsal dinner at six the same night.