H-moon Recap: A Rainforest stay vs. a hotel at the beach

So in Australia I told you yesterday about La Pacifique apartments and showed a video tour of how amazing the place we spent 5 nights in Burleigh Beach in Queensland was.  Well, on one night (Wednesday), we took an almost 2 hour drive to Lamington National Forest.  It's a park inland from the beaches that is a rainforest up in the mountains.  It was the only night that we actually booked before we left for the honeymoon. 

We stayed at a place called O'Reilly's Rainforest Retreat.  We were expecting a super cool resort type feel and though it was definitely nice, when we arrived, we felt more like we were in a youth camp in the woods.  :)

Again I will say that it is hard to truly get a sense of what a place looks like from pictures on a web site.  We were definitely not getting what we expected, but it was still very pretty and a very cool place to stay.  And our room was great.  Here is another (much shorter) video tour:

Me in the jacuzzi :)  We kinda overdid it with the bubbles...they were spilling out into the room :)

Fireplace in our bedroom - we did of course use that the one night we were there!  You just gotta!

So I will share more about this beautiful place in an upcoming recap.  For now, I'll share about the other hotel we stayed at in Kuta, Bali (Indonesia).  It's called the Wina Holiday Villas and Mr Fix It has stayed there several times before on his trips to Bali.  He loves it as it is right across the street from Kuta beach.  You may remember that our pup who just passed away was named Kuta after this location.  :)

Anyway, the Wina Villas were pretty nice considering that you're staying in Bali - it is afterall a 3rd world country and very different from where we live.  I will post some great pics and video of the 'city' and culture there in upcoming posts.  For now, here's a few pics of the hotel.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any pics off of my camera so these are all from their web site, but they are pretty true to reality :)

The main entrance

The pool side restaurant where we had breakfast every morning (Included in the reservation)

A view from the restaurant looking out at the pool

(we did not spend any time at the pool other than to jump in and rinse off after we came in from the beach)

What the rooms looked like.  The first night we stayed there, we had to have a room with two beds that they pushed together.  Then they switched us to a room with a large bed for the next two nights.  A little bit of the hassle with not having pre-booked reservations but not a big deal.

The cool thing about this place was that we could walk to the beach, the main strip of shops and restaurants and of course the little internet access they provided in the hotel itself.  :)  It was way cheaper to use the internet in Bali than in Australia.

The hotel was great.  Nice and decent food.  Unfortunately, we didn't have very hot water.  And one day we had to let it run for 15 minutes to get it 'warm.'  So we were quick with our showers.   And you needed them, because it was totally humid in Bali.  The temperature was in the upper 80's but the humidity made it feel a lot hotter.  Still not horrible though.  It was nice enough to walk around in shorts and tanks at night time and during the day we were out traveling to beaches anyway looking for surf for Mr Fix It.

Being the super friendly talkative guy that he is, Mr Fix It made friends with everyone wherever we went.  One day we got back to the hotel and one of the guard gate workers smiled at Mr Fix It.  He asked him if he needed a water or anything to drink.  I don't think the guy understood what he was saying because he just kept smiling and nodding.  Mr Fix It went in to the hotel bar and ordered a soda and when it was delivered he told the waiter to take it out and give it to the guy at the gate - I forget his name but Mr Fix It knew it. 

When we left later that night, the worker smiled and thanked Mr Fix It several times.  He's just kind of a good, generous guy that way...and that's why I married him!  :)

Wed recap: This is seriously a 'hotel'!?!

As I mentioned, Mr Fix It had been to Australia and Bali before and he did not feel the need to book any type of travel accommodations like hotels, car rental, restaurant reservations, touristy type attractions or tickets, etc.  We had our airline tickets and we had a couple nights at two different resorts booked and that was it!  And I didn't get him to book the resorts until literally 2 to 3 weeks before our wedding!

So when we arrived in Brisbane, Australia, I totally trusted him to figure it out.  Thankfully, I did convince him to rent a Garmin GPS system with our rental car which was a huge lifesaver in helping us get around!  He knew he wanted to check out Burleigh Beach (a place on the Gold Coast just over an hour south of the Brisbane airport) so we programmed in the city and took off.

When we arrived, we just started looking for hotels close to the beaches.  We found one that he said we should check out and as we walked up the steps to the door, Mr Fix It looked at me and said he just wasn't feeling it.  So after entering and seeing no live person to assist us, we followed his gut and walked out quickly.  We drove just a little ways away and found this place called La Pacifique apartments.

Now I'm telling you...this was a score!!!  We walked past an okay sized pool and into the front office and found a very tiny little front desk with an older looking bearded gentlemen sitting there.  We asked him if they had anything available for about 2 or 3 nights.  He said they didn't do one night stays but they did have a place available for 3 nights.  So we asked if we could see it and he walked around the corner and opened the front door to what was the apartment he lived in.  He called for his wife, Robyn to come out and asked her to take us up to #36 on the 12th floor. 

The second we walked in, we looked around, smiled at each other and told Robyn "Sold!"  So we headed back downstairs and booked the room for $150 a night.  Granted, it wasn't really a room at all.  In fact, it was a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom apartment! 

Here's a pic of the living room. 

We stayed there from Monday until Thursday when we were heading to O'Reilly's Rainforest.  We had only booked one night at O'Reilly's and we were so thankful for that as you will see in tomorrow's post.  So on Thursday morning, before we left La Pacificque, we asked the manager, Graham if they would save us the same room for us to come back and stay at for Friday and Saturday night as well.  They were so sweet and accommodating, they totally said no problem.  In fact, they gave us directions to a local grocery store and we bought some groceries to make breakfast and lunches each day since we had a fully stocked kitchen.  When we left for the one night to stay at O'Reilly's, Robyn and Graham even let us keep some of the groceries in the refrigerator.

Here is Mr Fix It making me breakfast one morning:

We totally enjoyed Graham and Robyn.  They were very sweet to us and we would run into Graham walking around the beach across the street sometimes.  They referred us to a few malls, shops, etc and even called me into their apartment one night to watch how they fed the wild birds off of their back porch from right out of their hand!  It was something you would probably never see here in So Cal. 

When we came back for the last 2 nights, they discounted our room for the 5 night stay since we had stayed 3 nights and then another 2.  So overall, we only paid about $110 US a night at most including taxes.

Our unit had apparently just been remodeled and so the cable tv in the living room wasn't working.  They called in their repair man, John to fix it and we became quick friends with him.  He shared lots of stories about how he came from Austria to Australia and his life.  He would stop and chat with us when we would run into him around the apartments.  One day when we ran out of laundry detergent I asked Robyn if we could get some more packets.  She didn't have any so she just gave me the box of detergent from her own apartment. 
Here's a pic of Mr Fix It looking out the kitchen window.  Every morning I would wake up and go look out this window to see the surfers in the water and what the weather was like. 

The cool thing about this place, too was that I could get up each morning and walk across the street to a little convenience store that had internet access which is how I was able to chat with my daughter, Little Miss on Facebook each day and keep up on a few blog posts, too.  Overall, we scored on our 'hotel' stay in Australia and would totally recommend it for anyone who travels there!

And here is a little video tour from me of our apartment.  Please excuse the racy pics of me in my undies in the mirror reflections :)  And sorry that the lighting is not fabulous on video:

So would you ever consider 'winging it' for a vacation in another country?  As much as I was freaked out to do this and wouldn't do it regularly, I have to admit that Mr Fix It did not let me down on our honeymoon.

A wedding recap - spots on my dress!

Ok, so I told you there would be no order to my recaps.  I know I started off with a couple honeymoon recaps but if I did that for two weeks straight, I might lose you.  So I thought I would share a few pics and a story about something every girl dreads on her wedding day - spots and stains on your gown.

Plus, I've also decided that at the end of each of my wedding recaps I will leave you with a small tip, words of wisdom, experienced advice or suggestion from the lessons I learned that will hopefully help you in your future planning process and on your big day.

Now mind you, I got married at an outdoor venue with a zoo.  So if you plan to do ANY pictures or wedding related events outside in your dress, just simply plan on the fact that you will in fact get some type of dirt or stain on your gown.  No way around it.  In fact, even if you don't step outside at all in your dress, unless you are wearing something that is above your ankles, people will step on it, food will get near it, and just a dirty floor in general are bound to stain that beauty.

Looking back, I was a horrible blogger bride.  I did not get photos of lots of little things (like the spots on my gown) that I knew I would blog about.  So forgive me for my lack of images in a lot of these recaps.

Anyhow, here is a pic of me in the pretty little Maggie Sottero SaBelle gown that I donned on April 16th (remember I have no pro pics yet):

And here's one showing that lovely train in all it's beaded, embellished, laced glory:

Here's a pic of my mom and niece checking out the zoo at the venue the day before during the rehearsal:

And here's one of my mom and my nephew (one of the ring bearers) and his other grandma sitting on the bench at the venue during the rehearsal:

Why am I showing you these random pics of the zoo and the bench?  Well, notice the things on the ground in those pics?  Dirt...and grass.  And even on the concrete areas of the venue there were leaves and dirt.  Now mind you, this venue, they keep it in tip top shape.  The night before your wedding from 3 am to 7 am, they have a cleaning company come in and sweep and hose everything down.  So it's not like it was filthy.  This is just what happens when you are, well, outside, DUH!

Now try to walk around and maneuver something like this throughout these type of grounds:

Needless to say, I got some great stains on my gown.  As I mentioned, if you plan on walking anywhere outside (and especially if you have a train), you will most definitely get your dress dirty.  Underneath my train was covered in dirt.  The top was not that bad, but it was not spot clean either.  At one point, my photog had me sitting on one of the little ledges in front of some shrubs and trees to get photos with my girls.  Later, while we were standing around, I noticed that there was a huge yellow stain of pollen from the flowers on the back side of my gown right on my waist.  Totally noticeable. 

I called over my coordinator and some BM's and asked them to get the bar of white ivory soap and the washcloth I had brought in the bridal cottage to do some spot cleaning.  My seamstress suggested using a bar of pure soap and washcloth to dab at stains rather than a stain remover type pad.

Well, the wash cloth and soap did little to assist in the removal of the stain.  Of course, my lovely coordinator Amanda had SHOUT stain remover pads in her waist belt.  So after realizing my seamstress' idea was not working, I gave her the go ahead to use the SHOUT.  And thankfully, the little yellow spot came almost completely out. 

Everyone around me was freaking out about the stain and the girls were shocked at how relaxed I was about the whole thing.  I am a type-A total control freak, perfectionist, stress-case weirdo about a lot of planned things in my life.  But I had resolved myself to the fact that nothing was going to upset me on our wedding day.  And I stuck to just that.  (Now granted, a few things have upset me about the wedding day after the fact, but you'll have to wait for future posts to read about those.)  So if they hadn't gotten the yellow stain out, I wouldn't have cared...after all, it was on the back side and if it showed up any pics, they could have photoshopped it out.

However, after we were completely done with all of the photos, once the guests started arriving just before the ceremony, I had my sister and BM Cousin A go out on the back patio with me and they inspected my entire gown and dabbed away with the soap and cloth to try to get some of the dirt stains out.  It wasn't horrible and they did a good job.

But believe me, this was not the last of my unfortunate encounters with stains on my dress...the best was yet to come...and at the worst possible moment!!!  (Stay tuned in a future recap)

Today's tip:  Be sure to understand what will happen in getting your dress dirty on wedding day.  Don't think it won't happen no matter how careful you are.  Be prepared!  Bring with you in your emergency kit:  water, pure bar of soap, a *white* wash cloth, stain removing pads, club soda, paper towels, Tide Eraser pen, etc. 

And the BEST thing that my coordinator had on her:  WHITE CHALK!  That little yellow stain of pollen, Amanda said that white chalk can be gently rubbed over most wedding gown stains to help 'hide' them on your big day.  I don't know if she had to use it or not because I think we got most of it out, but it was there in her hand at our disposal.

H-moon recaps: How rain affected our plans

Our honeymoon was pretty amazing.  Though I have to admit, I felt guilty about traveling halfway around the world just to lay around and be lazy.  We didn't really do any 'touristy' type things.  I really wanted to see the Australia Zoo while we there and we considered it, but we just decided to hang around and not do too much.  Our h-moon was mostly about laying out at the beach and surfing.  Unfortunately, we didn't do as much of that in Australia as we hoped since it rained a little much.

If you remember, the honeymoon was all Mr Fix It.  And he did not believe in making reservations.  We booked our airline flights through his credit card air miles and we did book a one night stay at a resort in Australia as well as 3 nights at a resort in Bali, but the rest of the time we were there, we had no plans and no reservations!  So once we landed in Brisbane, Australia, we got a rental car (of course one big enough to fit Mr Fix It's surfboards and we were surprised to fit them into a regular mid-sized car) and headed straight out of Brisbane towards the Gold Coast and Surfer's Paradise.

For whatever reason, Mr Fix It didn't want to stay in Surfer's Paradise.  He had been talking about it a lot but I guess he felt it was too expensive.  So we went a little further south to a surf spot called Burleigh Beach. 

I'll share more about our hotels and such soon, but for now, I'll just share some pics of the weather and surf.  The first three days we were in Burleigh, it rained off and on was cloudy.  That didn't stop Mr Fix It from still making sure he got out in the surf for at least a couple hours.  As soon as we rented our hotel, we headed across the street to Burleigh Beach and he jumped in.

This is a pic of the beach where he would surf.  The waves prevent you from seeing that there are actually about 60+ guys out in the water.  It was like that almost every day, even on the rainy days.  It was not this nice on the first afternoon we were there (this was taken a few days later), so I just laid on a towel in my pants and a sweater and took a little nap while Mr Fix It surfed :)

Here's another pic of the same beach spot where we would go when the weather was nice.  That little building on the right was a little place with several different restaurants.  We thought about going there to eat one day but ended up deciding to head somewhere else as we thought it was a little pricey and not very enticing:

In the coming days, we drove down the coast even further south out of Queensland and into New South Wales to look for more surf spots and beaches.  Here are some pics from a few places we stopped.  As you can see, the weather was not great and there weren't a whole lot of surfers or surf.  But they were still very pretty spots and beaches.

This spot was one of the more popular places called Kirra Beach.  It is a popular place and had about 100+ guys running around trying to catch waves right up until the sunset!  I didn't even get a picture of the chaos of the surfers just to the right of where this shot was taken.

The clouds in these shots (in Austalia) are just simply amazing!

This was a shot we took while driving down to NSW. It shows how ridiculously rainy it was. I took it through the car window because Mr Fix It thought it was cool how they carved a tunnel out of this mountainside:

Even with the rain, Mr Fix It did have a few fun days of surf in Australia.  And I had one or two good days laying out on the beach, too. 

In Bali, it was a totally different story.  There was a brief shower the first night we arrived in Bali while we were out shopping and checking out the town.  But the entire rest of the week we were there, we had beautifully sunny and WARM weather.  Humid, too, but it wasn't that bad.  Here is one shot of the sunset in Bali from the last resort we stayed at in Uluwatu. 

More to come with video and such - overall, the weather and surf was pretty good in both places. We didn't mind a little rain. The trip was still relaxing. Funny thing was, we both admitted that we totally overpacked! Since we were gone for two weeks we thought we'd need several outfits, but ended up not wearing probably half of what we each brought! :)

Wanna see that video from our ceremony again?

So for those of you that were in attendance at our wedding, you'll probably remember a little video that we played just before I made my entrance for the ceremony?  Well, in case you missed anything (and for those of you who didn't get to attend), here's the full video to view again!  And below is some background on how it all came together. 

Part One

Part Two

The part that says "Please Rise" and then faded to black was the exact moment where I began my walk down the aisle to the remaining part of the song that plays.

The video was a long work in progress which I started back in July before the wedding.  I searched YouTube for creative wedding montages.  Ya know the ones that they play at weddings now where you see pictures of the bride and groom from childhood through the current time played along to music selections.  Well, I wanted to do that, but with a twist that would truly entertain our guests. 

I came across a film student who had made a unique montage for her own wedding and posted it on YouTube.  People had contacted her asking if she would do one for their own receptions and she informed me that it would be like $500 or $600 for an 8 minute video.  Now for those of you who have experience with me and my computer skills, I love to create montage videos as a hobby. I have made videos of my daughter's All Star Softball season, her soccer season and even edited my sister's wedding video.  So there was no way I was gonna pay that much money to basically use the same script she wrote out and modify it to fit me and John.

The only thing I needed to figure out was how to incorporate the movie star clips and how to find a voice over actor to narrate for us.  Well, by the amazing blessing of the Lord, it all fell into place.

I did a google search and spent a lot of time searching for videos of stars on YouTube and then figured out how to download the videos to my own computer.  You can do that through Mozilla Firefox internet browser. 

Then I did a google search for voiceover actors and found a web site where VO actors can post demos of their work.  I found this amazing actor who had the exact voice I wanted.  And if it sounded familiar to you, it's because he is the voice of Divorce Court and also has done tons of movie trailers, promos, and is the voice of some Fox sports shows. 

Well, he was a blessing in disguise because when I contacted him via e-mail with the script and told him I was a single mom on a budget, he graciously offered his services to me at a ridiculous discount!  And then he turned around and e-mailed me back the audio files of the narration within less than 2 or 3 days!  So many, many thanks goes out to Jimmy Hodson for all of his time and generosity and a special praise to Jesus for helping lead me to him!

And then I shared the idea with John.  At first, he thought it was dumb and didn't like how I planned to incorporate it into the ceremony.  As a matter of fact, my pastor, Lyle was really concerned (and so was my DJ, Justin from Generations Entertainment) when I shared my idea of how it would lead into the song that would play during my walk down the aisle.  But once I showed the video to my DJ's, they said it was their favorite part of the wedding.  And then after the ceremony, while we were signing the marriage license, Lyle sat in the room with us and told me "You know, I was really worried about how that video was going to work with the ceremony and how long it was going to be, but I gotta tell you - it was really great and worked so well."

Yeah, I am patting myself on the back with this one.  I loved it and stuck to my plans even when everyone else didn't get my 'vision.'

So what did you think?  Did you like it?  What was your favorite part?  And no, I do not plan on going into business to do this...it's just a fun hobby. 

The recaps are about to begin!!!

Preface:  For those of you who are new to my blog, please note that I refer to John as Mr Fix It and to Jordan as Little Miss. 

This is to keep anonymity on the other blog sites that I am featured on. 

Ok, while I'm not fully caught up on everything I'd like to be with work and home and getting us all settled in and back on schedule, I have got most things under control now and am able to dedicate more time to blogging again. Still not sure how often I'll get to follow along with all my fellow brides to see how you're planning is progressing, but I will do my best to get fully back on track soon!


Anyway, on this little site, I am about to begin the recaps and I promise you that I've got daily posts to keep you busy for at least a few months :) I've already started making my little lists of things to write about. Remember that this site was mostly created for me to journal and track my own progress, feelings and life changes so that I can eventually transfer it all to save forever. :) Fun stuff! So forgive me if some of it is very personal sometimes, it's just for our little family.

Since I will have to wait a month or so for the wedding photos and video from our photographer and videographer, I will most likely start off with honeymoon recaps. I have some pics and videos and stories to share with you. Granted, I have to confess that I am not a very good blogger and I do not pull my camera out at every possible opportunity, but I will do my best to keep you all entertained.

And just a side note: I will most likely not recap in any type of sequential or chronological order. Most likely, I will let my thoughts come to me as they will and just recap randomly about different things throughout the day and our trip. So do not expect things to have any super organized type of order to them. :)

But for now, get ready because I do have some things to share for sure and they will start tomorrow most likely!

PS I am settling in well and Mr Fix It and I are truly enjoying our time together as husband in wife in our own home now. We have been cooking for and with each other and are adjusting as well as can be expected to new routes to work and school (for Little Miss) and to sharing a bed, kitchen table, etc. Although we are still really struggling with what to do about the tv situation. Mr Fix It and I have a lot of programs that we don't share enthusiasm for. For instance, he is not doing well with having to watch Dancing with the Stars, Chelsea Lately and the Colbert Report...but he'll catch on soon enough :)

The wedding is over and there is much to share!

Hi, family and friends...

If you are here, you've received my e-mail informing you of my personal blog.  For a while now, I didn't really post anything on this site because I was a featured bride blogger on two other web sites that I have been posting on for about 7 months now sharing all the ins and outs of our wedding planning process.  Well, now that the wedding is over, I am about to start sharing all of the recaps of our big day, our honeymoon and all that has been going on since then.

And so if you'd like, follow along with me!  I will blog on this site almost every single day with some little story or recap about the flowers that died, the magician who wowed all of our guests, the super hilarious photobooth photos you didn't see but I will share with you here and all that other jazz.  Like how none of you know that I totally started bleeding when I ripped my knuckle off pushing my wedding ring on during the ceremony!  Thank the Lord I didn't get blood on my gown! 

There's lots that you may not know about or maybe you were not able to attend and this will allow you the opportunity to follow along with photos, video and memories.  And hopefully you'll have your own stories and memories to share about things for us to save in this little journal...so be sure to comment when you feel so led!

Welcome, and let's get this party started!!!  Oh, and here are a couple pics from the big day that we've received through our wedding site:  http://www.weddingphotoswap.com/.  To share your own pics, just type in code 1266389914 and use the password beever.  We'd love to see your photos!