Au's Sweet Seventeen

Hey guys!!!

I've come to the point of laziness (to blog) that i've never reached before, but comparing to most other bloggers, i think i can still be called productive :p. Anyway... Here to blog about my niece Au's Sweet 17 birthday party.

Such a bright beautiful photo, so no-it wasn't taken with my camera *LOL*, i stole lots of pictures for this blog post from CL's FB and majority are from the professional photog they hired for the party! It's very easy to tell which ones are from them, sadly!

So yeah, the party's back in July :p, it's always taken me a while to blog when there are so many pictures to sort, resize and arrange, they intimidate me! At least i'm still better than #Undecided who still haven't manage to blog about HER bday in June!

But i digress. 

As i am covering all bases of this special occasion (in Indonesia-especially for Chinese descents, 17th bdays are very important for girls. It's like the rite of passage, the symbol that they have entered their adulthood. And as Au's friend put it, they're legal to marry already hahaha), this is going to be a long post and very photo heavy!

First of all : Invitation.

I think i mentioned this many times,  CL (Au's mum) is very creative-she came up with all the designs and details. And produced them all themselves as well, since they're working in digital printing industry

This is considered very simple, i saw Au's (and my other nieces/nephews') friends' invitations, they went all out (like, crazy extravagant-and expensive WTF. I don't think i want to have a daughter if i have to pay a fortune for the bday invitation only #stingy)

Theme was Red Riding Hood (oh yeah, sweet 17 parties always have themes here :p), mainly because Au's not even remotely interested in having a party and couldn't be relied on to pick for a theme -___-. One of her suggestion was 101 Dalmatian and she proposed to dress like Cruella de Vil WTF. In the end CL picked Red Riding Hood because Au's a die hard animal lover and at least there's a wolf in this fairy tale. I guess the fact that the wolf got killed in the end is not important? Hahaha

Each invitation comes with a puzzle piece that the guests are asked to bring and assemble in the party. A very creative idea but proven to be too hard to execute in real life hahaha

The invite also comes with a personalized luggage tag

CL pretty much handled the whole party herself (you can say that she was the one-person event organizer *LOL*), she just loves organizing parties that i think she should run her own EO. Au's not much of a party girl herself, and she was like "I'm fine without any party", i think she doesn't like to be the center of attention (she definitely got that trait from me, don't you think??? LOL. Thank God i celebrated my sweet 17th in Singapore so it was not that cray at all) but quoting KC "Your mother loves it! Let her do it!" and even proceeded on declaring that it's CL's party and not really Au's. Must i mention that it was CL's bday as well? LOL. (Au's bday's earlier in the month, but the party must be postponed since it was during Eid holiday) So yeah, it was more of CL's party than Au's la.

She even made the birthday cake (TIERRED one, mind you!) and the entire sweet corner herself (with her employees la hahaha. Her reasoning was, why pay for sweet corner when using her own resources' more economical? Not to mention tastier!).

Here she is, preparing the bday cake the night before

Then continued decorating it the next morning :

LOL at KC's annoyed expression. That's his perpetual facial expression, i believe his main emo (ala Inside Out) is definitely Disgust too hahahaha

Prep prep prep

She also made her own award *SMH*. She bugged me on end for gift ideas for the party (best dressed and all), i got the idea of giving them awards instead of gifts (it's cooler! Trophy like that would definitely be more cherished than just simple gifts, don't you think??? Well, i know i would!), but i was thinking more of those laser cut placate thing? I didn't expect her to assemble her own awards from scratch!

Totally in her element here hahaha

Seriously, why don't you consider making your own EO, CL?

Look how nice the awards turned out!

One more for Best Instagram!

Meanwhile the bday girl spent her morning getting bday nail art at Me-Nail :

Sorry for the fugly photo, Kiki Kwee was not around to arrange the photo shoot and Au was being super limp and hard to direct that i lost my patience within secs *LOL*

In case anyone's wondering what i got her for her sweet 17? I hunted for the pressie during our trip to Singapore earlier in the month and found this sweet, dainty diamond necklace :

I partly post this as a reminder to myself not to get the exact some thing for her wedding or something hahaha

In the afternoon, the make up session begun (i decided to do my own makeup, which i did within 15 minutes because i was pressed for time zzz) :

That's Melly, who pretty much becomes our family's private MUA by now hahahaha

I left for Me-Nail to fix my nails and then straight to the hair salon (just to curl them, i spent more than twice more time being ignored, waiting for someone to attend to me than actually getting my hair done WTF. Super annoying. I have successfully train my maid to curl *and color* my hair now, so i don't even have to go to the salon anymore now *thank God*, please don't get married too soon my dear maid! LOL) so i asked hunny to snap some pics of Au for this blog post. He snapped LOTS of BLURRY and slanted photos T.T, 90% of the pictures are unusable WTF T.T. The ones i ended up using must be cropped the hell out *sigh*.

CL adding baby breaths to her braids. Why does Au look like Elsa whenever her hair's braided? Do you want to build a snow man, Au?

Eh, talk about artistic. Can't imagine how it'd look like if i was the one sticking the flowers anyhow LOLOLOL

They went to the venue earlier (the venue was at Tune Restaurant) for some photoshoot and here are some of the stunning photos of the bday girl :

Joe Photography did a wonderful job, love the result! I don't mind promoting them for free since they're so good hahaha

Dress by Melly (yes, the MUA i mentioned earlier)

We scrambled high and low for that blazer KC wore -___-, ended up getting a Tommy Hilfiger so he'd look less "uncle" and more of "big bro"? LOL

Another creative idea that CL had but turned out a bit hard to implement was that the guests are supposed to find their own name card and use it to reserve their seat hahaha, it made a total traffic jam at the reception area since it was pretty hard to find your name among so many other names!

Souvenir was a jar of custome made sticky candy

Polaroid corner for the guests to snap selfies and stick it to an album along with some special wishes for Au

Yep, even the bday girl's mother had to man the reception area at one point *LOL*

I love the arrangement and decors ^^

The puzzle the guests should finish but sticking the puzzle piece they got from the invite

Okay, this girl's so camera ready hahaha

The puzzle was proven to be way too hard to do though hahahaha, some people spent the longest time there while others simply gave up (i tots would too @__@)

The statuesque bday girl

Sweet Corner by Au Tarte

CL's an awesome baker (partly thanks to her own love for food i guess hahaha), #Undecided's hubby has a very picky taste bud and he went gaga for the sweet corners, he packed loads of the leftover home hahaha. Au Tarte's based in Banjarmasin though, so if you're in Banjarmasin and want some yum munchies... Contact them! Don't forget to tell her that i recommended her hahaha

BB looking like a much prettier version of Jessica Iskandar here (if she reads this, she'd go "Who's she?" and after i explain who JeDar is, BB's going to get really offended and call me mean. LOL)

Nom!

Selfie is a lifestyle *LOL*

At the photo corner. Not a fan of the result of photo corners so i'm just posting hunny's snap instead hehe

This is the VIP room where the elder family member were placed

While the rest of us were eaten alive by savage mosquitoes in the outdoor section -___-. We have some complaints about Tune Restaurant's services (i guess they're not used to bigger scale parties like this, but still. No excuse for this, man!) and one of it's definitely their promises about fumigating the venue before the party. Fumigating my ass, the mosquitoes were having more fun than us the whole night FOL.My poor feet were disfigured after the party and it took almost a month to heal, i should sue them zzz (but first i have to insure my legs. LOLOLOL)

The theme of the bday cake was "rustic", nature inspired and simplistic to match the woodsy-theme

Snapped this while looking for a venue for OOTD snaps (outfit post here), my God i look like the villains in Indonesian sinetrons. And when i look mean, i look like CW *LOLOLOLOLOL*

I love how Joe Photography's photogs knows my angle without me having to fight them *LOLOLOL*

The dishes (you only get to choose the main and dessert) :

Pizza entre

Salad

Rather burnt-tasting mushroom soup, and look at the oil floating at the top!

Steak was good though

And i actually love the panna cotta, CL packed LOADS home and i secretly ate one of them everyday WTF. I think i had about 7 in the end FML

Another complain for Tune Restaurant, i actually think their dishes (with the exception of the oily mushroom soup) are very nice BUT their timing sucks! It was like what, half an hour or more between each dishes that lots of the guests actually left before the main was served! And in my group alone, my main came more than half an hour before the others'! Maybe Tune Restaurant should really maintain their time and work rhythm better if they want to cater to big scale parties like this again, for the moment i strongly not recommending them for big parties, they seem very inexperienced and confused! But as a normal restaurant, i don't mind coming back for a meal.

Cheers!

One of the games of the night was guessing Au's shoes size and the silly girl had to check her shoes -___- wat da....

The host (very funny, recommended! But i can't remember his name *LOL) and he actually made KC relight the candles and ask CL to blow on them as well since it was her bday too hahahaha

Apparently there's a tradition of surprising the bday girl during the party? Au's close friends wore masks of celeb guys she fancies *LOL*, it was a bit creepy though -___-

The bday girl was tickled pink nonetheless

No idea who those guys are. Recognized Jared Paladecki but that's because i loved Gilmore Girls, which is way before these girls' era *LOL*

CL also forced me to be the judge of the Best Dressed *sigh*, i thought i could just pick them and tell Au or something but the host actually insisted on "interviewing" me WTF. Anyway, i picked Au's teacher for the male best dressed because honestly all of the male teachers dressed better than her friends *LOL*.

I don't remember having such a fun teacher back then *LOL*

#Undecided and hubby, who offered to help out but arrived an hour late -____-

Pic with the extended family. Who took this??? Made us looked like tare panda LOLOLOL

With my Amazonian (i hope she doesn't read this, if she does... Oops?) cousin Myr (Sabsab is definitely an Amazonian too), Au, CL and CW

Bday girl and her friends who attended

Disco time

I thought 17 year olds are wild (i sure was *oops*) but the boys actually bailed and went home while the girls partied/hang around the disco floor -___-. If it were me and my friends... Well, probably gonna dance until morning hahahaha.

Seriously, the host and the DJ had more fun than them -___-

Some extra photos :

Hunny and #Undecided's hubby

BFF in black

I saw Au (who was complaining of sore feet) sitting down while wearing the black wings her friends made her, and the lighting was just right so i quickly snapped this :

Throbbing feet angel *LOL*. All those craps i said about my photos being not so good? I take them all back *LOLOLOL*. This photo is all kind of perfection, alright! I just need to learn to edit *not gonna happen*

And that was the end of the long, tiring and memorable day! It's 3 months too late, but i just wanna say to Au : have fun! Enjoy the rest of your teenage years, 20s would be fun, but you have to cherish the ignorant fun only teenagers can have hahaha. Don't be afraid to make mistakes, to be who you really are-because whoever you are, you can't be wrong and this is the time for you to start finding yourself.

I know it's hard to be a teenager sometimes, with all those hormones raging and crazy thoughts swirling, but trust me-they all shall pass and one day you will look back and i hope you'll look back with a smile on your face instead of regret. While i don't want you to get out of control, it's okay to be happy, to do things to make yourself happy (within limits of course. I am obligated to say this, i am her aunt after all). And if you haven't, find your BFF, trust me a BFF is one thing that kept me sane at times!  

Imma end this post with a pic of CL when we wished her a happy bday at 12 PM. My whole family's horribly forgetful (i have to literally tell my mum that it's my bday or she'd forget it completely, to give you the picture of the situation *LOL*) so i often missed her bday, but not this year!

Toodles for now!

#Pink