We’re going on our honeymoon!! Yay!

7 months ago, we took the plunge (click here for pictures and videos from the wedding)

4 months ago, we took the Honeymoon Compatibility test....and barely passed (click here to take the test yourself)

1 minute ago, we took a dice, rolled it, concluded to cross off Item #1 on my travel bucket list and call it a honeymoon. Hehe.

I was kidding with the last one. But yes, in spite of #babybaby's attempts of destroying my list (click here for video proof!) we’ve finally agreed on a honeymoon. Woohoo!

So “calf land” it is! [*The name Italy comes from the word italia, meaning “calf land”]

Neither of us have been to that part of the globe so it will definitely be an adventure. Haha.

While I intend to eat my way around the country that invented the thermometer**, all my husband can think about basically revolves around the fact that the automobile is probably one of Italy’s greatest products. So yes – cars, circuits and anything to do with speed. Oh and golf. If applicable, that is. How romantic.

We’ll figure that out later but for now, we’re excited about planning this very much-anticipated getaway. We’ve finally got our schedules cleared, which means we’ll be on a proper vacation or honeymoon (whatever you want to call it, lol). Oh joy!

We’re currently working on our basic travel checklist (have travelled a bit for work but not sure how honeymoon travels differ, so this will be the first):

Flights – found a really good deal online, but we’ll have to leave in less than 3 weeks
Visa & Passport – No visa required for Malaysians staying up to 90 days, minimum 6 months passport validity.
Accommodation – sorted. Using a combination of bookings on Airbnb, Booking.com, Agoda and an independent apartment website. Will do a review of the experiences on all these booking engines after the trip, for your reference.
Activities/Tours (if applicable) – work in progress. Deciding between Viator, The Roman Guy and a few other operators for sites that involve long waiting lines (like the Colosseum, Vatican Museums, Pisa, etc). Do you have experiences with any of those tour companies (would love to hear from you)?
Inter-city transportation, airport transfers, etc – expensive to drive in Italy so we’ve decided to train around the major cities.
Basic Italian words – hoping item #7 will be of help. Lol
Useful travel apps – trying out the Ulmon, Tripadvisor and Museum app. Oh and Lingolook Italy.
Pocket wifi – currently considering a few options. Will update after the trip.
Packing list – the challenge of bringing enough for the October weather (to last a month), yet saving some space for souvenirs (and Italian cheese) within the 30kg luggage allowance. Yee-ha!

We’ve got the camera at the top of our packing list, so will do our best to document the trip with unbiased reviews of our Italian escape when we get back. Meantime, if you have any Italy travel tips to share (must-eats, where to eat and the usual travel stuff), we’d be most grateful.

Big hugs!

References:
*http://facts.randomhistory.com/
**http://www.lifeinitaly.com/

PICTURES AND VIDEOS FROM OUR TRAVELS

Source: http://www.hannah.today/marriedlife/

Honeymoon Compatibility Checklist

According to http://www.weddingclickers.com, 99% of couples who opt for the traditional wedding (i.e. not a destination wedding or an elopement), take a honeymoon.

But then again, according to statistics, only 1 in 4 couples go on their dream honeymoon. Where do/did YOU fit in?

If you contribute to the pool of 25% who were fortunate enough to realize your dream honeymoon, great! If you’re not, it’s never too late to start planning – your finances, logistics and timing. Even if you have kids as extra baggage, it’s still not impossible to plan your ultimate travel itinerary. Take stylish blogger Ashley Muir Bruhn as an example. She’s one amazing supermum who makes adventuring with a three-year-old and a toddler look effortless and fun.

Picture from http://www.hitherandthither.net/

So here’s the thing. #Babybaby and I got married 3 months ago but we haven’t done the honeymoon thing yet.

Heck, we haven’t even got anything planned. And no, we do not intend to contribute to the remaining 0.1% of couples who decide – NO HONEYMOON. So in making an effort to plan (yes, blame previous inactivity on work, timing, bla bla bla…excuses), we decided to do a bit of homework and came across this…

THE HONEYMOON COMPATIBILITY CHECKLIST. Jeng jeng jeng.

For the fun of it, you can print 2 sets and get your partner to do it with you. Basically if you don’t have at least 6 common answers, you’re in for some serious lessons on compromise, so good luck to you. Lol

Here goes:

[Questionaire from www.honeymoons.about.com]

So how did you fare? Haha.

At our end, despite the divergence in activity preferences (I shall let you have the fun of guessing which belongs to who)…

…we managed to rake in a nonviolent score of 8/12. Okay la, the truth is, we barely made it.

So next step was to decide on WHERE to go. Hence, the next exercise – listing down our top 5 travel destinations/bucket list. If you follow my new Pinterest page, you’ll notice that I have more than 5. Lol

So this was a tough process indeed. Anyway, #Babybaby and I committed to the exercise (although I decided to sneak in a bonus #6…hahaha) and here’s the verdict…

That was when we realized that God actually had a sense of humour.

I suppose it will be a while before we actually go on our honeymoon. After all, negotiations do take time, so here's to a hallelujah time ahead. Lol

PICTURES AND VIDEOS FROM OUR HONEYMOON

Source: http://www.hannah.today/marriedlife/

The 1st-time wife: Compromise

Being on my own since I left home at the age of 16 meant that I have been so-called “independent” for the last… *counting-with-fingers*…16 years! Yikes! Didn’t realize I was THAT old. Lol

Sure, the word “independent” can mean a host of different things in various different context (trust the English-language pros to overcomplicate things), but basically being independent in my case and probably yours too, would simply mean that we’ve been on our own, i.e. accountable to ourselves, and nobody else. Obviously, when I started my first full-time job at the age of 19, for the hours I was at work, I was accountable to my boss. You get the idea.

While independence for most would mean having to work and fend for themselves, carry their financial burdens alone and re-building their lives, careers and personal creditability from scratch, some may think the idea of independence as being in a state of total liberation; having the freedom to do what they want to do, whenever the want, however they want.

True on both ends, independence can either be a good or dangerous thing. I’ve known a lot of people who spun their rather unfortunate state of independence into success stories that deserve nothing less than the highest of respect. I’ve also known some who turned their lives completely upside down, for the worse.

The difference, which I eventually learned, was the word

Discipline.

How I spent my time and the little resources I had, and whether it would be towards instant gratification or for the better of my future, boiled down to how disciplined I was with the decisions I had to make. Not easy. I’m sure you can relate to that.

So for the past 16 years, and through the many mistakes I made over that period of time, I’ve learnt to grasp the concept and importance of this scary word – discipline – which I try very hard to apply to my business, my priorities and my daily habits/routines. Still a lot to learn and a long way to go, but if I may add, it gets easier with time so hang in there!

I must say though, that the transition from “independence” to marriage can be quite an eye-opener. *laugh* Sometimes I think it’s God’s funny way of saying,

“Okay Hannah, after 16 years I think you’ve finally learnt your lesson on discipline. You’re not as fast a learner as some of my other children but I think you’re finally ready for your next lesson – compromise.”

#alamak.

Okay, if you think the concept of compromise is something you can grasp instantly and easily, go talk to the Supermums who have been married with kids for at least a decade. In fact, talk to any married woman with kids and a husband. And you wonder why so much more commercial emphasis is placed on Mother’s Day as compared to Father’s Day. Believe you me, it’s no coincidence.

Now that I’ve joined the Marriage club, I have so much more respect for my mum and all the mothers around me. First step of learning the art of compromise – God gives you a husband. Then depending on how fast you can learn, He gives you the kids for a new level of learning. Cool. I suppose I will learn to accept that eventually. Lol

So now that I’ve answered your question on “How’s Married Life?”…

Since we got married in February, the million-dollar-question we keep getting is, "HOW'S MARRIED LIFE?" *sigh* Hope we answered your question in this video, together with this long-due unboxing video. I love my new toy BTW!!!

…please don’t ask what I gather would be the next progression of questions to follow. Lol. The answer is: "Not so soon". Lol

Compromise.

From having the liberty to make decisions on my own to now, having to obtain consent from my husband on almost all of my decisions is a BIG adjustment. Then we talk about sharing a living space with someone who possesses a totally different set of living, eating, sleeping and cleaning habits as you do. Fun, right? Lol

Don’t get me wrong, being married to the love of my life is one of the best things that’s ever happened to me. But the initial adjustment to one another’s living habits and SOPs makes it so much more interesting. I’m sure #babybaby will concur. Haha.

One of the prominent lessons on comprise for us came in the form of sleeping habits, the other, in the form of eating habits.

Sleeping habits.

To cut the long story short, we’ve finally agreed on our regular bed times, with #babybaby being so gracious as to give me a head-start to fall asleep BEFORE he commences his symphony of snores.

See? Compromise. *cheeky-laugh* Oh I love my husband.

Then on my end, with our eating habits being rather different from each other (where do I start?!), I’m learning to adapt my cooking/food preparations to suit his taste-buds.

Looooooooong way to go with that, but just to give you a better idea:

So how do you compromise on that? We're a total opposite of each other in terms of eating habits and preferences. Meantime, while I think my husband is praying hard that I will grow to love chicken breast meat as much as he does, amongst other things, we managed to pull this off...

Grilled teriyaki chicken breast on a bed of sweet potato mash + mushrooms

Black-sauce braised mushroom with chicken breast meat

Baked macaroni with mushrooms, mushroom cream, spinach + lots of cheese!

Still working on expanding my cooking repertoire so if you have any ideas on more #Babybaby-friendly food, please share! Haha.

Next week, I’ll share my travel bucket list with you, and maybe you can give us some input on honeymoon destination ideas. *clap-clap* Exciting, exciting! Hehe. Oh wait, but my list may be different from #Babybaby's. *look-up*

Yes, God...got the hint.

<Learning in progress> Compromise. I get it. Lol

PICTURES AND VIDEOS FROM THE WEDDING

Source: http://www.hannah.today/marriedlife/