♡ Getting Ready for the Chinese Wedding: Hair, Makeup, and My Chinese dress! ♡

Preparing for the wedding in China was a little different than what I did to prepare for the Catholic wedding. Bo's mom handled all the planning of the Chinese wedding before Bo and I arrived in China. In America, everything has to be booked a year ahead, but in China not that much time in advance is necessary.

We decided to have a traditional Chinese reception so that I could experience the Chinese wedding customs. My favorite part was the dress of course! It was really hard for me to buy one while I was in America. Bo's mom tried to go shopping for me and take pictures, but sizing is just too hard. Sizes in China are really small too...So, I ended up buying my dress on TaoBao LOL. It's kind of like a Chinese ebay but they custom fit it to my measurements.

Buying on Taobao let me see many different kinds of traditional Chinese clothing and I chose the Hanfu style. Qipao are another traditional style for weddings, but I preferred the long, flowy style of Hanfu. It is said that Hanfu in China was a major influence on the kimono in Japan.

Bo told me from long ago he was not going to wear a funky traditional hat or anything and he insisted on only wearing a red patterned top with formal Western black pants. Haha.

Bo's mom also shopped for a silk veil to match the color of my dress (which apparently was hard to get a perfect match.) When I got to China, I finally could try on my dress and I was so happy with it. I brought along my own red flats because I'm not going to find size 11 in China!!

Bo's mom also prepared some goody bags for all the guests. Each bag included special wedding candies. She also prepared raffle prizes, similar to bridal shower customs in the US. Also, she made these little raffle tickets that had our Rilakkuma wedding logo on it.

Bo's mom hired a company to handle the photography, video, stage, and coordinate the wedding. It was much like a big "show". They had a huge banner with a photo from the Catholic wedding near the entrance.

The day before the wedding we headed to the hotel where the wedding would take place and practiced the ceremony. Earlier that week, I also had a "test" hair do.

The day of the wedding, I headed to the beauty salon, which was actually across the street from Bo's house (very convenient). I had my hair washed and styled into an updo with flowers. Bo's mom got her hair curled and makeup done, while Bo got his hair super poofed for the wedding. I laughed when I saw him!!

I did my own makeup because Bo's mom said that I may not like the style they would choose. Traditionally, makeup would be very very white for weddings, but luckily I am already very pale. Plus, I'm pretty comfortable with makeup and I was happy how it turned out.

Bo wrote down the vows for me to practice. Omg..his handwriting...

Then we all rode to the hotel, me and Bo checked into our room, and I did my makeup over there, and got dressed. When, I was ready had the photographer come in to take pictures too. A little strange for them to come up to the room LOL.

Guests all sat around round tables and could begin eating during the ceremony. Fun fact..Bo and I barely got to eat the wedding food. We were busy on stage, toasting at everyone's tables and pictures afterwards so we amazingly were barely at our seats. The hotel said they would provide us with a snack beforehand, but it turned out to be a bunch of sweets right before we headed down. This sugar buzz was not good for our nervous energy!!


Here's the video with some great footage of getting ready. Next video will be about our vows and another of the whole ceremony!

Thanks for reading!! Until next time!

♡ Mary

My Kawaii Wedding blog posts:

♡ Our Kawaii Wedding(s)!

♡ DIY Kawaii Rilakkuma Stationery

♡ DIY Wedding Polaroids with Rilakkuma 

♡ My Kawaii Lolita Rilakkuma Bridal Shower

My Kawaii Wedding videos:

♡ ALL My Kawaii Wedding videos ♡