My Surprise Bridal Shower {LATE POST}

Chocolate Cocktails (very yummy)

Hmmm...My surprise bridal shower was different shades of awesome, i'm truly blessed with the sweetest friends and i'm grateful to have them in my life.

You either throw yourself a bridal shower or your friends plan one for u; i have always been a part of the latter. I was kinda wary my friends would not be able to plan and execute a bridal shower for me 'cos i am always the planner and main player in all the surprise bridal showers we've held for our married friends. I've written about bridal showers and how best to plan them, as well as baby showers i have planned in the past and i know how they typically work, at least in Nigeria.

The typical surprise bridal shower starts with 2-3 close friends of the bride-to-be coming together some months before the wedding to decide on a date, venue, decor, activities and a budget for the shower as well as contacting the groom-to-be and letting him know their plans so he can help surprise the bride. After this they create a group usually on Whatsapp or BBM to invite other friends of the bride-to-be and update them on the plan so far, get more suggestions from them and inform them of the amount to be contributed per person and the account to pay into (of course na when e reach money matter people take off, act funny, etc. making money collection the most stressful/annoying part of the whole process).
I am always the one that kicks off this planning process and i know how stressful it can be (though i enjoy it) so u can imagine why i was nervous. Infact i thought i won't get to have a bridal shower! But ma gals came through for me *wide grin*

awon goons mi

My shower held on Sunday, 11th May 2014, the weekend before my wedding. Hubby-to-be was in charge of helping my different groups of friends link up, well the ones in Abuja anyway (my friends dnt all know each other. I have office friends, uni friends, etc.) and making sure i dressed up nice and arrived at the venue in time for my surprise. He did a good job.

My cake

Being the planning lover that i am, i asked Yoee to fill me in on the planning process and she told me how stressful and annoying it was (as i'd expected it'll be) but i enjoyed hearing every tidbit. There were those that contributed even though they could not make it to the shower(Mel who had just had her baby and Wyn who was in Lagos), i sent them thank you messages after the shower and pictures; those who argued on the agreed amount or paid late; those who went all out and made me gush. It was fun being the celebrant this time and hearing how the shower was put together. I even added an Excel sheet to my wedding budget of the whole planning process and those that contributed to making the shower a success. Don't mind me, i just like having this stuff documented so i can look back on it. Oya straight to the main shower gist.

Yoee told me they needed music for a get-together i think (can't really remember), so i needed to get my butt down dere with my laptop and playlist, she said she had discussed with hubby and he had agreed to bring me down. I guessed it might be my surprise bridal shower since that was the last day of the weekend before our wedding weekend. I sha dressed up and went with the flow, i randomly chose to wear a black and white gown and funny enough black was the color code for the shower. Hubby took me to Bolton White Apartments and as the door opened SURPRISE!!!! it was the sweetest thing, i was just grinning like a Cheshire cat, from ear to ear. They pulled me in and draped a bride-to-be sash over me and put a crown on my head. I really did feel special.

It held in a nice 2-bedroom apartment with a big living room, kitchen and balcony at our disposal, i loved the setup, decor and the cake(this is the EXACT cake i wanted, big ups to Yoee for catching my hints back then); It was so heart-warming seeing how much effort they put into everything. Yoee a.k.a Alcohol goddess brought the alcohol, Farida brought the small chops, pizza n soft drinks, Ejura brought cupcakes, Pauline was in charge of decor, Bola a.k.a Miss B was the MC and Joy was the Photographer/Videographer. I was the DJ still. lol.

enjoying my small chops

After hugging and thanking the gals, they finally got me seated on my 'throne', placed a tantalizing plate of small chops in my hands and things were set in motion by my able MC Miss B and her tiny voice. lol. The first game was 'How well do you know the bride-to-be?', everyone had a pen and paper and Miss B would ask them questions about me (my fave food, color, etc.) and they would write their answers down and the person with the highest no. of correct answers is the winner. This game was so funny 'cos they kept trying to ask me for expo or confirm if their answers were right while Miss B did her best to block my face so i wouldn't pay attention them. Chide won this game and the highlight was when Miss B read out some of the hilarious answers they had written, we all had a good laugh.

Yoee was having way too much fun torturing me

Next game was 'How well do you know your husband-to-be', i alone played this game, Miss B would ask me a question and i'd answer within 10 secs then she'd compare my answers to what Hubby-to-be had written for them. Yoee was on punishment duty, standing happily beside me as she was in charge of drowning me in alcohol for every question i answered wrong. This gehl eh!! she really wanted to drown me, even questions i answered correctly she'll say time was up and make me guzzle down *smh* luckily she only got to do that about 3 different times and that was how i discovered that i quite like Coffee Patron.

The process

Joy (on my left in the pic) won obviously. lol.

Next game was the 'Tissue wedding dress', the gals were divided into 2groups, they picked out their models and were asked to design an outfit on them using just tissue. It was too funny, i just sat down watching their 'creations' take form actually it was falling apart. I was to pick the winner and had to go with the model that managed to keep her tissue dress on. We all had a good laugh with this game.

The winning banana found a spot on the cake

Next game was 'Fastest fingers', the gals were all given bananas and a condom sachet, the fatest to get the condom on the banana properly is the winner. Oh my days, u had to be there!! i laughed so hard i fell off my seat when Miss B was inspecting the condom-wearing bananas. Ejura was the winner of this game. Some claimed their bananas needed a bigger condom (Magnum tins), some put it on backwards, some put a rip in it, some said the condom was to big for their bananas, some did not get it on all the way. It was too funny walahi!

Last game of the night 'Charades' had us rolling on the floor laughing while clutching our sides in pain with aching jaws. The gals were separated into 2 groups and each group would pick 1 person to be their representative; the representative would go to the opposing group and they would tell her a word or sentence to go describe to her group without using words and her group would try to guess it. Where do i even begin with how competitive and funny this game turned out to be, i even participated. Let's just say it involved trying to describe 'crocodile in the ocean', 'sex not in the beach' and 'igede dancers'. Try picturing how someone would describe the above to their group. It was crazy!

Hubby-to-be came around as we were rounding up so i cut the cake, took pics with him & d gals and he happily got a take-away pack of small chops and cake when leaving. The gals and i touched up, they cut cake to take away and we went to Sofa Lounge to karaoke and dance the night away. I honestly had way too much fun and laughter for one night. Ejura, Yoee and I finally went back to the apartment @past midnight, we cleaned up the messed up apartment a bit (we didn't have to but i have a bit of OCD) and put the leftovers in the fridge. I was given my lovely gifts and we crashed.

My gifts

Next morning, we put the apartment in order some more, warmed and ate our leftovers, looked through pics & vids and had a good laugh before checking out around midday. The shower was more than i could have ever expected and i'm grateful!

Toodles!XooX

He put a ring on ME!! {EXTREMELY LATE POST!}

This is an extremely late post!!!!!! Sorriii *Covers Face* We have been married for about a year now.

our trad weddn

Check out our wedding website-->> http://jemimahnaa.wix.com/tosinandmohammed 

and other features on Natural Nigerian and Verastic

I got engaged on February 15, 10:20pm, no i dint check the time but na wetin dem tell me be dat. It was quite unexpected and i was so surprised i teared up!

This is our proposal and relationship story, i was able to get my fiance (now my husband) to record his side of the proposal{planning, etc.).
But first here's our story for your reading pleasure :D Enjoy!

OUR STORY by Me

I met Moh for the first time in University in the year '06/'07 i guess, i can't quite recall precisely, i remember our meeting vividly though, i was standing at the walkway to Dorcas Hall and he was with a couple of my friends and we got introduced. I did not think much of our meeting asides 'oh he's cute' and then i totally forgot about him. The next time we bumped into each other was during our Youth Service @ a friend's house in '08, we exchanged yahoo messenger IDs, started chatting, nothing serious and that's how our friendship started. We decided to take our friendship to the next level 'relationship' towards the ending of the year '12. We had our Introduction in Nov '13 and he Proposed (mostly for formality though 'cos we already knew we were getting married after the Introduction and to present me my gorgeous Emerald ring!-which is what i've always wanted) on 15th Feb '14 at a small surprise dinner he organized with my friends @Nkoyo Restaurant. I was pleasantly surprised that he put effort into the proposal and did not go with a cliche Valentine's day proposal. Moh is definitely my soulmate, seriously, i'm not being cheeky, i can be a lot of work to deal with honestly but he can handle me and gets me on so many different levels! We have had and will still have our occasional quarrels but i think that just spices up our relationship :) and teaches us more about one another. He found a post from my Formspring i answered on my blog sometime in '10 (which i had totally forgotten about *btw) and the question was 'If you could make one person fall in love with you who would it be?' and i wrote Zakir (a part of his name). I honestly don't know why i did 'cos we weren't close friends at the time, just chatting on yahoo messenger (the BBM of our time. lol). I guess it's a sign that he was mine all along and we just had to wait for God's timing.
DISCLAIMER: There is definitely wayyyy more to our story than this and it involves some snubbing, quarrelling and other not so cute stuff but the Hubby has made me promise not to add these details, as much i'd love to, so bear with me. Bottom line, as rosey as our story reads, don't forget roses gat thorns and they prick and hurt, lol, things aren't always so 'petally' even after marriage.

OUR STORY by Le Boo

Hmmm…..

Just like she said, I met Tosin on my way to her Hostel. Yeah, we got introduced but I was really in a hurry and didn’t really pay attention to her.

I thought that was the last I'd see of her only to see her again at a friend’s house. We had a really nice conversation so we exchanged contact details. I discovered that I always enjoyed chatting with her and before I knew it, we became good friends. It was the start of a glorious friendship I must say.

After a couple of years, one day I stopped to think about how close we had become over the years and I decided to take our friendship to the next level and I’ve had no regrets ever since.

We had our Introduction sometime in November 2013 and in February 2014 I proposed. Most people usually start with the proposal first but I’m a very weird guy and I think that’s part of why she loves me. I do the strangest things.

Everytime I look at Tosin I can see how much I’ve been blessed. She completes me in ways I cannot explain. Mehn… She’s the woman for me. I don’t know where she was hiding all those years but all I can say is that God’s time is the best.

THE PROPOSAL

MY Side

Like i said earlier in my side of the story, we had our Introduction in Nov '13. 

Spot d 3 key planners close to me

The proposal happened @Nkoyo Restaurant on 15th Feb '14 around 10:20pm at a small surprise dinner le boo organized with my friends  (Yoee, Naeemah and Dr. F being the major planners).
 I was pleasantly surprised that he put effort into the proposal and did not go with a cliche Valentine's day proposal. We had a regular day, i saw him earlier in the day and told him i was going for Dr. F's dinner party later to celebrate her graduation from culinary school. Lemme backtrack a bit, on Thursday evening, 13th Feb,

@Uptown wen Dr. F called to invite me to 'the dinner party'

Dr. F had called me up to invite me to her dinner party, at the time i was having dinner with le boo and his bro @Uptown. I thought it was a bit odd that she was not making the meals to show off her newly acquired skill and opted for us eating out instead but i dismissed the thought, just happy to get some free nice eats. lol. Le boo spoke to her to congratulate her as well and then asked if his bro n friend could come along and she said yes, again i felt it was very odd for him to make that request because it's totally unlike him.
On the day of the proposal itself which was a Saturday, i was at Yoee's house chilling 'cos we had a girls' night out the night before so some of our other friends were still at her place. They were all on my case to do something about my hair (it was in its natural and wild state) before going for the dinner. I told them i honestly couldn't be bothered since it wasn't my party and worst case scenario i'd tie a scarf, but they just kept going on about the hair, that's when i started to suspect something was up. Next weird thing was Yoee insisted on me picking a particular outfit to wear for the dinner, it happened to be a lovely dress i'd used for a friend's bridal train. I like the dress but i felt it was over the top to wear to someone's dinner party and i did not want to be overdressed or outshine the host, when i told her she dismissed the thought and told me everyone was dressing fancy so i should have no fear of standing out. Moh stopped by my house as well and we jisted a bit and he also checked out my outfit and approved it before i went back to Yoee's
Anyways, we went back to her place and chilled and i dozed off at some point, I woke up to see 2 missed calls from le boo and called back, he gave me attitude and said he'd been calling and why did i not pick and then said he was no longer interested in going to the dinner. I had already explained i was asleep when he called so his reaction did not make sense to me, i said fine, he did not have to come and i was going regardless. I later found out my friends forced him to pick a fight with me to throw me off suspecting the proposal 'cos they know i'm sharp like that.lol. Yoee and I dressed up for the dinner and she helped straighten my hair and put it in a bun (very tasking job i tell ya!) and we waited for the call from the host that she was at the venue so we could head down there. While waiting Yoee kept receiving calls and kept saying it was from Pauline (another friend) that she wanted to know our movement so she could join us there, Truth was the call was from le boo trying to find out the state of things.
Finally we got the call from the host and headed down to the venue, we got there really late, around 10pm and while we were making the U-turn to enter the venue, i spotted le boo's car (i know the plate no.) parked in a somewhat hidden corner. Thoughts started running through my head, i knew the ring had arrived earlier on but kept saying to myself 'he wouldn't propose at somebody else's dinner party and steal their shine, although Dr. F and Naeemah have been on his case to put a ring on me since we had our intro so dey wouldn't mind', i had absolutely no clue that the dinner party had been organized for me just for the purpose of the proposal. *blushh. I had also spoken to his bro after my phone fight with le boo to confirm that they were really not coming for the dinner and he told me they weren't and they were heading to his house already.

wen i was totally clueless a proposal was coming

Imagine my surprise when i had settled down and was jisting with my friends, when le boo, his bro and one of close friends Dj walked in and joined the table. The photographer at the dinner was also our friend Tolu Cole and i kept saying it's a small world that he knew my other friends unknown to me that such was not the case, i said hi to him and he acted professional so i gave him some space since he was 'on duty'. I knew in my heart of hearts that he was going to propose but put aside the thought after all it was not my dinner party. He asked me to step aside and settle our phone fight from earlier, i obliged him and it just felt odd, standing aside from the dinner table. I told him we could settle the fight when we were alone and that i was feeling awkward, everytime i tried to move back to the table, he'd stop me from even glancing there.

our step aside to settle the fake fight

He called my full name and told me how much he loved me and by now my heart is overpumping 'cos i could just sense it that the proposal was coming plus now the photographer was taking pictures of us and that did not make sense too me. Next thing the lights go dim in only our section and from the corner of my eye i spy the waiter going to the table with something fancy. I knew it was my ring, he then led me towards the table that we could go back and have our seats. The lights come up and i see a black box on a bed of red petals in a white plate, my heart stopped as he took out the ring and went on one knee, my head was fuzzy, i could hear my friends shouting and clapping and then i remembered i was wearing a huge green and gold ring on the finger le boo was gonna put his ring.,lmao!!

spot my massive green ring that tried to steal the shine

I discretely struggled and freed my finger of the ring so he could place my REAL ring there. I can't even remember what he asked me while kneeling or if i said yes, all i remember i pulling him up to hug and kiss him while tears filled my eyes.
{My friend's later made fun of me that they thought i was a hard babe and there would be no tears in sight during the proposal, they are lucky they did not bet on that. :)}.
I wiped the tears as they brought out a cake with pyro fireworks sparkling. We cut the cake and i went round to hug, beat (in a friendly manner) and thank my friends as they filled me in on the whole planning process and their roles in it. It was quite fun and even though i kinda suspected it would happen, it still hit me hard, i wouldn't have had it any other way + we had food and cake to take away!! lol #diehardfoodie.

 

Le boo had always told me not to expect anything ghen gehn when he's presenting me my ring despite my LOUD hints (showing him vids on youtube amidst others) that i wanted something ghen ghen. lol. I love and appreciate that he put in such an effort to present me my ring in such a romantic manner that i'll forever cherish and that he involved my friends and got a photographer to capture the moment. It was a complete package.
*By the way, he had let me pick out the ring wayyyyy before it arrived 'cos he knew i wanted something unique and wanted me to have something i would love. I perused the web and settled on an Emerald ring (as a lover of all things green) with an Emerald cut and some diamonds around it.

HIS Side

Listen to the audio recording and Enjoy. (It was a tug of war getting him to record this in detail). The recording was made on Sunday night, 23rd Feb '14.

I hope you enjoyed this post. It was a lovely experience and i'm happy to share it here though long overdue.

Toodles!XooX

Surprise Baby Shower!!!

Mel has given birth!!! and on her wedding anniversary too!April Kid!! How awesome is that?! And seriously that seems like the best anniversary gift to give her husband, though i'm not sure how much fun it'll be for Zoey sharing her birthday with her parent's anniversary. But we'll wait till she's old enough to care about that. I'm soo excited u'd think sey na me born. I went straight to the hospital to see her as soon as i got the good news. Okay let's take some steps back, this post is called 'Baby Shower' afterall and it definitely happened before Zoey's birth. So here's the jist bout how it went down.

Y'all know we love surprises!! So of course the baby shower was a surprise planned with Mel's husband (He's always a huge supporter of our surprise plans). We went with the easiest plan and minimal cost. We started by creating a bbm group and adding close friends to the group, we agreed that we would not be contributing money this time around, instead each of us picked something to bring and to handle, e.g. i chose to bring a cake, handle decor and make waffles, while others picked snacks, pop corn, drinks, food, ice-cream etc. 

We agreed to get to have the shower at her house, we spoke with her husband and he let us know when they were back from church, so we arrived at the house one after the other. I was the first to arrive around 3pm and i went with a friend, Mel was sooo surprised to see me and not long after the other ladies arrived as well. She went to change into a comfy picture friendly outfit while we decorated the house. We did not know what gender she was having so i used pinks, blues and whites for the decor. I had done quite some research (Pinterest mostly) before the day so i had a programme for the shower and fun games for us all to play, my experience with the bridal showers also helped because i knew the type of games to select based on the guests attending the shower so no one was bored. You can check out the programme & games here  and here for other useful links(themed drinks, decor, music,etc,). 

We all wore colorful beads to spice up our outfits.

Our music playlist comprised of only songs that had baby in it-Justin Beiber, Britney Spears and More

We had loads of fun playing games and left the house at around 7pm to go to the Karaoke Bar before we rounded up for the night, I had a swell time with this shower. We made waffles and had it with ice-cream, had cupcakes and a cake with a Supermom topper, Pop corn, Fried rice, Peppered chicken, Juice and soft drinks, water, biscuits, cookies and other mini pastries. The games we played were:

• Midnight Diaper-This game was fun, i made a list of funny and witty statements and handed everyone markers and 2 diapers each to write on, the mom-to-be picked her favorite stamement and the guest that wrote it was the winner. We then piled up all the 'marked' diapers with the statements into a stash for the mom-to-be and dad-to-be to use when the crazy midnight diaper changes start. Hopefully it will put a smile on their faces on such days.
  
• How huge is Mel's Tummy- For this game, all the guests picked a ball of yarn and cut it to the size they felt the expecting mom's tummy was, after all the guests have cut a piece and have it in hand, each person will measure their string around the baby bump and the guest with the closest size to the bump wins.
  
  
  
  
• Guess when Baby 'Cool' will land and the gender- I printed a Calendar with only the month of April since i knew that's when mel was due and passed it round for each guest to write their name in d date box they thik the baby will be born and draw the head of the gender they felt Mel will have. There was no winner for this game 'cos we had to wait till she gave birth to find out.
  
• How many nursery rhymes do you know- This game involved guests singing the nursery rhymes they know and trying to top that of the others while i took note of the number of the nursery rhymes each guest had mentioned, after a little while i told them to stop and the guest with the most no. of rhymes won. (It was fun reliving our childhood through this)
• Baby name game- I modified this game a bit and made each guest write 3 names for a boy and 3 names for a girl that they felt were really cool names then i made Mel pick her favorite names for both gender and the guests that wrote the names were the winners.
• Name that Baby Animal- This was my favorite game 'cos i laughed till my tummy hurt, i had printed a list of many popular animals and some rare ones like Platypus, Kangaroo, etc. and i was the moderator. I would read out the name of the animal and the first to get the name of the baby animal would get a point, at the end, i tallied each person's point and the guest with the highest point wins. I got all sorts of hilarious guesses from the guests and the game was also educative.
  
• Advice for the mom-to-be -There was a mom among us so she gave a lot of useful advice on how to prepare and care for the baby while the rest of us focused on talking about her keeping her relationship and home and also asked each other questions and got useful answers.
• Name that Disney Cartoon- For this game i did a mashup of many different popular old and new Disney toons and while each clip played, the first to get the name of the cartoon gets a point, after the clips finished playing, i tallied the points and the guest with the highest number wins. Watching the tunes was definitely a fun trip back in time and we all had loony smiles on our face by the time it was over.
• Draw a baby- No artistic skills needed for this game, had a good laugh looking at the stick drawings from the guests

Gifts

The momma-to-be got 2 gifts, a diaper cake from me (i learnt how to make it on Youtube here with just diapers, baby wipes, rubber bands, blankets, Bibs and Ribbons) and a baby bottle sterilizer.

The guests that won the games got Bon-Bons  as their win. I eventually gave the other guests though! Its all about having fun afterall.

We compiled all the docs used and advise written into a folder and gave it to the mom-to-be as a keepsake

We all got to take a piece of the cake home and some mini pastries.

Pictures

We took tons of pics, each winner with their game item and the momma-to-be, personal pics with bibs, group pics and at the karaoke bar.

When the shower was over, we cleaned the whole house and kitchen so she wouldn't be stressed with doing the cleaning, then we went over to the karaoke bar and bellowed some sweet tunes out with the momma-to-be before we went to our various homes. We also left the daddy-to-be lots of eatables to show our gratitude for his support!

All the best planning or having a baby shower. 

Toodles!XooX