It was supposed to be a “secret wedding”… We wanted our partnership to be legal and official even before we lay out all the plans for 2023, one of which is being able to do our dream beach wedding. Blame it to my “segurista” and OC personality, I just want everything ironed out on the legal front before the year ends. And I’m very grateful for the fact that Mahal has always wanted to marry me and supports me all the way, til forever and beyond… ❤

Actually, if we didn’t have the funds to do a beach wedding next year, a simple, “secret”, intimate civil wedding one is what we’ll really do. We are both introverts after all. I was even content to just have a piece of thread tied to my finger as a promise of his love. But thank you, God, for blessing us with a beautiful engagement, complete with an engagement photoshoot and engagement video shoot, and even an engagement honeymoon in Camotes Island which I’ll share here soon. We really feel so grateful plus I feel like such a celebrity (lol!) doing 2 kinds of weddings. Actually, even before J.Lo and Ben Affleck did their two weddings, doing the same had always been my plan… the two stars just beat us to it! Lol!

Didn’t JLo say

“Life is an art… and we are the artists… make it as beautiful as you want and create exactly what you want it to be…”

So that’s what we did!

So, if you’ve been reading my blog for a while now, you know that the road to becoming a missus is an exciting one. Just head to these posts for a little bit of history.

Anyway, I wanted both of us to be 1000% sure about each other on the marriage front and not get married just because we have a kid. We went through a ton of trials and tribulations in these last 10 years we’ve been best friends and lovers and thank God, we’ve become stronger for it and much more sure of spending the rest of our lives with each other for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, til death and beyond. We may not always feel in love with each other, but we’ve always chosen each other again, and again, and again, through thick and thin, through good times and bad times. Our commitment and loyalty to each other are just beyond measure and with that, we’ve proven what true love really is (at least for us).

However, early this year, I told him, we will only get married as soon as all his properties are in order. I just want to be practical too. I want to be able to tell myself that this time around, I used my head in loving too. After all, all my properties under my name will be his too after we say I do. We don’t believe in having pre-nuptial papers drawn up because that would be so unromantic so this is the next best practical thing. Prior to this, the land where his resort business is operating was not yet under his name. Half was still under the name of the previous owner and the other half was just under tax declaration. I was thinking then that if worse comes to worst, he can possibly be kicked out of his own property if he doesn’t take care of all the legalities, and with it, our lives that we’ve already established here. I didn’t want that kind of headache. I know he will give up his own life to fight for what is his should push come to shove so I advised him that in order for that not to happen, he has to take action and make both parcels of land legally his. So that was what he did the past several months. Then finally, he got his 2 land titles. He is now the legal owner of the lands where his resort business is built. What a relief!!! Everything he knows he owns — his hotel business and his parcels of lands are now really, truly, legally his. That’s one big thorn out of the way. We can now sleep more peacefully.

Oh, it’s also a blessing because according to the law, whatever you already own and bring into your marriage will be the absolute conjugal property of both spouses. So suffice it to say that whetever he owns and I own from before we got married are now both legally ours upon the celebration of our marriage. I’m now half owner of his properties and vice versa.

So the next thing we did was submit all the requirements for the civil wedding:

• CENOMAR
• PSA birth certificate
• Community Tax Certificate
• Certificate of Pre-Nuptial Seminar

Check, check, check, and check!

We then headed to the Mayor’s Office (Mayor Guaren of Oslob, Cebu) to schedule our “secret” civil wedding ceremony. I really pleaded the Mayor if we can do a very simple one. I even asked him if we can just come in regular house clothes and just sign the papers. They usually hold civil weddings by the sea in Cuartel with a special photo ops to be published on the Oslob Facebook page and I told the kind Mayor that we don’t want that since we have a beach wedding to look forward to in 2023. We really didn’t want any attention to our civil wedding. He then asked why are we doing it then? I said it’s because we want to adopt our son, Tuz, as soon as possible. He clarified if my son is the son of my ex and I said no. Tuz is Mahal’s son. It’s just that he was born before my previous marriage got annulled and the law states that he needs to undergo adoption to legitimize his succession. Plus, all my IDs are still under the last name of my ex and I want to have them changed already to Mahal’s last name so we can all have our passports processed and all my old IDs changed in time for our honeymoon next year and other future plans! With those reasons, Thank God, the honorable Mayor granted our wish!

Then we waited for our marriage license…

It was released earlier than expected. We prepped a bit for it like:

• Booked a trip to the city to buy some simple wedding clothes for us just in case they do take pictures of us. (And they did! And it was plastered on the Oslob Facebook page! Lol!)

Anyway, we wanted to get married on a certain date. But while we were in Cebu City, the Mayor’s secretary called and said that we need to re-schedule because of a very important meeting on the same day. The secretary asked if we can have it on the following day instead. We first obliged. But after computing it’s numerology meaning, we called back and requested if we can do it on another day instead so that it can still have that perfect numerology meaning for us that is aligned to our life path numbers.

Then we got back home in Oslob. The following day, we got married!!!

I loved it! It was so simple and serene! The Mayor gave such a heartfelt speech. And for me and Mahal, though we’ve known each other since 2012, there’s still that magical feeling that happened the moment we became legally one. I’m so grateful!!! We’re so happy!

And so here we are, closing this year with the best gift we could ever have… and we could ever give Tuz… and that is to become a legal family once and for all. After 10 years of being best friends and 100 months of being life partners, I am now legally his wife and him my legal husband. kilig much!

From House Villanueva to yours, a more bountiful , beautiful, magical, and blessed 2023 to all!

And now we shall lay out the plans for our beautiful, intimate beach wedding come summer time. That’s going to be our Wedding Part 2. Til then!!!

And til my next post!

UPDATE: On May 5, 2023, we finally did our dream beach wedding. Check out my blog posts about it:

How to Plan for a Beach Wedding (Our Dream Beach Wedding)

How Much Does An Intimate Destination Beach Wedding Cost?