Married or going to be married at Grand Palladium Punta Cana?

We had the traditional setup, with an aisle made of coconuts on the sand. It was lovely. We got married at 5pm, since our only other option was 1pm (the 3pm slot was taken by a bride with a legal ceremony, which depended on the judges availablility). We found out the time the day before we got there and then Carolina updated our photographer with details. We used Michael Weiler with weddingspuntacana and can only say the best things about him. We've been married for 4 days and we already have out wedding album, a video, 100 photos and a DVD with over 500 pictures. Brides who have been married for a year don't even have theirs yet! Every picture was wonderful and he was very accomodating. Nothing bad to say at all about him or his videographer.

We had a reception at El Bohio restaurant, right off the beach near the pool at the Palace. We had the private reception, since we wanted a DJ and first dance and such. We went with Carlos at DJ Mannia (we didn't have to pay for a day pass for him, but we did for the photographer) and he was the greatest!! $800 for a great night. We gave him our first dance song and father/daughter, mother/son and some other songs that we liked and he had all the rest of the music picked out from that. Every song he played was perfect. Right up our alley. My H and I have been to 7 weddings in the 2 years we've been together, so we made a treat for our guests and played everyone's first dance songs again, which got everyone up and dancing and then moved to "dance songs". Dancing the whole night! Which is not bad for a group that is usually the ones sitting at the bar when dancing is going on....

I think the only thing I had a issue with was the spa. Services- 2 pedicures, 3 manicures, 1 makeup, 6 wedding hairdo's. Price- $893, ($200 on nails, $693 on hair/makeup) without tips, totalling more than $1000. It would have been cheaper to bring our own from NY!!! But our hair stayed in place during the entire night, which is saying something, since it was WINDY on the beach! They know how to use hairsprays, those girls! But $1000 is way too much to spend on hair. We had only budgeted $500 on this, so there was a little sticker shock when I went up to pay, since this was my treat for my mom and bridesmaids. I'm glad I paid, since I couldn't imagine asking everyone to pay for their trip and then $120 for hair also!

Any other question, feel free to ask. It's all fresh still and of course I love talking about my wedding!

Congrats!!!!!!!!!!!! I am sorry to hear it rained on your wedding day, looking on the bright side, it's suppose to be real good luck!

that's my worse night mare, rain on my wedding day but what can you do, we don't control the weather sadly.

who played your music during the ceremomy? The system will accept Ipod, or just CD's?

did you have music playing for your cutting the cake during the ceremony? did you have an exite song?

I don't plan on doing the private dinner, we will do the private beach party, and have our first dance then (I know the photographer wont get it, but just make sense to have it then as suppose to right after the cake cutting) Carolina told me the cake cutting happens during the ceremony, but people only get to eat it after dessert, right?

I'm so happy you told me how much it ended up cost you for make up and hair for everyone, so we decided all to do our own make up, and the girls will do their own hair. I will just get my hair done at the spa.

Did you do the TTD session?

WHOA, you paid a lot!!!! once in a life time kind of thing, just keeping thinking that lol.

Thank you so much for the great details, and congrats again for becoming a MRS!!!!

Thank you for answering my question a head of time

Courtney,you definitely need you birth ceritifcate translated and legalized. As well as your single status. and your passport doesn't need to be translated or legalized.. they just use a copy of that as a form on I.D.

I will also definitely upgrade my bouquet. We are not sure we will have AHR (hoping to get out of that lol) Great deal for the bouts $10 at Michael's. The resort is charging $10 as well, but I wasn't thinking about bring them back.

I sometimes have that problem logging on to just this thread and no other threads, weird!!

It didn't rain, it was just cloudy. But the photographer said that was the best possible outcome, since it wasn't hot, and people weren't squinting in the sun for pictures. Plus the water looks AMAZING against the sand and sky in all of our pictures.

The music was played by a CD player. I don't think Carolina has an ipod dock, so I would burn all of your music for your ceremony on a CD before you leave. And if you have additional music for a DJ, put that on a separate CD since it was a PITA to get the CD from Carolina, to the DJ, to the videographer for the the DVD.

We cut the cake during the reception, but if you aren't have a private reception, I think you cut the cake during the toast right after you walk out. You and your wedding party go, have a few moments to yourselves and then we went back for a toast and pictures with all of our guests. We paid for the photographer and videographer to stay for the reception, since I really wanted pictures of the whole night for memories. You won't remember everything so I wanted great pictures to remind me, and it was only an additional $300 for both.

The only reason I would recommend the spa for hair is that they really know to use a lot of hair spray. You will need it. If you do your own hair, use at least 3 times as much hair spray as you think and then spray again for good measure. It is windy on the resort and super windy on the beach.

I decided to save the $800 and do the music myself, I bought a docking system and added all the music on my Ipod, I also got one of the guest (my uncle) to MC when needed other then that just put it on suffle. Do you think this suitable?

I will actually ask my photographer if he can and how much it'd cost for him to stay during the beach reception, I doubt it tho, it wasn't an option on the packages.

Thank you so much for answering all my questions. Yeah, not having the private dinner(btw how much did the private dinner cost you, for how many guest did you have?) so I guess I'll be cutting the cake during ceremony party, and have it served as dessert.

Now to think about it, it's costing me $9us p/p just for the beach reception, that's over $200, I am wondering if it might just be worth doing the private all together, pls pls let me know how much it cost!! thank you thank you.

I will definitely make sure the girls use a lot of hair spray, thank you for the suggestion and advice!! well needed. I can only imagine just how windy.

btw- how come $800 for the dj, past brides and Carolina said $200 or $250 for the 3 hour period, is it cause you had the dj longer?