rodent

Quote: Originally Posted by Kat81 Thanks so much girls! We just got home... and are exhausted. I will post a few pictures and stuff tomorrow!! welcome back!!!!

Quote: Originally Posted by relish.77 My wedding was to be Oct 15 at the Paradisus Rio De Oro, Holguin Cuba. We were to depart Oct 11, exactly 4 weeks from now. The resort has been demolished. I have no idea what i'm going to do. I'm in a serious state of panic and my travel agent is saying things are fine. I've seen the pics, nothing about that part of the country is fine. I have 26 people coming, not easy to reshcedule EVERYTHING. WHAT DO I DO?!?!?!? My fiance wants refunds, there's no way I'm cancelling the wedding. Tears are coming...crap. Oh my god- breakdown. are you sure it's destoyed? I read bad reports on trip advisor & also read this from someone who contacted their UK office "They have said the following: all staff and current tourists are fine. there are no reports of any serious damage - she mentioned some minor repairs were needed and the beach huts were going to be replaced and that everything should be back to normal by our visit at beginning of oct." I have a lot of experience with hurricanes & they love to report the worst. not jsut the media, but people love to talk about destruction. my mom lived in corpus christi, tx when a big storm hit in the 80s. she was on vacation at the time. the news reports said, "corpus has been wiped off the map." she was devistated. when she returned home, her place was fine. last august something similar happened & brides were so upset. then everything turned out to be fine. I know there has been a lot of destruction in the area, but it's possible that your hotel is fine & will be back running in time. I do not have details, i just haven't found anything reliable yet saying othewise. when a hurricane hit costa maya last year I got emails from people telling me my hotel was destroyed. I already knew it was fine & couldn't understand where their info came from. turns out they thought riviera maya was like a town. instead it's a huge area of land. so they thought if riviera maya was hit, my hotel must have been hit. only it wasn't even riviera maya. see how things get out of control fast? the best thing you can do is just wait & hope for the best. or try to take your mind off it any way you can.

ok i was wrong. it doesn't look like google earth does this. they did it after katrina. there is a company geo eye that will take pics for you, but it's $400.

I distance myself from people like that. it's so draining to talk to them about their problems & try to help them when they don't want things to be better. they just want to be the most miserable in the room & get sympathy. I've played that game before in high school. If someone really is having a bad time, I don't turn my back on them. But if they are just negative all the time with no good reason, I'm not going to wear myself out spending time with them.

flip your L & it's a J!

my mom said it's heading more towards mike's family (near galveston). they are only having people evacuate that live in low-lying areas. my aunt & cousin have evacuated. everyone is ready for the storm. now it's just waiting & hoping it's not a bad one.

has google earth done an update? often after storms they will put up current images of the area so you can see the damage. I'm searching...

Quote: Originally Posted by jamisoncollette You earn points by posting and viewing threads. 1 point for viewing, 5 for posting a reply and 15 for a new thread. You may get points for pics too, I don't remember. The only time you really need to use points is if you are buying something like a gift, shiny name, etc. You do need points to view some things. If you need points, most members are happy to donate them to you. I just donated some so you now have 1000. we have actually been cutting down on point donation. downloading stuff is what uses of the forum server the most, which is the purpose of the point system. once I understood this, i stopped donating points. the best way to earn them is to make something useful & upload it for others. then you get 50 points for everyone who downloads it. until then you can bookmark pages with something you want & download it once you have enough points.

OK I decided what I'm doing. I called & talked to her a while tonight. she sounded interested in seeing some of the pictures I've been taking recently, so I'm mailing her some prints with a card.

Quote: Originally Posted by SSPhoto Thanks for the heads up. I just go to the Mexican consulate in my city for the FM3 visa, right? Are they good for all the regions of Mexico? Does anyone know what the process is for getting 'approved by the resort' (Azul Fives)? yeah it should be good for all regions of mexico. I did not know there was an approval process. I think she meant to make sure they are not on the ban list. some local photographers in the area are banned from karisma.

Quote: Originally Posted by catandcleo Ooh - thanks for the info! I am off to Seattle tomorrow, so i will check at a Target on my way down. I have been putting off doing my OOT's, and now that i am so close, i am in a bit of a buying frenzy... not good! they are called johnson & johnson to go. they are in the section with all the little bottles of stuff for travel.

Quote: Originally Posted by KAMAY11 Awwww! What a cute thread! I took my grandma shopping this week...doesn't sound like much, but since her recent car accident (after which she can't drive anymore) she needs someone to take her around to do errands. I love knowing that I have helped her out a little. that's great. I'm sure it meant a lot to her. My grandma on my dad's side passed away a few years ago. but, I used to drive to town atleast once a month & take her to the grocery store. She'd stop & visit with everyone and buy way more stuff than she needed. but, it was great for both of us. losing her ability to drive to town anytime she needed something was really hard on her. I had just turned 16 when I started doing this & could relate to not having the freedom to get around. Another thing I did for her was buy a photoalbum & an archival marker. We set down with her box of pictures & she told me who was in each one & I labled the back & stuck it in the album. It turned into story time & we never finished the project. But, it was fun getting as far as we did.

Quote: Originally Posted by catandcleo Darn - at first i only saw "Vancouver" and got all excited. Then i read the whole thing and see that you are on the island. What's the name of the place, just in case i might get lucky enough to find one over here in the lower mainland? a canadian member got some first aid kits for $1 at a place I can't remember. I feel like the name was something like Shop & Save or Saveright. Something that implied cheap. us US girls picked them up at target for $1 in the travel section.

your grandma this week. if you do not have a living grandmother, do something nice for a friend's grandmother or someone who is like a grandma to you. Post what you did. It can be a simple as sending a card, sending some pictures, stopping by her house to do some chores, giving her a call...anything. The random act of kindness thread got me thinking about this. If it's fun & heart-warming we can pick someone else for the next random act of kindness. The most recent thing I did for my grandma was buy her a $7 subscription to OK magazine off ebay. Such a simple thing, but she was thrilled. I like knowing that each week she gets a little gift from me, even if it is smut I'll have to think of something I can do for her now. I'll probably mail her some pictures. she loves getting prints in the mail to take to BINGO with her.

Quote: Originally Posted by Jessica&Adam OMG after reading this I kind of feel like I got screwed! Our guests are paying about $145 per night, and this is not all-inclusive. I thought it was a good rate but after reading I'm not so sure anymore. And my site is way more expensive too! Its $1000 not including any flowers or decorations (that is just to use the site and officiant I think)...def does not include bubbly! Sounds like you ladies got a hell of a deal - i'm so jealous! i'm pretty sure the hilton is much fancier. our hotel wasn't fancy, but it was nicer than hotels we usually stay at on vacation. it just wasn't luxury. it ran about $85 per night per person also, my ceremony was the renewal of vows. the legal ceremony was around 1,000 or more.

great stuff! your guests will love it. i wish I would have done the DIY sunscreen thing. I wish I bought some biodegradable sunscreen & divied it up.

Quote: Originally Posted by LisaG Oh this hurricane sucks! Martha - I'm glad you are feeling ok right now. I'm sure your parents are glad you guys are there with them. I think the food, water and generator is a great idea. You can never be too prepared. Morgan - I'm so sorry to hear it's heading towards your family. Are you in contact with them? Have they had to evacuate? Funny story....well not really funny but kinda. Our boss lives in Houston and is in our Dallas office Mon-Thur. Well, he is at home right now (in Houston) TAPEING up his windows. Uuummm hello....tape? Seriously? What is he thinking? They're saying Houston may only get like 80mph winds - which is definitely something your windows can handle - but tape? He cracks me up!! they have not had to evacuate their town. my mom doesn't evacuate even if it's advised. She'd only do it if its mandatory. a few years ago when rita hit, the evacuation was the worst part. also, there was a time she didn't evacuate & a tornado hit where she would have gone. something similar happened to mike's parents. the area we live in doesn't flood. my town had a huge flood in 98 & our house was fine. Quote: Originally Posted by Yari Morgan - Oh no! Don't worry though hopefully the path will change. Martha - Gotta love parents!!! I always hope for it to lose power. I know people all along the coast so there isn't anywhere better for it to go. my family is prepared. we've been through many hurricanes. we still get nervous though.

Here is mine. I wrapped wire around it & attached it to a metal comb.

Quote: Originally Posted by photographerShay Wow, sounds like you did great Morgan!! I'm spending $350 also and get all that you listed except champagne (but I wouldn't have wanted that anyhow so that's ok). The hotel for my guests is only $50/night, but we're not at a big resort.... of course the only people attending is our daughter and our two sets of parents. So we're having a very small, intimate, casual event. I can't wait! Oh, with that small of a guest list a TA wouldn't be a huge help. We only had 25 people total, but over 60 that were interested. It would have been a PITA to deal with all of their questions. it was great to be abe to say, "email the TA." a casual wedding is nice. I don't think I would have enjoyed it with many more people.

Quote: Originally Posted by photographerShay I may get some backlash for saying this, but I actually disagree with the advise to hire a travel agent (just my opinion). If you take the time to research and really dig using the various forums and google searches, you can find all kinds of options and determine the least expensive choice that still meets your standards. this isn't backlash at all. but, I did the digging & found a really nice hotel that was cheap. then i hired the TA just to do the bookings. she was cheaper than what I could get online. sometimes the price matched, but it was never higher. the best part was that guests only had to put down a deposit. for me, that was the best part of having a TA. I live in NC & we thought about having it at a beach here. but, by the time you figure in flights, rental cars, hotels, meals etc. it probably would have cost about as much per person. It definitly would have been a lot more for us. our guests kept commenting on what a great value the trip was. it was also a great value for us. the wedding (ceremony, champagne, decor, officiant, music, mic..really everything we needed for the wedding) was only $340. Then we had dinner in a hotel restaurant together. the actually wedding day was super cheap. I would not have been able to pull off something like that in the states for that price. I'd check with the people who you would not want to have your wedding without & see if the price works for them. we knew our parents & siblings could make it. others couldn't because they didn't have the vacation time or budget, but we were fine with that. we wanted a small group anyway.

Happy Birthday!

also, in the "what I'd do or not do again" thread no one ever says they wish the spent less on photography. but, often people say they wish they spent less on their dress. my wedding was so cheap, but when people see the pics they think we had a really amazing wedding. I mean it was wonderful, but so simple. but the pictures are awesome. I guess what I'm saying is that you can cut out all the decorating or get a cheap dress & a great photographer will make it look awesome. or you can spend a lot on decorations & a dress, but it will just look OK in mediocre pics. but, i do think budgets are very important & I'd never want to encourage people to overspend.

Quote: Originally Posted by JoLo908 OMG, I want to get a T-shirt with this on it... just for fun...lol! I only found these quotes. hmm, maybe I just started something. One man's "tacky" is another man's tasteful. one man's tacky is another man's marketing ploy on bdw they call me senorita tacky if you make the shirt it has to be TACKY. tie die, fringe, puff paint, the works

my resort is free for kids. i think it's 1 kid per 2 adults in the room. i'm not sure though. only one kid came. also, can they do 3 nights instead of 5? most of our guests only stsyed 3 nights.