SunBride

If you are using a local photographer, you should be able to find one that suits any budget, from 500$+ If you are flying in a photographer, the starting price would be travel fees only. I would say on average photographers will charge travel fees + a few thousand dollars, but it depends, the ones less experienced with DWs will often do it for travel only, or travel + a small fee (500-1000$), but the most experienced ones might want 5000$ - 10000$

I know there was a thread or two with the exact same title a while back, maybe 6 months to a year ago. Try doing a search to see if you can find it (them)

Quote: Originally Posted by Gina and Rusty Hello all! There is soooo much information on this site, so great! I do have one question for those who have gotten married in the Mayan Riviera. I plan on shipping a large tote with welcome bags, starfish, seashells, favors, etc. Are there any restrictions from customs on what can and cannot be shipped into Mexico? Here is what I plan on sending: (50) welcome bags: toothbrushes toothpaste mouthwash advil packs mini sunblock lip balm water chips/snacks 50 starfish 50 sanddollars tulle for back of seat covers Should I be concerned with supplies getting held up in customs? Thanks! Gina I don't know the exact restrictions, but I know that I read somewhere on the forum several months ago of a bride who was going to be charged a ridiculous amount of customs, so high that it made more sense to just abandon the items (so she lost what she paid for them and also what she paid to have them shipped). Most brides around here strongly advise against advance shipping items, it's better to just pay extra for an extra suitcase. Maybe somebody else can offer more specific info.

Quote: Originally Posted by Steph158 Thanks, she is on my short list for photographers. Just having a hard time chosing one. Please post your pictures when you get them, it has been difficult trying to find more of her work! Congrats on your wedding! Have you seen these photos posted by one of the Dreams Tulum brides? Picasa Web Albums - Monica - pro wedding pics I especially love the TTD ones!

Oh wait, sorry, just realized you said you are using the Wedding in Paradise package. I don't think we ever received word on that yet. Most brides use the other 2 packages. You should double check. You will of course have to pay for the meals for the guests. If you are using the silver menu it will be 40x55$ or the gold menu 40x65$. If you want to just use the regular restaurant menu it would be 40x20$. If they charge you the 750$ for the private reception, it would be in addition to the meal charge. But I would expect they won't charge you it, I think it's purely to close the restaurants.

Quote: Originally Posted by lolosmama I have a question on the reception/private fee. If we use the Dream of Love or Ultimate package, do we have to pay the private reception fee of $750 to have a group in the ballroom, on the beach, etc? We will have about 40 guests. Not the ballroom, beach or pool, but to have them close down one of the restaurants yes.

or what about putting the food into a "food puzzle" so they have to work at it to get it out, one kibble at a time? I know they have these for dogs and they love em, don't know if cats would do it too

Quote: Originally Posted by Simistar Not sure if this will work for everyone (but worth trying!!), but I just got an e-mail from David's Bridal offering a FREE SHUTTERFLY PHOTOBOOK 8x8 (20 pages)... Here's the promo code that was in the e-mail: DB75-37S0-3467-PGTF15 It says the offer is good until April 30/09 Hope someone/people can use this!! I tried it and it says: "Sorry, this special offer code has already been used" so obviously it was a code only to be used by one person and somebody used it

Oh yeah, and I wanted to add that I cannot believe Morgan's generosity, WOW! I'd like to recommend you take away my Mod's Choice Superstar award and give it to her. Although I love my banner, I've had it long enough and it's somebody else's turn and Morgan seriously deserves it for doing this. (I know it's not actually my position to recommend her for it, seeing as it's the "mod's choice" but I just thought I'd point it out as a very small way to recognize her)

Quote: Originally Posted by neen I know I'm sooooo delinquent in posting my review, I'm busier now than I was BEFORE the wedding! As I type this I'm still at work and it's after 9pm! I'll post it soon, though, promise. I'm sorry! I've been bitting my tongue not to say anything I was going to call you a tease by promising us it last week. Last time somebody called you a tease is produced effects pretty fast! Sorry to hear work is so crazy. You have a good excuse for not posting your review, we'll try our best to be patient

wow, I'm so sorry to hear about your experience. It really hits home to me, as I had a very similar experience with my photographer. There were some good aspects, for one, she offered me a fabulous price and secondly, she was overall nice and friendly (like with my family and everything) and most importantly, I LOVE my photos (even better than I expected) but she was SO HIGH MAINTENANCE! I have never used that exact term to describe her before, but as soon as I read your words I realized that that was a perfect way to describe it. I always felt like I was writing emails to try to make her happy, when it should have been the other way around! She was also really stressed about the travel aspect and she was crazy stressed about doing a good job (she's a major perfectionist, which I saw as being a good thing as I am one too) and about having enough time to photograph. She put so many demands on me before the wedding, it was really not fun to deal with. It's like she forgot it way MY WEDDING DAY and I was the boss, not her. She was the single greatest cause of stress in the 2.5 months leading up to my wedding (which means in the entire planning process once the resort was booked). There was other stuff too, but I'm going to stop there. The most major cause of stress though is when she saw my review after the wedding. It was 75% awesome and 25% negative (although I seriously downplayed the negative). She completely flipped out at me. You would not believe the emails that followed. It was nuts. I cried for 3 days and got nothing done at work. Some of you will remember the long thread on this forum somewhere when I turned for you guys for advice (and everyone agreed she WAY over reacted to the review because it was mostly very good). So after that I deleted the review, it was just too bad to keep dealing with. Anyways, all this to say, I know all too well the importance of having a photographer who makes a bride's experience and wedding better, not more complicated. I had a few hints of problems to come before I booked her, but in my excitement about finding somebody good who I could afford to bring that I pushed those concerns aside. I wish I hadn't. At a few points before leaving I did regret my decision a little. Overall though the experience was not horrible, just not as good as it should have been. But then what happened at the end after the review really ruined it completely. I hope many future brides will read this and learn from our mistakes! (and no I don't mean not hiring my photographer, I am not out to ruin her business, I mean make sure to book a photographer based on portfolio, price and PERSONALITY!)

Quote: Originally Posted by Blkatz OMG the picture of the luggage in the van is hysterical!! I know!!! Notice all the matching luggage tags! Quote: Originally Posted by Teesha Hi Ladies...so I know I've been MIA lately (super stressed), but I have been reading all the posts as they get forwarded to my email account. I do have a question though, does anyone have a good sample of a welcome letter. I'm having a hard time writing mine and am lookin for some inspiration. Any help would be great! Teesha your wedding day is almost here! Try not to stress, you will definitely regret it afterwards. Everything will be fine, and the stuff that doesn't work out won't matter. You may have better luck with the welcome letter thingy in another part of the forum, where you can get responses from all brides rather than just DT brides. My newsletter and another bride's is posted in the member contribution section in page 1, but my newsletter doesn't really have a "welcome letter" per say, it's more just a bunch of usefull info.

Good luck Rachel! Can't wait to read about it all and see your pictures! Quote: Originally Posted by Adlergray Oh and Past Brides what is the most someone has brought on the plane with them?..I'm a hevey packer anyways and now we have are OOT bags and flowers and sand ceromony stuff and favors ..ect..I'm getting worried about getting it there-J I think I win this contest!!! We had 6 large suitcases (one of which was a golf bag, the other 5 normal suitcases) and 4 carry-ons (2 rolling ones and 2 backpacks) and my dress garment bag (with my husband's suit insine also). We went with Air Canada which has a really generous luggage allowance. We were allowed 2 large suitcases each, and then my parents took 2 of ours. We were each allowed a rolling carry-on and a smaller carry-on. I'm not sure if my garment bag was "suppose" to count as one of the carry-on, but I said screw it, I'm brining it on top of everything else I'm allowed to have! PROOF My parents, sister and husband and I at the Ottawa airport Almost all of these are ours. My sister had one piece, as did my parents (as well as the small garment bag) Our luggage in our room. This isn't even all of it because the golf bag is in the closet, as is my dress, and there is one small rolling bag missing in the pic. And here is the van driver trying to put all the luggage (my whole family's and my husband's whole family, 10 people total. Honesetly, more than half the luggage was mine and my husband's, the rest was for the other 8 people!) We were so insanely packed down in that van, they did not take into consideration the fact that we were all allowed 2 large suitcases when they assigned us that van (we were 10 people, so we were allowed 20 suitcases, but in actually there were only 14 as everybody besides us only had 1) It makes me laugh so hard to look at those pics. I can't believe it's been almost a year!

There's a bit of discussion about those 2 resorts in this thread: http://bestdestinationwedding.com/forum/t37136 Also I recently came back from CSS (just a vacation, not a wedding) and wrote a very long and detailed review and posted a TON of pictures (there are a few in the thread but a link to about 100 others) http://bestdestinationwedding.com/forum/t37275 And there are a few wedding reviews on CSA on here somewhere

I got married on day 5 of a 7 day trip, (i.e. arrival day, 3 full days, then wedding day, one full day, then departure day) so I only had one full day after the wedding. I was a bit disappointed about this, thought it would be better to get married a day or two earlier, but I had no choice because of the 4 business day rule (not counting the weekend). Turns out I didn't mind at all! Once I got there I was having so much fun and the trip was so relaxing that I didn't mind waiting for the wedding day, I had other things on my mind too (having fun), it's not like I was sitting around waiting for the wedding day. And having only one day afterwards wasn't that bad either. Sure, it would have been fun to stay 2 weeks, but if staying only one week I don't think it's that big of a deal to have 2 days before the wedding and 2 days after or however else it works out. I was just happy to have at least the one day (I would not want to have to leave the morning after my wedding!) Don't worry so much about the small details. We can never have everything perfect, and in the end it doesn't matter anyways!

I got married on day 5 of a 7 day trip, (i.e. arrival day, 3 full days, then wedding day, one full day, then departure day) so I only had one full day after the wedding. I was a bit disappointed about this, thought it would be better to get married a day or two earlier, but I had no choice because of the 4 business day rule (not counting the weekend). Turns out I didn't mind at all! Once I got there I was having so much fun and the trip was so relaxing that I didn't mind waiting for the wedding day, I had other things on my mind too (having fun), it's not like I was sitting around waiting for the wedding day. And having only one day afterwards wasn't that bad either. Sure, it would have been fun to stay 2 weeks, but if staying only one week I don't think it's that big of a deal to have 2 days before the wedding and 2 days after or however else it works out. I was just happy to have at least the one day (I would not want to have to leave the morning after my wedding!) Don't worry so much about the small details. We can never have everything perfect, and in the end it doesn't matter anyways! (trust me, normally I am a perfectionist, but in the end, these things don't matter).

Quote: Originally Posted by t777a does anyone know how the photographer is at the dreams tulum There are many links to photos on page 1 in the bride list. Look for the ones that used the resort photographer. People have varied opinions, I would say about 3/4 of people are happy and 1/4 aren't.

I was really set on this. When I mentioned it to the coordinator, she thought it was a bit strange to walk down the aisle to the mariachi or caribbean trio, she thought a guitar or violinist was more appropriate, but I didn't want to spend that much money on something that did not go with the DW theme. She said the mariachi/caribbean trio was more appropriate for cocktail hour. She also mentioned that they would only play a 45 minute set, and so I would get more bang for my buck if they played during cocktail hour (i.e. a full 45 minute set) versus during the ceremony (during which they would only play 3 songs, for entrance, signing and exit, and then there would be about 20 minutes left for them to play afterwards). In the end I decided to just use the speaker system with recorded music as it was so much cheaper. All this being said, I know others have used it for the ceremony, just thought I'd share my experience and explain why I changed my mind about it.

Quote: Originally Posted by sunstarsmoon I wish I had a dollar tree around here. Maybe I will go check our dollarama. But if they had them online I could have them delivered to my daughter in Vegas! I priced some mugs online and with a logo put on it was going to cost me aprox 300.00 I really dont want to spend that much. Love your website and your DIY mugs! Dollarama just started carrying them in the past couple weeks. They are now carrying a bunch of items above 1$. They call it "dollarama plus". I think the mugs may have been like 1.25 or 1.50$

Quote: Originally Posted by JeninVirginia I stillhave not been able to do my review- work calls! Here are some of the pics taken by the resort photographer in the meantime. Adobe Sign in to Adobe Thanks for posting your photos Jen, they are great! Just a reminder to everyone that Jen had previously posted that the resort photographer she used was Reuben (thanks so much for taking note of that!).

Quote: Originally Posted by JennyK Well since he was staying with us for a while I wanted to make sure it'd be someone that would get along with us as well as my opinionated friends lmfao I didnt want a stiff. lol I know.. I'm a gusher but when I'm pleased with something, I love to make it known. I hope it'll help other brides in picking their photographer. Don't feel bad for gushing, I was just trying to be clear to other brides that JM is obviously special and you can't expect that type of treatment from any photographer. I speak from personal experience. Usually we put most of the importance on the photographer's portfolio, I think most brides highly underestimate the importance of good customer service (I know I did). This is especially important for a destination wedding since the photographer will be spending a lot more time with the whole group and also you will likely spend more time communicating with the photographer in advance because of the travel arrangements and all that stuff.

I'm so so sorry to hear this. It hits me harder than it would have 2 months ago, because just under 2 months ago my husband was laid off. It was devastating to him. He never thought there was any chance at all of that happening to him. He got really lucky and got offered his job back a week later. It was totally crazy. They signed some contracts that put them in a position to rehire 1/3 of the people they had laid off, and he was one of them. His friends weren't so lucky. However I think most of them have found jobs by now. Our good friend was one of the ones permanently laid off, we felt so bad as he has 3 kids and his wife doesn't work. But he found a job after 1 month and is actually now making more money and he had gotten 12 weeks severance and was only out of money for 5 weeks so he actually has more money than before. Sorry to go off on a tangent, just trying to get your hopes up that something good might come of this. You may find a job you love more and/or make more money. In the meantime, I say, you have 1 week to sulk and feel sorry for yourself, after that try to take advantage of the extra time you have to spent with your FH and to plan for the wedding! There are a ton of idea for beautiful (and cheap!) DIY projects on here. Before you know it you'll be working again (and wishing you had more time for wedding planning!) Good luck!

I'm so so sorry to hear this. It hits me harder than it would have 2 months ago, because just under 2 months ago my husband was laid off. It was devastating to him. He never thought there was any chance at all of that happening to him. He got really lucky and got offered his job back a week later. It was totally crazy. They signed some contracts that put them in a position to rehire 1/3 of the people they had laid off, and he was one of them. His friends weren't so lucky. However I think most of them have found jobs by now. Our good friend was one of the ones permanently laid off, we felt so bad as he has 3 kids and his wife doesn't work. But he found a job after 1 month and is actually now making more money and he had gotten 12 weeks severance and was only out of money for 5 weeks so he actually has more money than before. Sorry to go off on a tangent, just trying to get your hopes up that something good might come of this. You may find a job you love more and/or make more money. In the meantime, I say, you have 1 weeks to sulk and feel sorry for yourself, after that try to take advantage of the extra time you have to spent with your FH and to plan for the wedding! There are a ton of idea for beautiful (and cheap!) DIY projects on here. Before you know it you'll be working again (and wishing you had more time for wedding planning!) Good luck!

Quote: Originally Posted by wahmsuzanne As I'm doing all of this planning to try to nail down a date I remember reading somewhere that we need to be in Mexico for a certain number of days before we can get married ... but did I also read that we have to be there a certain number of days if we're just doing a "ceremony" ... we'll get married here right before we leave. Thanks! And is this rule per resort of per Mexico? You still have to be there a certain number of days before a symbolic ceremony, to give them the chance to meet with you and do all the planning. I forget the exact number of days (it's on page 1 under the "ceremony" section).

Quote: Originally Posted by Adlergray Hi guys, dose anyone know where we could buy or rent vases in the area, RM to Cancun? have you tried asking the coordinators? For renting I don't know, but to buy you could go to Wal-Mart in Playa del Carmen.