SunBride

yay! I was waiting for the review to comment although obviously I checked out the slide show a few days ago as soon as you put it in your siggy. Everything looks absolutely amazing! Both you and all the wedding stuff. As usual Claudia's team did a wonderful job taking pics. And you look so happy! The pictures of your bridal party on the stepping stones of the pool is such a great idea! And man, what a bridal party you had! Looks great! Thanks for sharing with us!

I can answer this one for you...The aisle runner is the resort's, I have seen it used in several other weddings. Which reminds me of something I noticed in Amy's pics. They put the aisle leading from the seaside grill. So in her pictures of everyone walking down the aisle you see the seaside grill (and some employees) in the background. I can tell from one of the pictures Neen posted so far that they did the same for her too. For my wedding, they had the aisle angled just slightly more towards the back rather than to the side. While I was waiting for my turn I was still hiding behind the Seaside Grill, so for the first picture you can see the edge of the restaurant, but after that the aisle kinda angled to the left so that it was directly behind the gazebo, so for the rest of the walk to the gazebo the only thing in the background of the pictures is one of the buildings. Anyways, just a small detail for those of you who are extra detail oriented. You may want to ask them to put the aisle more to the back of the gazebo rather than diagonally towards the seaside grill if you want to avoid that background. I didn't ask for mine to be done any specific way, that was just the way they did it (and the way I had seen it done for weddings preceding mine) so I wonder why it is that they've changed it a bit since then...

So in preperation for my upcoming trip to Jamaica, I was thinking how I really didn't want to have to buy another disposable underwater film camera to get pics at Dunns River Falls. I've used those cameras several times and I am never very happy with the results. I started looking for underwater cases for digital cameras. There are hard cases made for different camera models, but they are 100$ and up, and there is a good chance I will be buying a slimmer point and shoot soon, so I wanted something that would work with any camera. I found this Aquapac at REI, an american store (not sure if online only or if they have actual physical stores too) but then to save on Shipping I managed to find it here in Canada at MEC (Mountain Equipment Coop). It was 30$ at REI (although once I signed up they have been sending me codes for 15% and 20% off) but shipping was 20$ to Canada. (Note, as I post the link, I notice the price is 40$ but I swear it was 30$ last week.... They also have a bigger one for 40$). http://www.rei.com/product/752136 At MEC it was 35$ but you have to be a store member (lifetime membership costs 5$). http://www.mec.ca/Products/product_d...45524442618542 I had read a few reviews online and they were very good. People say it's really easy to push the buttons through the blue flexible plastic, and the clear plastic doesn't even show on the pictures.

Yes I have seen them at Canadian tire too. And they do go on sale every few months.

wow, I can't believe your boss is on your case about this! As long as you are polite and friendly they can't ask for anything more.

Quote: Originally Posted by lydiag Hi Everyone, I don't have a date confirmed with DT but I'm shooting for early Jan 2010. We want a very BASIC wedding; ceremony to be Catholic in the chapel and then we were thinking of dinner at one of the restaurants to save some cash. Has anyone else done a religious ceremony at the DT? I've tried reading through the posts and I can't seem to get through the hundreds of pages attached. From what I've read it is mainly legal ceremonies occuring. Yes the 100+ pages are definitely overwhelming. If you check the detailed bride list you can read through to see what type of ceremonies people had. That would be the best way because most of the past brides aren't around any more (basically just me and a few of the ones from the last month or so). Also, you should note that the symbolic ceremony is in fact quite religious (religious readings). One or two brides have complained about this. I'm not even 100% clear on what the difference is between religious and symbolic.

Quote: Originally Posted by andime85 Eeek!! These are the hotels that we are deciding between too!! I didn't think it would be so hard!! Good luck! One thing that I am having a hard time with is finding out whether or not you can actually swim in the ocean at Sensatori.....lots of TA reviews say no, but our travel agent says that he knows some people who just came back and that you can swim there....can anyone who has actually been to the resort shed any light on it?? My family are "water people" and I would like them to be able to swim in the ocean.... there is a thread on the azul sensatori and somebody there should be able to answer your question. And welcome motorola, good luck making your choice. That's always the hardest part. At least you have it narrowed down to 2.

Hi Denise, welcome back. Do a search in the mayan riviera sub forum and you will find TONS of info on local photographers. My personal favorite is Claudia Photo, her whole team is awesome. Her price is approx 2000$ giver or take a few hundred depending on number of hours. But there are a ton of other great photographers too. And many of us bring photographers from back home because sometimes it's a better value if you can find somebody who charges a reasonable price and since they will be there all day for the wedding and also take other event photos (in my case trip pictures during the vacation and a TTD). It's an even better value if you can split the outside photographer with another bride getting married at the same time as you (either at DT or even another resort in the mayan riviera). good luck with your planning.

So I wrote the following email to the contest people " I am a participant in the Your Quest contest, and I am writing to express my concern about cheating in this contest. I am curious if measures will be taken to check whether contestants have created fake email accounts for the purpose of voting. I see some of the contestants have 50-100 votes per day, and I have difficultly believing these are all legitimate votes. As somebody who has been following the rules closely, I am disappointed to think that the winner will likely be somebody who cheated to get ahead." And here is their response "Thanks for your feedback. We are working hard to eliminate the possibility of cheating within our contests and promotions. This being said, there is always someone out there who thinks that they will get away with it. Rest assured, that before any ‘winners’ have been decided, they’re votes and their profile will be put under close scrutiny to determine if there is any evidence of misrepresentation. Again, thanks for your feedback." I'm so impressed they actually responded! And now I have a tiny glimmer of hope that I could win

I am having trouble with this one too. I think I am making only one book, the wedding. I think I will forget about the vacation pics. I may give in and make a smaller vacation one though if I can get it for a good price. But I am focusing on the wedding one (am ordering it in 12x15 from my publisher). I am also debating adding a page for each AHR at the end of the wedding book. If I decide to leave it out, I definitely won't bother doing a book alone. we don't have enough great pics of the AHR for it to be worthwhile. I would definitely combine the wedding and TTD, to me the TTD is just an extension of the wedding pics.

are you sure your resort won't let you incorporate the parts you want into their legal ceremony? At my resort you could add your own vows, readings, etc to the legal ceremony, you just couldn't change the necessary legal part.

Quote: Originally Posted by DWbride09 well if it makes you feel any better I was let go 2 months ago and FH was just laid off last week. Neither of us has a job and we're 4 months aways from our wedding. lol All roads lead to success though, even the detours. Oh my gosh, that's awful! I'm so sorry. I'll stop pouting now.

Neen - congrats, you looked great, can't wait for your review and pro pics! sgbrown - try not to worry about it too much. On your wedding day everyone will be focused on you and you won't even notice the other weddings. As for reception locations, there are several to choose from so chances are you can get something outdoors.

wow, that is nuts! I was just planning a vacation to Jamaica and that resort is running for 1250+250 taxes right now from Ottawa. I understand that's a last minute price and that you will pay more to book a year in advance but 3000$ is just insane. Have you tried talking to other travel agents? Otherwise I would go ahead and plan your wedding and wait until the summer to book because that is when all the travel packages are officially published and when the early booking bonuses start.

Quote: Originally Posted by Rebecca&George Can someone please donate me some points?? I really want to be able to open up attachments. Thank you soooo much ) Rebecca Sorry, I would definitely give you some but Tammy Host has asked us not to donate points (see thread below). I suggest you just try to participate as much as you can. Tou get one point for reading posts, 5 points for replying and 10 points for starting a thread. http://bestdestinationwedding.com/forum/t29202

Poor you, good luck. Beautiful siggy pic though!

yes we have unemployment insurance in Canada. The rules are you make up to 55% of your salary up to a maximum eligible salary of 43 000$. So the maximum amount you can get is 450$ per week, or 23 4000$ per year. His salary was considerably higher than that. But it will help a little.

He is pretty positive, hoping he can find a new job fairly quickly. I don't know though, there will be a lot of people from Nortel loosing their jobs and the market may become flooded quickly. It's especially hard because he loved the company he worked for. It was voted one of the best companies in Ottawa a few years in a row by HR magazine. He has never wanted to look elsewhere because he always thought it would be a step down. THANK GOODNESS we aren't in the wedding planning stage. That would have killed me. I am really dreading telling my parents. I know they are going to feel SO SO bad for us, and they are currently away on an extended vacation right now so I don't want them feeling crappy, but they need to know.

Funny thing about the economy is that recently I had been saying that as people who were not affected by the poor economy, that it was our civic duty to keep spending! (as an economist I couldn't help but think this way, as I know that if everyone panics and stops spending it just makes it all worse!)

he does not get a severence package since it is a temporary lay-off. If in 3 months he finds out the lay-off is permanent, he will get one week of pay for every year he has worked there, so in his case 5 years = 5 weeks of pay. Until then, nothing.

I know this is probably a common thread these days, but let me tell you I NEVER expected to be the one posting this. A couple months ago I mentioned to my husband that we should probably face the facts there was probably a slight possibility he would loose his job, because he works as a software developer, and the company he works for gets most of its business indirectly from Nortel, and everyone knew Nortel wasn't doing so good. My husband re-assured me that there was no way at all he would loose his job, because his company was doing so strongly, and he was one of their favorite employees. I tried to make him acknowledge that there was the slightest possibility (I mean, to me it seemed like there was the slightest possibility for everyone, except maybe federal gov't workers like me). Anyways, so last week Nortel announced its bankrupcy. Okay so maybe we are just stupid or what but we were not at all concerned about his job. Honestly, I don't think the thought ever crossed either of our minds that he might loose his job. In fact, friday morning I drop 4000$ on a vacation to Jamaica!!! We were suppose to leave in 2 weeks. Friday afternoon he finds out there is a big meeting at work Monday morning. He knows it's likely they are doing lay-offs but he was super confident he wouldn't be one of them. He says they would have to lay-off 75% of the company before laying him off. So we don't really worry about it all weekend. We figure worse case scenario is he will get a pay cut. Well this morning he gets the news that he is laid off. They laid off almost half the company. Nobody understands why him. Seriously, not to toot my husband's horn but he is VERY good at what he does. After getting the news, while saying good-bye to his colleagues, everyone is in complete disbelief that he was one of the ones laid off. He says it was awful. Everyone was crying. He was actually only temporarily laid off, for 3 months and then they will let him know if he gets his job back or not. I am thinking the chances are slim. And he does not want to sit around for 3 months. So he doesn't want to count on being re-hired. Really, it could be so much worse. I work for the federal government, so my job is pretty much guaranteed. If we are very careful with our money we can probably get by paying the bills with just my salary (I am already careful now, as I am naturally a cheap person, but now I mean going to just the basic of paying mortgage, bills and food and nothing else at all). Luckily I bought cancelation insurance on the trip and it covers lay-offs. One of our closest friends who works with my husband got permanently laid off, and he has 3 kids, and his wife is a stay at home mom. I feel so bad for them.

Thanks ladies! I've pretty much given up hope because although I am in 5th place (almost 4th) the first few contestants have 2500 votes while I have only 350 I would have needed to have 50 people voting every day like they have, but I only have about 10. I still vote every day with the 5 accounts that people have given me (i.e. their username and password).

Quote: Originally Posted by JeninVirginia I confirmed with the front desk on the Ipod Docking Station- 8 D Size Batteries Finally an answer to that question! Too bad it was too late for Neen, hopefully she figures something out. I'm adding this info to the update list for page 1

Quote: Originally Posted by jerzygirl85 Hi everyone, I am getting the ultimate package and was wondering if flowers are included as part of the set up of the beach arbor. Does anyone know? I don't remember it being clealy stated in the wedding guide. Also, I need an opinon on the colors I am thinking of using which are sky blue and espresso. I really love the combination but my FH thinks the espresso may be too dark for a beach wedding. Any ideas/suggestions? Thanks! Flowers on the arbor/gazebo area always included no matter which package you choose. I personally think brown and blue will look great. I agree that brown alone would be a little dark for a DW, but paired up with a beautiful blue it will look fabulous!

Awesome review, it wasn't that overdue, it's been less than a month since you wedding day! I can't believe they repaid the cost of the lost cameras. There are many stories out there of people who had things stolen at resorts and I have NEVER heard of them being compensated. Although in this case the resort was more to blame seeing as guests are told to leave their bags outside for the bellmen to organize and bring to your room (but I recommend keeping the most valuable items, such as cameras, money and rings, laptop with you).