ablj209

Has anyone been to the Jellyfish just for dinner (not reception)? Do you have a copy of the regular menu? This place looks amazing, FI and I were going to go there one day during our second week as we would likely want a change from the resort food by then. FI's mother and some others are talking about going too, so it may be a group dinner (8-10) people during the first week instead.

Groom/GM attire arrived today. I ordered the shirts online from JC Penney and the pants are from Sears. This is FI in his attire. FI modelling what the Groomsmen will be wearing. Closeup of the pattern in the shirt. Palm trees!!!

Those are awesome! Too bad I don't do well in heels, I would buy them for in a heartbeat

The wait is brutal, but I recommend holding out as long as possible. My wedding is February 2011, I booked a group rate for 10 people in April 2010. I was told by my travel agent that the prices were really good and were not likely to drop and even if they did, it would only be by $100. So for the sake of giving the hotel my confirmation number and getting the ceremony booked and peace of mind to know that everything was settled, we went ahead with the group rate. In October, a few days before the final payment was due, the rates dropped by $250 ($500 for the child rate)!!!! Thankfully, we were able to snag a one time price adjustment, so we all paid the new rate. It is now November and the rates have dropped again. This time another $200. The guests who are booking now are getting an awesome deal!!!! $1200 + tax for 7 days All Inclusive at the Riu Palace Punta Cana with flight leaving from Toronto. I know it's really hard to play the waiting game, when all you can think about is having your date taken or the hotel sold out by the time you go ahead and book.... but if you can, I say wait until there's 3-4 months to go.

Update for November. Things are moving along extremely well. My parents have officially booked so now we have 13 booked for the wedding ceremony and 63 confirmed for our AHR. I have my dresses (bought a shorter one for the evening and also to wear to the AHR), my BM's dresses have been ordered. The JR was off the rack, so I just need to get it altered for her. The boys clothes have been ordered as well, we have the pants and are just waiting for the shirts to arrive in the mail. My mom and I are going dress shopping this weekend. OOT bags are done, looking into decorations/favors for the AHR (that's not till April so I have lots of time). Everything's coming together perfectly!!! I'm so excited, a little over 3 months to go!!

Yay!, my parents have officially booked for the full week (they still chose to use their own TA), but that's OK... my dad will get to walk me down the aisle, and both my parents will be there to share our day!!!

@MrsTo (not future any more!!!) thanks so much for sharing. I'm getting soooo excited, my wedding is in 3 months woohoo! I just love reading through your review and looking at your beautiful pictures over and over again!!!

Number 2 is beautiful!!!

I got some fantastic news! My parents met with my Dad's oncologist on Friday and now that he's 3/4 of the way through his treatments, they asked again about him travelling in February. The oncologist said that he's doing amazing, he's had no setbacks at all, no real "chemo" symptoms (naseau etc). He said medically there is no reason he can't travel and in fact had even recommended my Dad go to the Dominican!!! Woohoo! Looks like it all worked out in the end! My mom is now calling around to get quotes (travel insurance will still be high, but they will pay whatever they have to). She has an issue with my Travel Agent, but I'm trying to talk her into using the same one so that they'll be part of the group and hopefully they're room will be in the same area and not on the other side of the hotel. They are doing some number crunching and deciding if they will come down for 4 days (thurs-sun) or the full week with everyone else!

There's a section for wedding reviews under BDW General > Share your wedding/Engagement Story > Wedding Reviews.....Thanks!!!!

@Caleya... The notebooks are just blank (lined) pages for guests to jot down notes/journal/etc.. The only info I put in was the welcome booklet that has the puzzles etc. It has some spanish phrases and a map of the resort. Some people put all sorts of info on the hotel in there, but I'm sure everyone will have done what I already have and visisted TripAdvisor and/or the hotels website to see what's available. The only other thing I'm considering is a brochure of available excursions with a description of the activity, duration & cost (if I do this, it will be a VistaPrint creation!).

@maryam18 - the key card holders came in 3 parts.. the coil wristlet came from Ebay (24 for $3.99), the clear ziplock badge holders were from Ebay (SpecialistID) 25 for $11 and the card insert was a Vistaprint free business card. I have already posted in this thread about the cost and quality of the mugs. Thanks!

Eenie, meenie, miney, moe!! These are my inspiration bouquets. The resort has informed me that they have purple orchids available and would love to pair them up with cala lilies and/or I think they're called Stargazer lilies... I definately want something tropical!!

A few people have asked for the template for the first aid kits.. Enjoy! Wedding Survival Kit.ppt

Just a thought.. There are plenty of % off coupons floating around.. You could use one of those to cover the cost of the duty

@sara - unfortunately discountmugs charged me duty upon delivery. This seems to be a "luck of the draw" scenario, there are several posts on here about this topic. Some canadians have been able to get delivery without owing duty. They were sent via UPS and I have always been charged duty through them Maybe you could request that they send it USPS or FedEx instead?? When I went to pick them up (wasn't home when they tried to deliver), I had to pay $65 duty.

@nan - i think the bags are excellent quality. I have no doubt they will hold up well for my guests. I tried not to have them too personalized so that my guests would be more likely to use them again. @lua - the mugs were from DiscountMugs. I designed the image in powerpoint and emailed it to them. I ordered and paid for 32 mugs and they ended up shipping me 40. The cost was $192. I believe if you go into the order section, it says minimum 48, but I was able to update the quantity manually since I didn't need that many.

I ordered the canvas bags all together as I still hadn't quite mastered how to get the free items as individual shipments. The cost for 21 bags was $79. When I started ordering the goodies (pens/notebooks/keychains) I did the individual orders for the free items and only paid shipping.

Thanks everyone! The bags came from VistaPrint and the First Aid Kits were the $1 Johnson & Johnson ones that you can get at Target/Walmart/Dollarama. My local Dollarama only had generic ones (which meant awful bandaids), and when I went down to Buffalo to do some shopping, the Dollar Store there only had 2-3 so I ended up ordering them off ebay. I didn't want to have to run around to several different stores hunting for them. EbySearch was the company and they were selling them in packs of 5 kits for $3.99, so 79 cents each!!! They came with the bandaids and wipes, I then filled them with the Purell, chapstick, tums, tylenol, pepto bismol and put the label on them. Total cost of the each bag and contents works out to about $15.

Four months to go and I think these are almost done! Just have to print out some final copies of the Welcome Booklet. I plan on giving out one bag per couple, hopefully I'll be able to get the concierge to put them in their rooms while we're all out at dinner the first night. Each bag will have 1 of 2 custom lined notebooks. The beach picture was one that I had taken on a vacation to Punta Cana in 2008. I absolutely adore these little first aid kits (thanks BDW brides for the idea!). Love these too! Stainless steel mugs with custom screen print from DiscountMugs.com 1 of 3 Punta Cana keychains from VistaPrint (the quality of these are much better in person!!) My Welcome booklet that has double sided information, colouring page, word search, sudoku, and a map of the resort

Your photobook looks fantastic!!! Thanks for sharing!

I sent out 50 invitations in September with an RSVP date of November 1st. So far, I have received back about 10. The problem is that the 10 I have received, I already knew if they were coming or not.. it's the distant relatives that I don't speak to on a regular basis that I am really waiting to hear back from. It's frustrating!! I went a little overboard with the OOT bags and actually ordered far too much stuff !! I think I may have some Punta Cana goodies to sell (notebooks, travel mugs etc) when we get closer to the date. I might give some out to the people I knew who wanted to come, but really couldn't afford it.

My invitations arrived and were mailed out about 6 weeks ago.. I'm so excited to come home every day to find the orange rsvp envelopes in my mailbox. The invites were done by CustomPaperWorks and I love them!! Front Cover (cream sparkle cardstock) Inside Invitation The inside pages have travel information, a page for the AHR details and the back cover is our contact info and registries. The last page has a pocket that holds the RSVP and return envelope.

Those are amazing pictures.. I love the picture of the two of you lounging in the beach chairs with a drink in your hand!!! That is 100% DESTINATION WEDDING!!!

I have a MOH and a JR.BM. I fell in love with the JR dress, but unfortunately, had trouble matching the colour for the MOH, so we ended up with a complementary colour instead. I think the 2 colours look great together and the fact that they are not similar in age or body type will help with the look. MOH . Jr. ~ will have straps added and the bone removed (she's 9)