jenlevergood

Don't worry Sarah, it wasn't that complicated when you get there. We had dinner together most nights as a group of 15. We would meet in the plaza each night for a drink as a group and then decide who wanted to go where for dinner. They often were able to seat us at 2 different tables and there usually wasn't much of a wait, depending on the restaurant and what time you like to eat. The pager system for tables works awesome and we never minded relaxing with a drink for 30-60 minutes if we wanted larger talbes.

I felt the same way about paying for a private dinner but I guess I bothered Ana enough about it and she was able to arrange for reservations for us for our group of 15 at the Italian restaurant. She told us that it would be at two tables but we just moved them together with the help of the staff when we arrived. It's worth asking what they can do again and we had to go early at 6:00 but it was really worth it and we gave out our welcome bags that night. If you are looking to meet for drinks, the best bar would be in the plaza where our group met for a drink most nights before dinner. Good luck!

JBean, Our chair covers were the standard white chair covers that you see at any hall and looked very nice, I can send you photos if you like. There was 15 of us so we had 2 round tables with 7 and 8 each but each table we had would only comfortably hold 8 people. You have the option of a seperate table for the bride and groom and/or wedding party but it seemed silly with our small group. It is definitely your choice for seating arrangements and Ana went over the seating with us when we arrived at our first meeting. We definitely didn't want to drag any more junk down there than we already did, so we did go with the centerpiece they offered. We had one included with our package and purchased an extra one for $50, with white lilly and calli lilly. We thought they were really nice but your WC will send you an attachment of all the different options.

Hey JBean, Check with you wedding coordinator but I'm pretty sure that the chair covers come with all of the packages that include a private reception. I'm not sure what the chairs looked like without the covers but we rented the chair bows for the ceremony and they moved them to the chairs at the reception as well.

Hey Ahollo02, I hope that I'm spelling her name right but yes her english was great. I actually really enjoyed spending most of my day with her, she was an awesome person

Here are a few photos, there are so many that it's hard to chose my favorites. We did a trash the dress session a few days after the wedding and it was so much fun and those are some of my favorite shots. Ashley from Blue Lens was awesome and she loves doing the TTD shoot. Also, I forgot to mention that we had a romantic dinner on the beach that was included in our package. It was absolutely amazing and we would recommend booking one to any one that is interested. It is an extra $200 US if it's not included in your package and very worth it. It was just us on the beach with fresh flowers on our table, surrounded by Tiki torches and our own private waiter serving us a 5 course dinner. Fabulous!!! So romantic and private for a special night.

We just got home from the Valentin on friday morning and had the most amazing trip and wedding. I am so happy with our decision to go with this resort and loved every minute of our 2 weeks in paradise. There were 15 of us the first week and then just my husband and I for the second. We were booked in a Silver suite for the first week and a Golden for the second but were upgraded to an Emerald suite in building 12 for the 2 weeks. I was unsure of this at first because it was quite a long walk to building 2 where our guests were staying but it was an amazing ocean front room and it was awesome on the wedding day because the wedding was just to the right of our room. We were there from January 6-20 and were married on the beach at 4:00 on January 10. We originally chose the middle package but I really wanted a video of our ceremony so we went with the Once in a Lifetime package and I am so glad that we did. All the little extras that were included in this package were well worth the money. I also cannot say enough about our wedding coordinator Ana, she was such a pleasure to work with and because of all her hard work, everything went very smoothly. After quite a few emails and lots of pleading, Ana finally arranged for a reservation for our group in the Italian restaurant, which everyone loved. We handed our our welcome bags and included personlized hand written welcome notes to each of our guests. It was a lot of work but so worth it. We also went with personlized cloth bags and travel mugs from discountmugs.com. They were very affordable and shipped to Canada, which was a big plus. As for our wedding day, it was even more perfect than I could have imagined. Me and my maid of honour spent the majority of the day at the spa, which was a wonderful experience. I had Itzel do my manicure, hair and makeup and she did a wonderful job. She was such a calming person and really is a perfectionist. I was very anxious about having my hair and makeup done at the resort but I was very pleased with the results. I took some pictures with me for inspiration but ended up going with her recommendations and was so happy with how it turned out. Ana even checked on us a few times and arranged for champagne and lunch to be delivered to us at the spa and also dropped off the flowers for my hair. We also had our ceremony on the beach between buildings 11-12. Kiko Flores also performed our ceremony and did a beautiful job. We were in touch with him via email before we arrived and we arranged and wrote our own ceremony, which our guests, especially the moms, loved. We had a perfect day and the ocean was beautiful. One of the reasons that we chose this resort was because of the location on the beach where they preform the cermemony is quite far from the swimming/watersports area and was very private. I cannot say enough about Blue Lens photography. Ashley was such a great person to work with and was very relaxed. She did photos with the boys before the ceremony, then in my room getting ready. We were so impressed with the quality of her work and her original ideas. Our video also turned out awesome and we have already watched it a dozen times. They even interivewed our guests on camera after the ceremony, while we did photos, which was a nice surprise. We were so impressed that we ended up purchasing the CD's of the edited and unedited photos and also an amazing slideshow of pics that Ashley put together to music. I will try to post some pics on here soon or you can email me and I will send you some if you are interested. We did cocktails and appetizers in the gazebo with the Mexican trio, which was great, followed by dinner on the Mexican terrace. Our guests are all still raving about what a wonderful trip it was and how beautiful the wedding day was. I would highly recommend the VIM to anyone considering it. It definitely exceeded all of our expectations. Like everyone else said, the rooms, the grounds, the food, the drinks and especially the service were all first class. The employees of this resort go above and beyond to make your vacation wonderful and many of them told us that this was a great place to work. We definitely tipped everyone very well thought because they are very underpaid for how hard they work. If anyone has any specific questions, feel free to ask. Everyone on this site was so helpful to me in planning our big day, that I would love to be a help in any way that I can. Good luck ladies, and enjoy the whole process, I kinda sad now that it's all over but I have memories that will last forever.

Brandeemdavis, I am so glad that you were able to use the speakers and thank you for the use of your hurricane vase, it worked out perfectly. It's funny that we never actually met while we were there but I did see your husband and the boys out front of their building just before your ceremony and was able to tell him congrats! Your pictures turned out beautiful, congrats again and glad that your day and trip were just as amazing as ours. Overall, I wouldn't change a thing! I'm just sad to be back home in this freezing cold weather.

Hey girls, The music was a big decision for us too and maybe one of my only small regrets about the entire day. We were only 15 people so we decided on bringing our own portable ipod speakers for the reception. We thought they had great sound quality at home and were loud enough but the sound still wasn't great outside at the Mexican terrace. None of our guests seemed to mind and we still had music playing during dinner and had our first dance but after that it definitely wasn't loud enough to dance to. We all ended up going to the Plaza shortly after we had our wedding cake. I almost wish now that we had invested in a DJ because our "private" party ended earlier than I would have liked but it does seem very expensive. I'm not sure on the quality of the speakers that the resort has for rent but if they are the same ones that they used on the beach for the ceremony, then the sound was amazing, even with the wind and surf. Hope this helps

Wishing all of my fellow January brides good luck. We leave today for Playa del Carmen and the big day on monday. This has been a great website to help me get organized and I thanks everyone for your help and suggestions.

So it's finally here, we leave this afternoon and the big day on Monday. I'm kinda freaked out but so excited too. We are so over weight on our luggage but hoping that they are nice to us at the airport. Wishing everyone else getting married soon good luck and I will definitely check back in when we get home and let everyone know how things go.

I ended up ordering different mugs through discountmugs.com and had them customized. The website is very user friendly and they had many options for images and the fonts/print/colours etc. They turned out awesome but I haven't tried washing one in the dishwasher yet. I went with the plastic version because it was much lighter to take them on the plane with us and also much cheaper, so I doubt they would go in the dishwasher but they have many different types of mugs. We were so pleased with the product that afterwards I also ordered personalized cloth bags from this company to use as our OOT bags.

Thanks Sweetpea, I am getting super excited and have lots to do too. We leave for Mexico in 6 weeks. Congrats to you too!

If anyone is looking for personalized items for their guests, I would highly recommend discountmugs.com. We ordered personalized travel mugs that turned out amazing. We were so happy that we ordered personalized cloth bags that we will use as our OOT bags but are the perfect size that can double as beach bags. We are so happy with the quality of the products for the price and both boxes arrived before the delivery date, which is pretty amazing since you never know what to expect when shipping from the US to Canada. Just a little FYI if anyone is interested, check out their website.

We are planning on going shopping for speakers for our ipod this week for the reception. I was thinking we could probably share things like that if you were interested since we are getting married the day after each other. We also didn't want to pay the extra money but I'm trying to limit the amount of stuff we are lugging down there. We will have about the same sized group as you too, 13 confirmed right now with possibly one more couple joining us. Are you bringing decorations for the tables for the reception?