MJKH

Here's how we made our decision: The winters here are cold and long...and the weeks we are usually the most desperate to escape are mid January to the end of February. I love autumn here as well as Christmas at home and all the preparations. It takes us until mid January to pack everything back up again and get the Christmas stuff put away for another year. My fiance's daughter was writing exams the last week of January. Travel in mid to late Feb was considerably more expensive, so we went with the very end of Jan/beginning of Feb. We had been to the Mayan Riviera twice before and loved it. The resort we picked was in the price point we wanted ($1500-$1800 pp), was an all inclusive, had lots to offer our guests on site and was easy to take day trips out (e.g., Akumal to swim with the turtles, Tulum to see the ruins). Having a civil (legal) ceremony in Mexico for us was easy peasy. They needed three business days to process the paperwork after we arrived, and we did have to do the bloodwork but that was no biggie. If either of you have been married before or if you'll be changing your name when you get home, there will be an extra step or two. When we factored in the time the resort needed to process the paperwork after we arrived...when our preferred ceremony/reception site at the resort was available...and when our dream photographer was available...we came up with two possible dates...Feb 2/12 or Feb 3/12. Our TA was really helpful in making the calls back and forth at this point to ensure we were getting exactly what we wanted. Once these things were set in stone, everything else came together just fine. Good luck!

Thanks...LOVE Victoria...lived there for 2.5 years and miss it a lot. But, if I hadn't left, I wouldn't have met my honey! ; )

Actually, if you hop on to Trip Advisor fairly quickly (before anyone loads new photos) you'll see good views of the beach bar with photos #216, 584, 678, 749, 1088, 1446 and 1948. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe photos #695, 756 and 807 show the space with the thatched roof that is used for yoga (along the path of the lazy river).

Armour, if you go to Trip Advisor and search thru the Traveller Photos for Grand Sirenis Riviera Maya Hotel and Spa, there is a recently posted (July '12) photo of the beach snack bar. It's titled "Beach Bar". You'll see how it's set up during the day...just a small number of high tables and barstools.

I love that little snack bar area for a reception...at night, that part of the resort is quiet. It is also a really easy area for guests to get back and forth to from their rooms. That's where they'll hold special bbqs or lobster dinner evenings. I posted a picture of the beach looking out from the snack bar in this thread quite a while back. I'm pretty sure there wouldn't be room to seat 35 of you under the roof of the snack bar...I've only ever seen it set up with the tables and chairs on the beach next to the snack bar. Are they suggesting the yoga space for your ceremony in bad weather? I don't know that I have a picture of this space, but I'll look when I get home tonight. It's just an open area along one of the paths with a thatched covering. There is lots of lush greenery around. The staff would do their best I'm sure to keep the general public out of the way and out of your photos, but it's still not as private and out of the way as the palapa/beach area. I've never heard of a reference to "Playa Nueva" at the GS, so I'm not sure if this is a new area they've groomed for weddings, or if this is the area of the main beach around/in front of the ruin. If so, this is not a private area but they do their best to keep the general public out of the way and out of your photos. I would also guess that the later you hold your ceremony, the fewer the people who will be hanging around there.

Thanks ladies! I stumbled upon those little woven straw photo albums on sale at our Real Canadian Superstore (I believe they were around $2.25 each) a year ago this spring but have never really seen anything like them since. Sorry, I know that doesn't help you very much. As far as a breakdown for our AHR: Invitation set up and printing at a local print shop = $70 Brunch reception buffet and beverages, gratuity, etc. (no alcohol and includes my husband's 25% staff discount as he is an employee of the hotel) = $2167.50 Photography = $700 (we purchased a Groupon from this photographer about a year ago for a photo session and inquired about bumping it up to include 5 hours of shooting the day of our reception...which she did for the additional cost) Clothing and accessories for bride and groom = $550 (my husband simply wanted a new shirt and tie for the suit he bought 8 months earlier) Hair and make-up = $95 (she didn't charge me the full rate for makeup as she was late and I was shortchanged there) Succulent centerpieces + extra succulents for decor/cake = $550 Flowers from Costco for beverage table centerpieces and bridal bouquet = $85 Wedding cake and stand = $450 Candy for candy table = $200 All other candy table accessories, jars, frames, etc. = $250 (the jars, tongs and scoops I have since sold as a set on Kijiji and made all of our money back) All other decor, photo guest book, instant film, photo printing, kids activity packs, cork boards (which I have since sold), etc. = $400 Adding it up, and with all of the other little incidentals I'm sure I'm forgetting at this point, the total cost was around $5600- $5700. My parents covered the food and beverages (hotel costs), centerpieces/flowers and wedding cake. The fact that my husband is an employee of the hotel where we had our downtown reception obviously really helped. The hotel gave us a complimentary suite for three nights as well which was awesome. Still, when I look at the total, it was a lot of money...especially when I would have been more than happy with a backyard bbq! ; )

Groupon Alert! Available nationally (as the ordering is done online) - Vistaprint $15 for $30 worth of product or $19 for $40 worth of product. But the Groupon expires Aug 25/12 so you only have a month or so to use it. http://www.groupon.ca/deals/national-deal Also, I noticed they had a super good deal on these Toms canvas wedges, and they get even cheaper if you order 2 or 3 pair.

Ohhhh...I LOOOOVE your mom's dress! And you look absolutely stunning in yours...great choice! : )

My now-husband wore one on his linen shirt...granted it was long sleeved...but I wish we would have scrapped the idea of getting him a bout. After the first couple of hugs, it looked like crap...and the darn thing was flippin' and floppin' all over the place...we had to keep straightening it out for the pics. Ughh...it was a pain.

And for anyone struggling to create inspiration boards to share (as I did) here is a great site for helping to create photo collages...www.picmonkey.com

Check out this girl's blog if you haven't already "photobookgirl.com"...she's done lots of reviews and gives Photobook Canada high marks in terms of quality and ease of use. I've only ever used Photobook Canada...my husband and I are now both really comfortable using it...and we're so happy with our books we have no desire to try any other printer.

Ok all you Photobook Canada users...I found out something really important tonight that I wanted to share. After hours and hours...over weeks and weeks...spent working on our big wedding photobook (230 pages worth), I decided it was time to send it in for printing so I could move on with my life! ; ) I was curious if there were any reviews regarding the paper upgrades they offer...in my seach for more information, I discovered this girl's very interesting blog on photobooks: http://www.photobookgirl.com/blog/photobook-america-canada-photo-lustre-paper-review/ But, here was the highlight of my evening...after reading her calculations (see below), I figured out that I was indeed better off to use the company's 40% off discount rather than one of my groupons (because our book was so large). I priced our book out using a groupon, and then again with the 40% discount they are currently offering to "like" them on Facebook, and we saved over $50 by using the discount over the groupon. How to Get the Best Deal on a Photobook Groupon vs. Company Promo Savings Compared Generally, the best deal out there now is the 70% off Photobook America/Canada Groupon that pops up from time to time in various cities throughout Canada and the U.S. Groupon is a company that works with national and local businesses to advertise big discounts to folks who subscribe to its free e-mail newsletter. Many deals such as restaurants and salons are obviously local deals, but many companies like photo book companies are online and therefore their deals can be purchased no matter where you live, as long as the company ships to your location (in some cases even internationally). I havemore information on how Groupon works here. Groupon operates in more than 100 cities and we also track Living Social deals – a company very similar to Groupon. If you check out my Photo Book Groupon Tracker – you won’t have to sign up for emails from 100 cities – we track the deals daily on our Groupon Tracker page so be sure to bookmark it or fan my Facebook page so you don’t miss a deal! Since I’ve been writing this blog for over a year now, I’ve also noticed that Photobook Worldwide consistently has a 40% to 45% off promo code that’s updated every month. This book was not cheap, but it is a very large size, of high quality and and more than 150 pages with upgraded paper. But still I’m PhotoBookGirl and as my motto goes, “never pay full price for a photo book!†So which deal is better? Let’s compare the two savings for my book. Groupon $35 for $115 worth of value: Book total $304.00 less $115.00 = $189.00 + $35.00 spent on Groupon =$224.00 40% off company promo: $304.00 less $121.60 = $182.40 So for the book I ordered, using the company’s promo is better than using the Groupon.

Gee, I totally forgot about the Mexican. We ate there 2X in 2 weeks and the food was good too. The steakhouse is actually one of the poolside buffets during the day (which means that some of your guests may be spending a lot of time in that space)...the food was good but if you want a smaller, more intimate/unique restaurant, I would go with the Italian too. The black and white decor is very sharp! JMHO...

Wow Selina...that's exciting! Have you narrowed it down at all? How many are in your group? What kind of food are you guys into? Our reception was at the palapa...while we were there we saw a reception happening at the Brazilian and one at the Italian. Both of these are smaller, more intimate restaurants. We preferred the food at the Italian restaurant...and the menu would appease a wider range of tastes than the Brazilian I would think. The Japanese restaurant was YUMM-O, but I don't know that the set-up is conducive to the mingling that would typically happen at a wedding reception...it's all about the show!

You know what...I would still take your inspiration photo and get them to price it out for you...you never know. But, take along a couple of other pics of bouquets you would be equally (hopefully!) excited about. The bouquet that showed up the day of the wedding was nothing like what I was expecting (having given them a couple of inspiration photos) but I actually really loved the pop of yellow orchids in it, especially in our photos.

Sorry, I can't help with this one. We asked for a couple of specialty flowers (orchids), and Araceli called the florist for a quote while we were having our first meeting. The quote was so crazy high ($40 US for one larger pink orchid), we skipped anything "specialty".

Oh gee...I hope I can explain this...go to your signature area and type in your heading or whatever. Then attach the link by clicking on the little icon that looks like the world with the chain link underneath it (when you run your cursor over it, it will say "link")...it's two sections to the left from the icon that you click to attach a photo to a thread/reply, etc. You'll have to cut and paste the URL into the box for the actual page you want brought up when folks click on your heading. I'm sorry, IT is not really my thing, but hopefully that works for you!

Here is a picture of our AHR wedding cake on our hand turned wood pedestal cake stand from Etsy seller woodandglass...a husband and wife team who were awesome to work with. I can't wait to use it on our anniversary!!!

A Groupon popped up today for a photo wrapped canvas (16 X 20) for $49 from a company in California called "Picture It On Canvas". It says that it includes the $20 shipping fee to Canada but not the $10 brokerage fee, so I guess it would be closer for $60 total. Just wondering if anyone has used this company or has feedback on this deal??? http://www.groupon.com/deals/picture-it-on-canvas-saskatoon-4?c=title&sid=11206257&utm_source=newsletter&s=body&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=picture-it-on-canvas-saskatoon-4&pt=&division=saskatoon&date=20120701&utm_content=all-deals_saskatoon&p=1&addxe=amFuZWxsZWhvbHN0ZWluQHlhaG9vLmNvbQ==&user=aeb2312905f732b84b26a6b976d096a2da8aa08f86550466ce6a2e54ea507c94

We have over 50 items currently posted on Kijiji, most of which are wedding-related. When you open up my Kijiji ad posted for the Barijay dress, on the right hand side of that page is a box to send me a message or "view poster's other items".

Ok, so I've just realized that not all of my pics were posted. I have a lot of items all currently running on our local Kijiji. And it's too beautiful outside to spend the next 3 hours re-listing everything here!!! Here is the link to one item, which will allow you to view my other items (see link on right hand side of page). I hope this works!!! http://saskatoon.kijiji.ca/c-buy-and-sell-clothing-womens-dresses-skirts-Brand-New-Barijay-Dress-Style-108-in-Peacock-W0QQAdIdZ373217277