AllieH

Mmmm chocolate martini - I want one of those! lol no, I wasn't planning to do any food at cocktail hour. I figured the dinner would be more than enough, and it starts at 6pm, so fairly early. is it ok if I'm dreading the humidity?? that's one reason I wanted Cabo vs. RM, but RM is closer for most of our guests.

Thanks Nikki! We are doing Gazebo 55, and my 1st choice was the martini bar because of the AC factor, even though it's a hike. but it will be in Nov, so outside might be ok too. the cocktail hour should be around 5pm - do you think Guacamayas would be busy then? And I think I will bring some votives for Tucanes after all. I love candle light... and we will have the lanterns too.

I'm putting in a mug, a survival kit (OTC meds like advil, aspirin, tums, ammonium, bandaids, antibacterial gel, shout wipes, etc), lip balm, lanyards/key holders, mints/gum, a welcome letter & timeline and that's about it. Very similar to what you are doing! We don't have the budget to go overboard..lol I'm OCD...that's my excuse. Plan, plan, plan is my middle name. I'm guessing on the OOT bags - until we get final payments made, I don't know what our count will be. But I figure that a few extra won't hurt, and if we have a lot extra, I'll resell it to someone who can use it. Or send them to friends who can't make it but still want to be part of our celebration. Plus I don't have a bridal party, so that makes things a whole lot easier!

Great pics!!!! Is your table set up the "standard" one? I noticed the gold chargers, and was curious. Did you bring the centerpieces with you, or did EDR supply them? How did the votive candles hold up in Tucanes? do you have any pics of the beach bar? either Guacamayas or the Martini bar were recommended for us for the cocktail hour, and I wasn't sure what to recommend. Sorry for the questions!!!!!

Uhm yeah Shan - nothing like packing a whole lot into a short time!!! good luck. Am trying to pull all of the details together now - little tags for the favors, the survival kits for the OOT bags, tags for the OOT bags, etc. Just balancing all of that with work, since it's our busy season right now and isn't going to let up until I head for Mexico (sigh!!).

Yeah, I totally chickened out of the DIY. I have 3 yards of tulle in my closet and a comb, but I've heard it's really hard to cut, and overall hard to work with. Not sure I believe that..but I still wasn't going to shell out a fortune for a bunch of tulle! I found some really inexpensive ones on eBay - Venus_Veils is the seller. My veil is GORGEOUS, and a cathedral with beading shown above for $37 (free shipping too!). It was a total bargain.

I agree - I would mix and match the beads and crystals. Here's a pic from the detailing on my veil. It's pretty simple, but it has a lot of sparkle to it. Good luck!!

this is beautiful Nikki! unique, love the bling and the ruffles.

gorgeous Kat! love the bling at the top and the texture at the bottom.

gorgeous!!! I wouldn't have guessed it's a knock off at all.

ok November girls - we're at the 4 month point. How's the planning coming along??

YAY!! Congrats to you! I'm so glad it all went well, and appreciate that you did a "test run" on the venues for us hehehe I can't wait to see your pics. and I'm thrilled that everything went just the way you wanted.

This was another idea I had as well - very easy to decorate with a few stamps or labels or cut outs, some tissue and some ribbon. I just couldn't see paying $5 or $10 for a custom tote, even as adorable as they are!!

I would say the mugs would be more useful when they get back home. I know that I have tons of tote bags around the house, and we never seem to have enough travel mugs (for the morning commute). We ended up going with a "green" grocery bag style for the bag itself - something that is great for the beach, but also useful at home, and the inexpensive mugs. Both were around $1 each.

PS - don't stress about all of the options and add ons available. You have plenty of time to make those decisions!! If anything, I'd recommend deciding on whether or not you're having a private reception, and which location you want, and then planning the details later. And we decided to bring our photographer with us. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

Hi Amanda, We are getting married at EDR in November, a sister resort to Azul, and they have the same wedding packages. We have most of our "extras" decided. We are expecting around 46 guests as of now. We went with the free package with a symbolic ceremony. It includes the very basics for the ceremony, a group reservation in a restaurant (we are using it as our welcome dinner), and not many other "frills". We decided to spend more $$ on our room vs. their buy-up packages, because we just felt like the $$ for the buy-up packages wasn't worth the add ons - we weren't planning to use most of them anyway. The free package also comes with a special menu breakfast in bed and a private dinner on the beach for you & your groom (either can be used any time during your stay!). I think there's also a couples' massage lesson, the separate groom's room for him to get redding the day of the wedding, decorating your room on the wedding night, and a few other romantic touches. We are adding: --wooden aisle runner --hair rehearsal & wedding day style for me (bride) --wedding day hair style for my mom (also offered to my FMIL, but she declined) --private dinner/reception - we went with the pick & choose menu --pro amplifier for our iPod for reception --smallest cake for cutting ($60) A lot of brides also do the sheers at the gazebo and the flower arrangements for the gazebo. I will be bringing sheers for the chairs, paper lanterns for aisle, gazebo & reception decorations, table runners for the reception tables, and other reception decorations with us. I'm also doing a real touch bouquet for myself, corsages for the ladies in our family, and bouts for the guys so we didn't need those from the resort/Lomas. Overall I am focusing on the beautiful setting of the resort, and keeping the decorations personal, yet fairly simple (and transportable!!). And affordable... and assuming the amount of booze available during the reception will ensure it'll be quite the bash! Hope that helps with some ideas. Good luck with all of your planning!

wow - these did turn out really great!!!

Dollar Tree has their travel mugs listed again - $1 each! http://www.dollartree.com/catalog/search.cmd?form_state=searchForm&keyword=travel%20mugs&x=34&y=15 We went with the 15oz red/green/blue ones - they don't exactly match our colors (tangerine/aqua), but for the price, I'm going to deal with it!! I ordered 2 cases (72 total), and will only need 50. If someone wants to call dibs on the other 22 for $1 each plus shipping, send me a PM. I'll pick them up on Saturday, July 14th.

4 months!!! I just ordered a cake topper from mudcards. Totally silly to spend that much $$ on it, but I just love her work, and thought it's the perfect way to have a fantastic keepsake after the wedding. plus I'm having her put my pugs on it, so they'll be "with us" in Mexico. We're trying to decide on cups/travel mugs for our OOT bags next. Oh the fun decisions!! how's everyone else doing?

I decided to use the table #'s as a way to incorporate my fiance into the wedding. he's from NYC, so I asked him to find me 6-7 images of iconic NYC places. I'll print them out in black & white, add a label of some sort, and we'll use those as the table names. I'll have a tag for each person/couple that will have their table assignment on it, as well as their entree selection. I'm not sure NYC really ties into our "beach wedding" theme, but I decided it was more important to incorporate him into our day in this way, vs. worrying about whether or not it fit just perfectly! so still in the planning stages, but this is the idea we're going with.

Hi Clariza! We looked at each of the packages side by side to see if we thought the "extras" in the buy-up packages were worth the price. In our case, they didn't make sense and the add ons weren't things we wanted to begin with. We decided to do the free package, and then add on the essentials that we wanted from there. My fiance and I sat down one night at our computers, and I had him look at the free package, while I looked at each of the buy-up packages. we'd go through the lists item by item to determine what the "add ons" were for each package vs. what was included with the free package. hope that helps!!!

SparksFly & Jwed - your dresses are stunning!!!!!!!!

great job!!! I can't wait to see more of what you do.

even if it doesn't, you can have gel cups added to give you support (and lift, and curves...). so don't sweat it!

they will hold your posts until you get a certain # - it is a bit annoying, but post a little more and it'll be ok.