LindsayOO

As soon as I organize the pics I'll post some! It will take a bit to get the photographers pictures but as soon as I do I'll be sure to share

Hello all! We just returned two days ago from our wedding in Punta Cana and it was awesome! We stayed at Dreams Palm Beach (great resort!) and had the ceremony there, followed by the reception at Jellyfish. I also posted a review on the Dreams Palm Beach Brides facebook group with a review of the resort/ceremony. You all helped me so much and I hope you find this review useful! We had 65 guests in total - 60 adults and 5 kids. Leading up to the Wedding I see alot of brides writing posts about they how they haven't been able to reach Mayte and are waiting for responses, etc. Honestly, you really do not need to worry about setting up every little detail ahead of time. I was pretty relaxed about planning everything with her and I'm glad I didn't waste hours of my time worrying about it before the wedding. She has EVERYTHING under control. Once I confirmed our date and the amount of people coming we picked our appetizers, menu and alcohol options and opted to add a dessert course as well. She assured me that everything could be changed once we got there if we wanted and we actually didn't pick our dessert until we were there. It took me a little while to receive a quote but I wasn't too worried about it. The pricing has gone up slightly from the 2009 brochure but not by much...a couple hundred dollars here or there. The only things I sent her ahead of time were inspiration pictures with our colours, the seating plan and a timeline of how we wanted everything to go the night of the wedding. The Pre-Wedding Meeting We didn't set up the date for our meeting until a week before we left, so don't worry - she will be in touch the week before to set it up! We took a cab to the restaurant and met Mayte, who is so sweet and chill and just an awesome person! She went over every detail with us and made a bunch of different drinks we could sample so we could pick the welcome drink and cocktail hour drinks. We also tasted the appetizers we had chosen and picked the dessert. The drinks we ended up choosing were a sex on the beach for the welcome cocktail (we wanted something everyone would like) and for the cocktail hour we had a guava mojito and a frozen coco loco..both were really good! The only things I brought to the meeting with me were the guest favours (personalized leather luggage tags from ETSY...everyone loved them) and some coloured straws for the cocktail hour drinks. We also confirmed the times for the buses. Honestly, DON'T stress about trying to have all these details planned ahead of time - Mayte has a list of everything and goes over it all with you at the pre-wedding meeting...including details I didn't even think of! We brought cash and paid for all the services as well, which was nice to get rid of the money lol. The Wedding Day We had our ceremony at 4 pm and we had arranged to have the buses waiting to take the wedding party to Jellyfish for 4:45 and they were right on time. We arrived at Jellyfish and everything was set up and perfect! It looked beautiful. I'm so happy that I let her choose all the decor because what she did was WAY better than anything I would have thought up myself. Right away the wedding party started commenting on how awesome the venue and decor was. The room was set up with a head table for 10 and 7 other tables. Mayte mixed round and square tables and it worked out very well. The ideal number is 8 per table but we had a couple with 7 or 9 and it worked out fine. We finished taking pictures and our guests arrived right on time, just after 6 pm. They had sent 2 buses to pick up all our guests, I believe each bus seats around 25 - 30 people. The servers were ready and greeting people with the welcome cocktails and we went right into cocktail hour. We chose 3 appetizers - the tempura shrimp, spinach and cheese pockets and chicken lollypops - all were good and it was the perfect amount for 65 guests. The guests were blown away by the venue. The DJ/dance floor was set up beside the bar and there was more then enough room to keep the dance floor inside. Mayte had left the dance floor lights set up outside as well, but unfortunately it rained pretty much the whole day of our wedding so we couldn't use the outdoor areas. It was my original intention to have the dance floor inside anyway because I find alot of people hang out at the bar and if we had the dance floor outside the party would have been split up..just something to think about. We also got the cigar rollers and everyone loved it! They even put labels on them that said Greg & Lindsay & our wedding date. The DJ asked everyone to take their seats at 7 pm, we did a wedding party entrance and our first dance and then dinner was served. They started with bread and platters of olive oil/balsamic vinegar to dip. We chose menu #1 and because we had some vegetarians, Mayte made it so guests had a choice of ceasar or garden salad and the chorizo platters were served family style, which was perfect! Dinner was a choice of chicken supreme with red bell peppers and white wine sauce, sea bass with shrimp and ginger/passion fruit sauce or pesto fettuccine. We changed the sides so they came with rice and grilled vegetables, at no extra cost. For dessert, we went with a brownie topped with passion fruit sauce. For the kids she made up platters with pasta, chicken fingers, etc and they brought those out early, which the parents were happy about. The food was AMAZING. I had guests coming up to me before dinner was even over saying how good the food was! The only thing I would suggest is to have them put the dressing on the garden salad before serving it. They gave olive oil/balsamic on the side but some people would have preferred a dressing already mixed. Once the dinner was over (took just over 2 hours because we had speeches in between courses) we did our father/daughter mother/son dance and then went right into dancing and partied until just after midnight. We had one bus leave at 10:30 for people with kids and our grandparents, and the other buses were ready and waiting at 12:15 am. The timing for the buses worked out perfectly! For the drinks we went with the cocktail hour pricing ($6 per person for the hour and included beer and 2 specialty drinks as well as water/soft drinks), dinner drinks ($8 per person for beer, wine and soft drinks during the entire 2 hour dinner), and we paid for 2 hours of open international bar after that ($15 per person per hour) which was well worth it. The shots were flowing, everyone was drinking and having a great time and the bartenders would make pretty much whatever anyone wanted...it was great! I didn't actually see the final invoice because my husband and his dad dealt with it but I was told what the final amount was and it was less than I thought! The 2 hours of international bar would have only taken us to approx 11:15 pm and we had told Mayte at the meeting that we would decide at that point if we wanted to pay for another hour of open bar or just run a tab for the rest of the night depending on how much people were still drinking...well..let's just say that our guests were having a VERY good time and there were tons of shots and drinks flowing right till midnight - it was never brought up and the last 45 minutes of drinking was not added to the bill. That is how amazing Jellyfish is - they just want you to have a great time! DJ One of the best moves we made was using the Jellyfish DJ and MC. They were amazing, honestly no need to pay extra for DJ Mannia. One of the groomsmen commented that he wished he could have the soundtrack to the dance party because the music was so good and others commented that the MC was the best they had ever seen at a wedding..and he didn't even know us!! DO NOT be worried about them at all!! Right when we got to Jellyfish the MC came over and went over everything with us and throughout the night he kept checking in with us and would verify everything before he did it. We had made a dinner music playlist which they gladly played, although the cocktail hour music they were playing was really good so we didn't even really need to make our own dinner music. They were playing chill, beachy, funky background music..it was perfect! We had given them a list of who was doing speeches and when and he called up the people at exactly the right times. He also announced the cigar rollers, the game to get the bride and groom to kiss, and played our first dance and father/mother dances perfectly. We did give him our IPOD which had those songs on it because they weren't popular songs. They had lights and sirens and it was such a great party!! I have never seen so many people on a dance floor at a wedding, for the entire night! There were people dancing who I've NEVER seen dance before and having the bar right next to the dance floor was perfect because it made it seem like one big party. Mayte Simply amazing. She is so sweet and makes everything run smoothly. We brought the cake from the resort because it was included and we forgot our cake topper at the hotel..no problem! She made one up with flowers and starfish, etc and it looked so cute! One of our nephews was feeling a little sick and she sent someone to the pharmacy to get him medication and he was better within an hour. One of my bridesmaids had her 8 month old there who is still breastfeeding and Mayte let her use her office whenever she wanted to feed/change the baby. She really cares about people. Cost I know alot of brides don't like to talk about money but I was a little worried there would be unexpected expenses and it was hard to figure out exactly how much it was going to be, since things kept changing, so I'm going to post some of the costs in hopes it will help some of you! Services (has to be paid in cash) DJ & MC - $650 Cigar Rollers - $350 Bus Transportation - $455 ($7 per person) Decorations - $850 Food and Alcohol Appetizers for 65 people - $396 Drinks - as mentioned above Menu 1 - $35 per person (I don't believe we were charged extra for adding dessert) Taxes are 16% which gets added to the bill and you can tip at your discretion. We tipped Mayte, the servers/bartenders, bus driver, DJ and MC and the cigar rollers. I will post pictures as soon as I get them from our photographer but it might take a month or two! Having our wedding at Jellyfish was the BEST decision we made and we had a blast. You will not be disappointed and the only thing I regret about our wedding is not doing the whole thing at Jellyfish! I was trying to think of something, anything that went wrong but honestly nothing did! If you have any questions feel free to ask away! Good Luck!

Here's how my ladies ended up looking...fabulous! I love the different shades and styles, and best part is they will all wear their dresses again.

Ladies! Just got back yesterday from our Punta Cana wedding. Amazing. Honestly. You all are worrying way too much. Mayte is so sweet and genuinely cares about us...she will always try to get you the best price and the best option for you. We actually changed a few things once we got down there that added more food and made it cheaper for us...I got married at the resort (Dreams Palm Beach) and my only regret is I wish I would have just done the whole thing at Jellyfish. It was awesome and I was afraid when we got the final bill it would be a couple thousand more then we expected but it wasn't..it was cheaper! I'm going to do a full review shortly, I just need to get settled. We had 65 guests so I'll be able to help out some of the ladies who had questions about having 60-70 guests. I really didn't plan that much or bring much with me and believe me, you don't need to. I'm glad I didn't waste hours planning things because even some of the things I did plan, Mayte had a better suggestion for. That being said, I was VERY organized with seating plans, guest favours, timeline for the night, etc, etc. So as long as you have the main things organized that's all you need. I did not bring ONE decoration down with me - you don't need to, honestly...her decor is amazing and better then anything I would have thought of!!

Ladies...I wouldn't worry at all about the lack of communication...I am getting married on Wednesday and I just set up the date to meet with her this past week...I know it's hard to not have everything planned with her down to a tee and waiting for repsonses can make you stressed out but honestly, we all know she is amazing and she gives you exactly what you want! She is so busy with the brides who are there that it's hard for her to email us all back all the time, well this is what she said to me anyway lol...her only day off this week is Sunday and she's using it to meet with me to go over our wedding! Even though she might not respond she has saved all your emails and she confirmed this with me...I can't wait to get down there (we leave for the airport 3:00 am Sunday) and I will do a huge review and post pics when I'm back!

Check out the thread on this website for Jellyfish....TONS of info on there!!!

It's about 20 minutes away at the most...we are staying at Dreams PB and doing our reception at Jellyfish in 3 weeks!! ahhhh!!!

Love your pics Marissa!!!! Beautiful!! We leave in 3 1/2 weeks..getting excited now

Sorry Mimi I know you are getting bombarded with questions...I'm just curious if you had your dance floor inside or outside? I have the exact same amount of adults coming and am a little worried there won't be much room for dancing inside...

Thank you so much MimiQ!! That was an awesome review!! I hired Krystie Ann as well so it's so good to hear that you were happy with her Two questions for you if you don't mind... 1 - Did you pay extra to change the Caesar salad to the caprese salad and the fries to the vegetables? 2 - We have the EXACT same amount of adults coming...did you keep your dance floor inside and did you find there was enough room? Did you have to move tables out of the way if you did? thanks so much!!

I loved your video Elizabeth! I see he's from Santo Domingo...do you mind sharing what the cost was?

Shimabride does your sister in law work at Doolins Pub in Vancouver? My sister works there and she was talking to her about the resort...it's a long shot but thought it might be you!

Thanks for the review!!!! This whole time I've been writing in the Dreams Palm Beach 2013 Brides thread which isn't very happening lol..I'm glad I found this thread! 41 days to go..eek!!