allieplask

Let me know what you find out - about the vendor fee. I have given up on sending Nicole emails. I have also emailed FF, gotten quick responses and am overall happy with their pricing. Obviously I can't do much until I know how many reception tables we will be having, etc. Also, Heather.. they have white plantation chairs for $5/chair. Not sure if I posted that here or somewhere else or not but I think that look is much more beachy than chivalri chairs and will probably go that route.

We designed our invitations 100% ourselves. I have seen tons of boarding passes, passports, invitations in little folders (all are great ideas!) and was looking for something different. Since we are having a destination wedding, we figured we could do something a little less formal and have a little more fun with it. We chose a "z-fold." This means it's a tri-fold in heavy cardstock and it opens like the letter "z." When opening the invitation, you see the front back and the rest folds out accordion style behind it. Invitations were important for us - we already send STD's and a few emails about booking travel - but we wanted our older family members who are not email/tech-savvy to have an actual invitation with all the travel information. With that said, we also wanted to highlight some things that hadn't previously been mentioned (ex. events we were planning, other things to do and when to RSVP) so people who had gotten the emails would also get something out of receiving an invitation. The front page of the invitation basically re-told people what they already knew - the resort name, the wedding date, etc. Here is the whole thing: As designers, we knew we couldn't leave the back of the invitation plain white.. but we also didn't have any extra information for our guests. We found some information on the Visit Jamaica website about how Jamaican's speak and decided to use that. If someone takes the time to read the back, it makes sense and gives them some information about Jamaica, the people, etc. It also added a nice pop of color being the same teal color used on the front. Finally, we didn't want to hand write the front of the envelopes. We figured labels were SO much easier especially because we also plan to mail out luggage tags, packing lists, etc. We figured using the labels would also use to just continue to have them re-printed every time we needed them (we used uprinting.com for the invitations and a local printer for the labels). We took the inside design from the invitations and continued that on the label so everything is cohesive. Here is my FIL's invitation (it's a little wrinkly and creased from being passed around at his office hahah). Also, when mailing out invitations, make sure you ask the post office to hand stamp each one! It looks SO MUCH nicer.

Here is a closeup of the custom stamp we ordered and used... (I blocked out the address)

For those of you looking to rent chairs... I have been going back and forth with Floral Fantasies - they have white plantation chairs for $5 a piece, which I might like better than the chivilari chairs! If you are renting chairs, are you using them for both the ceremony and reception? And if so, are you renting double for both places or will the hotel breakdown the setup from the ceremony and set-up the chairs at the reception during cocktail hour?

A lot of planning happening lately. We have designed our WHOLE suite - invitations, STD's, luggage tags, welcome letters, thank you cards, door hangers, etc. etc. It was very important to us that everything looked cohesive! As we print/send out items, I will post pictures. Our invitations went out last week and we are SO excited about the way they came out. We designed them and had the actual invitations printed by uprinting.com. I will post pictures of the actual invitations and the details a little bit later. Until then... I have pictures of the DIY envelopes we put together. Our wedding colors are coral, navy, teal, yellow and bright green (shown below). While our invitations use our exact colors, it was a little bit harder finding envelopes, etc. that matched the colors. Ultimately, we went Papersource (the most amazing store if you've never been) and got creative. They have so many awesome DIY projects, especially for weddings. You can even pay them to do invitations, envelopes, etc. for you! There we found that the colors "strawberry" and "midnight" were closest to our wedding colors. For our envelopes we used strawberry envelopes and lined them with midnight wrapping paper (the wrapping paper was a much cheaper/easier idea than buying cardstock). We had though about doing the opposite (midnight envelopes and strawberry lining) but felt that the strawberry would help the invitations pop in the mail and give off that "island feel." The envelopes are size A6. Inviting about 200 guests and mailing out over 100 invitations, lining the envelopes took a whole afternoon of working/watching college football. Papersource sells liner templates so we just had to trace the liner onto the wrapping paper and then cut out each liner. We got double-sided tape runners to attach them to the envelopes. Here are the envelopes all lined and stuffed! For the return address on the back of the envelopes, we ordered a custom stamp from rubberstampchamp.com. We have a wedding logo that we are incorporating into different things and thought it was perfect to use for the return addresses. The major problem is that while a lot of stores, websites offer "custom" stamps, they are not really CUSTOM! They are only custom in that you can add your own names/addresses. We had our own design and wanted that to be created into a stamp. After a few google searches, we found rubberstampchamp.com. They were super easy to work with and the stamp is beautiful! The size is a 2.5" circle. We hand stamped the back of each enveloped using midnight colored ink from Papersource.

we put ours in the mail yesterday...

Yes, please let me know if you hear back. I contacted them a few times.. only heard back once and was not given any answers. Would you use the chiavari chairs for the ceremony, reception or both? I would want white chairs too but have not seen options from them/what they offer. Do you know about the seat cushions? White would be fine for that too as long as they don't look/get dirty....

does anyone know of chair options for the ceremony? again, not a fan of the white covered chairs but i haven't seen pictures, etc. of beach ceremonies at the Suites without those chairs?

I think someone on here mentioned they were $8 a chair? Are you getting them for your wedding too? I def am... maybe they can just leave them at the resort after you use them so we can too hahaha... make their life/transporting chairs easier.

anyone know anything about welcome dinners? i saw the info from the beach resort saying that you can have a rehearsal dinner for a max of 40 people. we plan to have a "welcome dinner" instead of a rehearsal dinner but already have over 50 guests booked - does this mean the hotel won't allow us to do it? or will they make me pay the $800 for a private dinner?

We are planning an excursion for all of our guests (my father-in-law to be is paying). I know when I was in Jamaica last year there was a table in the lobby that set-up excursions for the day. We went ziplining and that was TONS of fun! It was only for 5 us of us and not a huge group but we booked it one day and went the following day. We didn't stay at the Iberostar, we were in Negril, but I would assume they would have something similar.

i like the lanyards idea... i'm just so torn and don't want to carry tons of stuff down there with me (i'm also lazy and don't want to put all the bags together when we get there either.. i'd rather be laying on the beach haha!!) i also thought about looking to by jamaican favors when i get there but again, i don't feel like having to go shopping for everyone and would rather enjoy my time on the island. i'll check out the ebay seller!

anyone who has been to Iberostar - where there lots of little bigs around during the day/night? when i was in negril last year sand flies were everywhere and would bite up your legs. just thinking if bug spray was necessary?

what is everyone putting in their OOT bags? i understand everyone has their own tastes and to each their own... but i'm having a hard time deciding what i want to take down with me??? for the actual bags, i am either getting colored tote bags, canvas totes or reuseable totes (my fiancé owes an apparel printing company so i can get them super cheap through his wholesale mills).. we will also be printing a design on them which is free since he will do it himself- something about jamaica so they are universal looking and able to be used again! we are also making t-shirts/tanks for everyone, again this is free (only the wholesale cost of the shirt). not sure about the front but the back will say something about our wedding. i also have door hangers made (not printed yet) and a welcome letter that will be inside the bag. besides that, i am not sure what to add.. i've gone back and forth on liquor/rum bottles but what's the point if it's all-inclusive or if the person don't like rum.. i also like the koozie idea because when i was in jamaica last year i kept wishing i had a koozie as my drinks were sweating all over the place (but my fiancé pointed out that what is the glasses are not beer can size? which was true for my jamaican resort last year). i'm not a fan of the kits of advil, bandaids, pepto, stain remover, etc. maybe it's just me but when i travel, i bring all that stuff anyways so i wouldn't want to get small packs of stuff i already have, only not to use them. i've also seen people do playing cards which i think is cute but are we really going to sit around and play cards? anyone else have other ideas?