DaynaBee

Hey RNtoBe, Just a bit of advice I wish I had known going in... They do give you the agility ladder and the jump rope but to be able to do everything you need pilates bands and dumbbells (I bought power blocks). You can do without the chin up bar but its pretty impossible to get the workout with just resistance bands instead of dumbbells.

Thank you everyone for your responses. I didn't even really think anyone would read it, I just needed to get it out and especially in a community that understands the pressure a wedding can put on people and relationships. I'm the first of my friend group to get married and it's become very obvious that its a lot harder than it looks. Thanks so much for the advice and the positive thoughts. It really helps. =)

I feel like I need a safe place to just vent everything. The process of being engaged and getting married has been one of the hardest years of my life. I went in to this knowing that people didn't want me to talk about weddings all the time and knowing that I would have to deal with a lot of my stress and weddings headaches alone. I didn't want to put too much pressure on people. I wanted inexpensive bridesmaids dresses. I even picked a wedding venue off the resort so the resort could be the best deal possible. But at the end of the day everything has fallen apart. The quickest summary is that 8 months before the wedding I had a small trip to Vegas planned. One of my bridesmaids suggested we do a bachlorette, more people came. We set aside one day to be my official bachlorette day and the long and short of it was it didnt turn out well and 5 of the girls left 2 of us in the club alone, didnt let us know they were leaving and went to party on their own. So my fiancee, whether right or wrong said we needed a do-over so we just did one last weekend. Which was pretty much the worst thing ever. A few of us (pretty much the same group) went up to a ski town 2 hours from here. Everyone was pretty much passed out or too drunk by 11. I had a stress meltdown, and when one of them saw me crying screamed at me for a few minutes, another one screamed at me some more, then they took both cars and left me and the one girl taking care of me there. I asked 4 girls to be bridesmaids and I am left with 1. And I'm worried she's distant now. We're leaving in four weeks and everything around me and these girls has left a bad taste in my mouth. My best friend of 30 years is gone. It was insanely apparent that she is the most angry person in the world and said that my life was handed to me on a silver platter and that i was spoiled. Which seems out of place considering we grew up in the same town with the exact same advantages and we just made different choices. At my bachlorette party it was like she was waiting to pick a fight with me. She even admitted that she drove up to the hotel so that she could leave at a moments notice when things went South. Which was all a shock to me as I figured we didn't have any problems and I have made an extreme point to not burden people with wedding plans, especially her. Another bridesmaid read into everything to make it so negative. That I picked her to fill out the party. Or that I picked her because she could afford to go to the resort and that was the only reason. I told her why I picked her when I picked her and it was that she was someone I wanted to have in my life and she had been so supportive and amazing and I see her being a big part of my future. But it was nothing but negative shit and that if she had known my bachlorette was going to be "all about you, I wouldn't have come." The last girl is the biggest problem. At this point I can't help but feel I've been manipulated for years. She always blames me for our problems and lists off all of these amazing things she does for me and then I feel guilty that I'm just reading situations wrong and that I should fix it. But every time we have a problem its because she's being over dramatic and hard to deal with but then when I try to get past it, it's a lot of what I did wrong, how hard her life is, and how everyone is rude to her. But I think it finally became clear to me that she doesn't do all these things for me or others. She does them for herself. I hear now that in all the planning it was a lot of negative sniping and rude comments. I also hear now that all of these people spent money they didn't have to come and how I'm supposed to feel guilty about that. I didn't ask anyone to spend money they didn't have. I try to be really conscious of that. I constantly say "if that is too much we can do whatever works." So I unwittingly walked into a bachlorette party where everyone was pissed off about money and everything else and when I cried half of them decided to end our friendships. I'm not sure how I was supposed to change things I didn't know about. Or even why I'm supposed to feel guilty for something I certainly didn't ask them to do. In general I'm left feeling like I surround myself with toxic people and it's a hard time to work on rebuilding your life 4 weeks before your wedding. I've tried to figure out what I did wrong. I cried. I know I cried. I apologized for crying. They say I was unappreciative. I did my best to let them know I did appreciate it. I'm not sure what they're looking for. But I guess at the end of the day I'm left with knowing that a bunch of people who I thought I was close with are perfectly happy leaving me in Vegas or at a hotel 2 hours from home with no ride because I was upset. And that really sucks.

Hey pokeyholly, It's funny you mentioned Asylum because I've been doing that for a bit now and was wondering if anyone else was doing it. It's been hard with no breaks so I've given myself a lot and fallen off the wagon a bit. I'm still doing like 4 days a week but I'm hoping this week I'm back up to 6 (I am keeping my sunday rest day, I'm not that insane) You should know that Asylum is a bigger investment but if you always want to keep on with your workouts. I think its worth it.

Hey Amberya17, The whole thing took me about forever. Probably 2 months. But I moved slowly. But I still needed to prime and paint each one and let them dry and then cut all of the lining and paint the tops and apply the stickers. I would say if I had all of the materials together it would have taken about 3 days including all the drying time I needed.

I finally got my invites all put together and sent out! Such a long road between designing the invites myself, hitting up my friend to use her typewriter to put down our web address on the shipping tags, stamping the monogram, dealing with the calligrapher and the printers. But yesterday was the day I finally got to put them in the mail and I am sooooo happy with them. Canada Post even has star sign stamps so we got one in my FI's star sign and one in mine. Love it! In case people are wondering, our envelopes, return address stamp, names for the invites and monogram were all done by Heather at Perch Paper Company .... http://www.etsy.com/shop/perchpapercompany Being a Canadian and in Vancouver no less where baker's twine apparently doesn't exist I actually found a great deal on baker's twine on etsy at ... http://www.etsy.com/shop/CustomCottonEtc And if you are in Vancouver and you want printing at a fraction of the cost go to rayacom... https://www.rayacom.com/ I was quoted $280 before tax at Juke Box Printing and at Rayacom it was done for $89 after tax.

Hey oblaka, thanks for writing back! That's comforting. I am looking to loose weight. I am a little worried about losing muscle but I haven't been able to get this last 10-15 lbs off of me and it's time to try something new. I guess I can always put the muscle back on afterwards. I just read about the 2 month being way harder so I guess I'll see how I feel after that =) I'm also wondering though. I'm not terribly flexible, and some of the exercises like the V push up I can't really do. I'm trying my best but there have been workouts I feel like I can't finish or I can't even do. Have other people run in to this and still seen good results?

Hey ladies. I'm assuming no one here is a personal trainer but I'm looking for popular opinion. I work out really hard regularly (2 to 3 times a week. 4 when I'm super motivated) and I just started Insanity. So far I'm not sore at all. I agree this is a hard work out. But from people who were already in pretty good shape, did you see a lot of results?

Hey Tiger Lily, Why can't you plan anything until they book? You can always source vendors, figure out decorations, go dress shopping, work on your invites. It's easier to find everything you want and then when you have final numbers it's just a click away.

I officially think the bridal party is the most horrific and devastating part of my wedding. As I've mentioned, I initially asked 4 girls who all said yes. Late one told me she wouldn't have attended my bachlorette if she knew it was going to be "all about you" and then bailed on the whole wedding leaving her deposit behind. My best friend has a secret and intense fear of flying that no one knew about and cancelled. So I kept positive and decided it was an opportunity to look at it in a new light and ask a guy friend who I should have put there in the first place but I was set on having girls for some reason. So I asked him and he said yes. Only two days later to get insanely mad that I couldn't give him a ride after work and then sent me a whole string of text messages during work saying he wouldn't be in the bridal party wanted to see if he cancel his payment for the wedding and insinuated he didn't even want to be friends anymore. I know he has some problems some times but there are some things you don't say. Especially to a close friend of 12 years. Needless to say even when we work through it, he wont be in the bridal party. Having your wedding used to threaten you is horrible. I am done asking people. This experience has been soul crushing.

I started with 4 and now I have 2. And one of them doesn't give me a great feeling in my gut. But at this point I've learned that a lot of people have people in their wedding parties that were political or didn't work out as life long friendships. So I'm just looking on the bright side. Also, I'm asking one of my best guys to be up there. I wish I had asked him in the first place. I hope he says yes!

Thanks so much Matt. I'll look in to them if we can't figure out this fire issue.

Hmmmm. I think I will bring this to my wedding planners attention in case we can use them as an example. Thanks!

Wow amazing job! Which etsy vendor did you end up going with for your table toppers?

Great idea! They look fantastic!

Being an event planner in my every day life I wanted to get my wedding venue and photographer and all that important stuff nailed down right after I got engaged. So I am getting married at Ak'iin in Tulum and very excited about it. Now that I'm working out details with my Wedding Planner down in Mexico, I was just told that we cannot have Chinese lanterns as Tulum has very strict fire restrictions. Which encompass everything from fire dancers to Chinese lanterns. Colour me disappointed! But I did want to share with fellow BDW brides in case they had their heart set on a fire related activity and were debating venues.

It's nice to read about other people's awkward proposals as well. Ours was very awkward! My husband in training and I were living together at the time. For the purposes of this story you need to know that his big vice is Warhammer. For those who don't know what that is, he buys tiny models, builds them, paints them, and then plays intriciate 4 hour long table top games with them. So one night he is out playing warhammer, and I came home from an awful day at work, felt like absolute trash, ditched my plans for the evening, watched terrible movies on Netflix and all around was feeling like I had been shot with a tranquilizer dart. He came home excited as usual (he loves playing warhammer) and wanted to show me the models he bought. So I listened to him tell me about what he bought (he said I was rolling my eyes haha) and then he pulled something else out of the bag, got down on one knee and asked me to marry him. I was really happy for about 10 minutes and then I just started crying about how I had a terrible day otherwise, so he took the ring back and said we would do it when I was feeling better. Two days later he proposed at our favourite brunch place. Neither felt exactly perfect on their own but I kind of love the entire weird story.

Hi Pierre, Thanks for the pictures. I know that Akiin is not a hotel but I still think it would be great to touch base with other Akiin brides!

Hey everyone! I see threads all around for brides getting married at this hotel or that hotel but I don't see anything in the last 3 years for Akiin. Am I the only one? Please let me know I'm not alone. Or if someone just got married there and they have advice. I'd love to know what people are doing here.

That makes a lot of sense. I'm talking to one of my "bridesmaids" today so you're insight helps. =)

I know what you mean about them being in their younger twenties. All of my friends (whether they can attend or not) who are closer to my age, late twenties and older, have been upfront and fantastic. If they can't make it they told me up front and have been sweet and NORMAL (oh how I love when people act the same way they usually do). If they can they have been cheerful and asked when they can pay the remainder and remind me how awesome it's going to be (how I love them). But the younger ones have been distant, whinny, rude, and fake. As someone who was never jealous of people getting married (and can't imagine why a 22 and 24 year old would be upset that their older friend is getting married) I don't see the point in it.

I know what you mean about them being in their younger twenties. All of my friends (whether they can attend or not) who are closer to my age, late twenties and older, have been upfront and fantastic. If they can't make it they told me up front and have been sweet and NORMAL (oh how I love when people act the same way they usually do). If they can they have been cheerful and asked when they can pay the remainder and remind me how awesome it's going to be (how I love them). But the younger ones have been distant, whinny, rude, and fake. As someone who was never jealous of people getting married (and can't imagine why a 22 and 24 year old would be upset that their older friend is getting married) I don't see the point in it.