TinkerSofi

I tried on my dress again today and I every time I'm just like "wow, I look great in this" hahah. I guess that's when you know you got the right one . I'm starting to think about hair and accessories. Hair I definitely know I want an updo. I'm a huge fan of half up half down hairstyles and originally that's what I was going to go for, but then I started thinking about how hot it is over there in August, even at night. To that I need to add the wind at the terrace and the sweat of me partying too hard haha (ew?). Basically I will end up looking like a hot mess if my hair is down. I know the hair on my back will bug me and I will end up putting it up in a lame ponytail. So updo it is! I will probably end up looking like a hot mess anyway, but my hair with humidity turns into a lion's mane and that's definitely not the look I'm going for hahah. I thought I wanted a hair comb for my updo and had found a couple of faves on etsy. Then I went into David's bridal and tried on a few hair accessories. I decided that a headband is the way to go. Even my friends call me the headband lady haha because according to them they look really good on me . I had bought this headband at Forever XXI a couple of months back. I only wore it for New Years and today when I tried on my dress I made like a "mock updo" (mock is another word for crappy haha) with it. I decided it looked good so that's what I'm going to wear instead of spending $120 on the one I liked at David's Bridal. Jewellery I had seen this etsy store a while back and saved a few things but today I think I'm ready to pull the trigger haha. I'm only wearing earrings and a bracelet because I feel like my dress is busy enough with all the embroidery. I knew I needed something like pearls if i were to have a bracelet because I was afraid that if I got one with crystals that it would snag my dress (a tulle skirt). This is the link to the store on etsy: https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/poetryjewelry?ref=l2-shopheader-name Tackling the to do list: by the way @ thanks for the whiteboard idea. We've been using it and I love that the fiance has access to it from home. It makes it a lot easier to communicate. For those that don't know what's going on, veryvalero has her own planning thread and she uses a board to put stickies of things on the to do list, that way both her fiance and her can tackle things and take things off the list. My fiance and I don't live in the same house, which sometimes makes it a bit hard when it comes to planning and keeping each other in the loop. She suggested this website www.realtimeboard.com so we make sticky notes of things to get done and my fiance can log in and see/edit it as well . Very useful indeed.

I got them off ebay here: http://www.ebay.ca/itm/361000819749?var=630338980358&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649 They were around $3.50 each. They had a sale where they'd give you 10%off every second one you got but I'm not sure if they still have it. With the exchange rate I ended up paying about $100, the shipping was free and there were no custom fees I don't know why I didn't realize they were silky when I opened the first one. I guess I was too excited haha. I think some of them are silkier than others. The nice thing is that they are silky without being shiny, so they're perfect for the beach

I think you'll be fine with the deadline. I'm sure they're used to working under pressure from time to time. For now just rest up and try not to worry about it . I personally hate tanning, in a tanning bed or outside, I get very impatient, but unless I want to look like a lobster on my wedding I'm going to have to. I'm so white, it's actually pretty scary hahah (check out my profile picture, yikes ).

That will be so nice for him! I'm waiting for the same with my future father in law, he hasn't taken time off in years, since my fiance and his sisters were kids. I'm really excited to see him relax for a while PS: @@calgarybride2015 it seems that we always get off topic on formus hahah. No wonder my brain is a mess of ideas Cheers to all of us!!

It's so good to hear that even after you come back people are still talking about it

your colors are so classy! I love them. I keep seeing these colors pop up and I keep thinking "darn, I should have chosen that!" hahah. I really like the bridesmaid dresses too! Especially the way it's worn on the third picture You're just so creative! I'm jealous haha. Keep up the good work

Correction: I opened up another one and I realized that they're actually quite silky! I liked them before and totally love them now! haha the plus is that they can be worn as scarves too I'll check that out. I really don't want to spend too much on these totes/bags so if I can't find anything I'll just go with the original plan and get paper bags with a label. I was thinking even a gable box would look nice.

I can't wait to read it!

We're having a buffet because we I'm personally not a big fan of picking my meal ahead of time. Sometimes when you see it you just want it! haha, and what if it's not what you picked? We also wanted people to have the freedom to have seconds, just more laid back. At any rate, at Azul Fives if you have your reception at the sky deck you can only have buffet or family style, but our decision for buffet was made way before we chose the sky deck

I'm sure you guys will have a great time and make amazing memories regardless . My whole life we've gone in groups to coastal cities (not at all inclusives) and we'd just meet up at the beach every day and then plan outings for those that wanted to come. It's a lot of fun too! and because none of you are really "attached" to a resort, then it gives everyone more freedom to go and see different places.

Yeah I'm not very happy about this situation either. We don't have enough money for a dj and none of our friends are djs but I'm a bit fed up with their monopoly on everything. It's not even a good monopoly! They charge a lot for subpar products. I'm definitely going to give them a piece of my mind after it's all said and done. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The sarongs are here! Oh man how I love receiving things in the mail!! [emoji16] haha. They're nice, I love the patterns and colors. They're a bit on the thin side but I didn't expect anything more considering what I paid. I think they'll get the job done and I don't know about my guests but I'll be rocking mine every day [emoji4]. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Ohh ok yeah. If we're talking about just the wedding , without counting trips, ring, dress, grooms suit, gifts, etc a wedding in Mexico can be well under 10k. Agreed. It's those little details that really bring the costs up, but it always depends on you and how you allocate costs. I think you can make any budget work, you might have to give up some things, invite less people, etc. but in the end you can make it work [emoji6]. Whatever your budget is, make sure you leave room for unexpected costs, they always seem to come up and it's better to be prepared [emoji4] Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

@@nattiegams325 such a good response. You can totally spend as little or as much as you want so it is hard to say what an average cost is. From what other brides have said it I think a realistic budget could be $15000-17000 with about 35-40 guests. This won't get you many luxuries but it will be a nice wedding , depending on the resort you choose. Of course it can go much higher than that depending on what details you want to add and whether you have more guests. I agree that you need to make a list of "must haves" and then search for hotels that have the most items from that list. For example, we knew we needed a family resort, it needed to be relatively close to nightlife and it needed to have venues off the beach for about 50 people. Most importantly, we wanted to pay around $1500-$1600 for trips. After taking that into account there weren't a lot of resorts left that met all these requirements. A travel agent will be the most help, otherwise trying to go through forums alone can be super overwhelming. A travel agent can give you 2 or 3 resorts to look into based on your preferences and then you can try and do research based on that. I also agree that you can consider receptions outside of the resort. I really wish we had considered this a bit more before booking.

I've only been to a couple of the rius in Cancun (palace las americas and riu cancun). I agree that their wedding locations weren't too private there. We stayed at the palace las americas, and you could easily go next door to cancun and enjoy their food and drinks. No problem at all. We could have easily taken a bus to their newer hotel in cancun, i think it's called peninsula, but we heard the beaches weren't as nice. Definitely do your research as to people from what hotel can visit any riu. People staying at the Riu Cancun were not allowed into palace las americas.

yeah, you can bring your own flowers from home they just charge you a set up fee, which is still lower than their natural flowers. I got some pomanders for the aisle as well, we're thinking of the same and just keeping everything else pretty simple. I just got them at michaels but your colors might be harder to find now that summer is coming. Check ebay or etsy, sometimes they have custom ones for a good price

They look great! I honestly don't think you're missing anything. They'll definitely be more complete than ours haha and I find people will be happy to get anything so they'll totally love your bags

thanks! I have to figure out what's next I haven't been doing much the last few days in terms of planning because of tons of work but here's an update: I've been thinking about what I want in terms of the itinerary for the week or wedding day. Initially I wanted to do two sides, one for the week and one for the wedding day, on a postcard size. When i finally sat down to write the list of events, the itinerary for the week was so sad that I decided I'll probably scratch that haha. So far it's just a welcome dinner and then the wedding day haha. We might do an outing as a group but chances are that we won't get it together until we're there. This is kind of what I like, and I know other brides have done the same: I sent it to MOH #1 because she's in school for graphic design and said she would help me out with these. She's writing some exams so she won't be able to work on these until March but I guess it gives me more of a chance to think about exactly what I want. Then I thought that since I wanted to do a welcome pamphlet, maybe I can include the itinerary in the pamphlet rather than having two separate things. I have to actually sit down and think and kind of design them in my head I guess before I make my MOH work in vain. I ordered the BM dresses yesterday! yay. So they will be here in 3-4 months.

that's perfect! I'll start something today. And that's great that your fiance was able to get those for free . I love free things hahah, especially when it comes to planning things for the wedding, every dollar counts.

we're having our ceremony and reception at the sky deck, but I also really like the garden for a reception or the Oriolla grill actually looks really nice when dressed up too . We weren't big fans of being on the sand for our events but I know that's a lot of people's dream, that's the only reason we didn't choose the beach.

I think if you want to spend $10000 just on the wedding it could be doable, depending on the amount of guests you have. That is really what determines how far you can stretch your budget. Just an FYI, if you go with Sensatori, they won't allow you to use outside florists, so keep that in mind as well as the fact that their price for flowers are beyond ridiculous. Bridal bouquets are around $100 for the cheapest ones and bridesmaids around $80. Those are not included in the wedding package. There is a bride on here who got married at Azul Fives (sister resort to sensatori), she had quite a bit of flowers and said she spent around $2000, just on the flowers. The good news is Karisma offers 4 hours of reception with their standard reception menus, but if you want to extend it you can, for $14pp per hour.

@ I need to go get some bristol board this week and start this. It's hard when my fiance and I don't live in the same house because we can't really have an exact copy of it but i'm sure we can work around that. maybe there's some kind of shared internet board where we can write notes. When we were considering doing tumblers I had such a hard time finding waterproof labels! We had figured something out and I had a few supplies but then we changed our mind . At least I'll still be able to use the supplies though so not all is lost.

I agree with you guys here, one thing is to give guests a plus one, and another is to have people invite others as they wish. I mean, that is unheard of for any wedding (or any formal event for that matter) and I still don't understand why people think DW are different. I would clarify with your mom's friend whether she's thinking this guy's friends will be coming to the wedding. If you don't want to confront her about costs because your mom is paying, maybe tell her that there's a limit for guests at the venue and you just can't have anyone else. Technically you could tell her that what she's doing is plain rude, hahah but if you're anything like me you'd never say that .

The mugs look great! I love the logo and the look of them on clear adhesive, they're practically invisible. Are the stickers waterproof?

I've been to a couple of the Riu resorts in Cancun and they were good, the food was good . I wouldn't say super amazing but I wasn't disappointed. The wedding venues at the ones I've been to at least weren't too private but I don't know what they're like in their other resorts. That was the reason why we didn't go with them. Maybe ask your TA whether she thinks prices will go down for that time of the year? We're traveling in August so that's we we got a really good price at AF, even our TA said so when she got the quotes back, so we booked. So far I like it but I've never visited, I'm just going by what other people have said.