yycbride2016

@@krystalball Thanks! The proposal was perfect! So happy with how he did it. And yeah i'm hoping the worst is over now that the hotel is booked, venue is booked, etc. Thanks for the compliment on my Save the dates! I thought they were cute. I"m super excited to show you guys the invitations. I'm going to go get them printed this weekend!!! Super exciting! @@TinkerSofi We looked at the Azul fives as well. I thought it looked like the dreams/ secrets quality which is what we really wanted. Unfortunately not a lot of our friends are working the best paying jobs yet so not many people could afford the quotes we were getting. I just wish the canadian dollar had been stronger when getting quotes @@ashhtayy On know! I'm sorry you had to have such a frustrating experience as me with TA's. I don't think i'd ever been so stressed before. The prices kept going up and up every time we would get more quotes as time was progressing. It was so frustrating. The worst is still how rude the TA was to me. My fiance had to contact her to tell her that we were done working with her because I was just so frustrated and upset. @@snswedding2016 Thanks! I have more things already done but I'll post it later! I'm going to go get my invitations printed today and go look at a few more bridesmaids dresses with my sister (MOH) this afternoon. Only a few more weeks till I get to go dress shopping!!! So excited and nervous for that. I'm the most indecisive person. Hopefully i'll find something amazing at a great price.

@@JoannaBanana I'm so jealous that your TA experience was hard to pick which one because they were all so great. I lost $400 because mine was the absolute worst and I had to start over from scratch with a new one. We almost booked with the Royalton (and part of me still regrets not booking it). Its such an amazing and beautiful resort but I was nervous when it first opened up and when I was talking with the resort in January they didn't have any prices for anything yet so I felt too nervous to book with them thinking my wedding could potentially explode with expenses. We decided on the Grand Sirenis and I'm just so excited. I wish these next 9 months would just speed up!

February 23rd at the Grand Sirenis Myan Beach, Riviera Maya, Mexico!!!

Well I finally couldn’t wait any longer to start my planning thread even though I’m still 9 months out from our wedding J I’ve seen so many great ideas on this forum and everyone is so helpful giving ideas. How we met: My FI and I met at university. In our degree of New Media there aren’t exactly a lot of… “normal” guys. It’s mostly the type that live in their mothers basements playing video games and are too scared to talk to girls haha. (No offence if that’s your type… I just prefer a guy who…isn’t that). Well anyways Kyle and one of his best friends lived together and were in every single class together which also happened to be almost all the same classes as me. We talked a bit but I wouldn’t even go as far as saying we were friends after first year of University. Once we got to second year we met properly at a Halloween party where well.. Kyle thought it would be fun to dress up as an office ninja and attack me (batgirl). Its amazing I’m marrying this guy haha. We became really good friends that year and once third year hit and we were back at classes in the fall we decided to make it official and start dating J The Proposal: The proposal all fell into my FI’s lap as I basically did all the hard work for him without even know it it I should start with the fact that I was on pinterest and noticed a couple rings I liked and thought I’d test the waters and show Kyle. He said “cool, send me a picture of them”. I was flabbergasted as marriage had been a taboo topic with him up until that point. Needless to say I took full advantage of the situation and sent him about 10 different rings I liked. I think I overwhelmed him and he said, tell you what, you have one day at the mall and one day only to show me as many rings as you like, and after that you aren’t allowed to even mention rings to me. I accepted the challenge and showed him lots of rings. Amazingly he was more of a ring shopper than I was. He made me go to all the stores a second time when I thought I was done haha. Ansyways, both Kyle and I are outdoorsy/ active people. We normally book a snowshoeing weekend in the mountains in the winter and go hiking lots in the summer. Last summer we didn’t seem to have as much time to go hiking so we decided one night over dinner that we would book a weekend getaway to the mountains to go hiking. (Apparently this worked out perfectly to his plans). I found a great deal for a suite in Canmore, Alberta and I booked it. Our friends had recently been on a hike and told us about it and so we knew where we were going to go hiking. (this was probably all about a month before we were actually going). So then, my parents live in Europe and told me that they were going to come visit at the end of September (unexpectedly). Again, this worked out perfectly for Kyle. He said he was going to send my dad a video asking for my hand in marriage and now he was going to be able to do this in person! Perfect…except I almost cancelled our trip knowing my parents would be visiting and I’d want to spend time with them. Luckily they convinced me to go anyways haha. So our October hiking trip arrived and I packed us hot soup (since it was the fall) for our lunch at the top of the mountains, really only packed hiking clothes and one cute top for dinner that night. Off we went. We hiked up to the top, taking pictures along the way and just having a great hike. We were eating our soup and then I must have put my water bottle lid on so tight I was really struggling to open it when kyle said need help? And I was stubborn and said no way I can do it, and looked up and he was down on one knee with a ring in hand. I was absolutely shocked and I have no idea how I didn’t see it coming. Me being so nervous and excited in the moment I said “thank you” to him when he said “will you marry me”. (Being that I grew up in Europe, Kyle always jokes that there are translation issues between us and he thinks I didn’t understand haha but I did!) He had champagne ready on the mountain for us and then told me that once we got down the mountain back to the hotel we were going for a couples massage and then to Banff for dinner J It was so amazing (except I didn’t really have clothes for the occasion haha). We decided to not go hiking the next day so that we could get back to the city early to tell our families and friends the amazing news! Everyone seemed to expect it except for me. I wasn’t expecting it till the winter when we would go on our snowshoeing trip haha. It was an amazing weekend to say the least. The Travel Agent: Now for the tricky planning…. We knew instantly that we wanted to do a destination wedding since my sister had done that 3 years prior and it was amazing! I also didn’t want to worry about any family drama or worry about feeding 100 people. So we contacted a couple travel agents and started getting some quotes. Everything was coming back way too much money unfortunately. We decided to work with one specific travel agent who at the time seemed on the ball and knew what she was doing. We finally agreed upon a resort in Los Cabos, Mexico. The resort was called Peublo Bonito Pacifica. Things started to get crazy and the resort wouldn’t answer my emails or book our wedding and when they did every little tiny thing was a big extra cost. I had asked my travel agent if booking the flights before confirming a date with the hotel was risky and she said no that’s fine and booked us. Needless to say the travel agent was wrong and became very useless very fast. She would have “family emergencies” every time I needed to get ahold of her or say she was going to call me back and never call me back. She was very rude to me and I was so upset as all this meant we had lost $400! I said enough is enough I’m looking elsewhere and I’m done with you. (FYI do not work with Expedia Cruise Ship Centers – they are so rude and unprofessional, even her manager was incredibly rude to me). So I had gone to the bridal expos/fairs in Calgary and met a few destination wedding travel agents during my whole fiasco and so I decided to call them all and see what their processes were and get more quotes again (this was probably our 4th or 5th round of quotes). I found one travel agent who answered all my questions so fast and got me quotes even faster! She was great! I decided to book with her and put my mind at rest! She is with Tier One Travel and I’d recommend her to any Calgary brides. The resort: We decided to go with the Grand Sirenis Mayan Beach in the Mayan Riviera, Mexico! The resort looks amazing and fun with so much to do and see. Not going to lie, we only got a quote for this resort because my Fiancé found @@calgarybride2015 's review and we were sold! I think my favorite part is that we can book a private location for the wedding and the reception. My sister’s wedding was on the beach and she had a fat man in speedo’s watching her wedding and getting in the photos. I was not keen on having this. We are going to do the free wedding (at this point I just need one more double room booked for 7 days and we will get this package). We are going to upgrade to the private beach and palapa and then pick and choose all of our extras (flowers, ribbons, music, food, etc.). This option seemed like the best bang for our buck! Save the date: I’m a graphic designer and a few years ago I used to make wedding invitations for a living. This was probably the part of our wedding I’ve been most excited for! My favorite color is a teal color (teal, turquoise, aqua), so I knew what my color scheme would be (since my FI hated the idea of pink). I loved the idea of going with a beach theme since it will be on the beach after all. I ended up mainly going with a starfish theme! Super cute! My original idea for the save the dates was literally to put the date down and the resort name. But my TA informed me I only had 3 months to get as many guests as I could signed up for our group rate. Plan: changed. I decided to turn my 1 luggage tag save the dates into 2 luggage tags. I designed them up. Printed them off at staples (and they also did a decent job cutting them). Tied them with ribbon, addressed all our envelopes and sent them off. Oh! Almost forgot, I also made cute little starfish return address labels. I think that’s it for today. Apparently this planning thread business takes a lot of work haha. I will update soon on engagement photos, bridesmaids dresses, booking process, wedding invitations, wedding website, etc.

@@snswedding2016 Yeah definately don't worry. You still have 7 months till your big day! You've got your dress and destiantion and groom. What else do you need! haha. I dont even have a dress yet and I get married in February 2016. I'm still working on my bridemsaids dress struggle I think that would be so cute to go back to the proposal spot. You should do it every year on the anniversary of your engagment! Would be so amazing.

OMG!!!! I'm so glad I'm not the only one who said "thank you" hahaha it's such a joke between my FI and I. I grew up abroad and we met when I came back to Canda for university, so he always says I'm so foreign. Because I said thank, you he jokes that it's a language barrior thing (even though we both speak the same first language hahaha). Congrats though! Super special!

@@snswedding2016 Omg your wedding planning is amazing! I feel so unpreparred now that i've read through your thread I thought I was organized but you are super organized and on the ball! Good for you. All of your ideas, plans, decorations, colors, etc are so beautiful! Congrats on everything. BTW I absolutely love your engagement story. So adorable and romantic! Looks like you've found a keeper

This is such a great idea. I have had to send out so many messages reminding people to book into my wedding group rate and if I had made it a magnet it would be on their fridge and staring them in the face every day haha. Good thinking!

@@TaraMarie33 I wish I had taken your approach and not sent out Save the dates. We are getting married February 2016 and I had to send out save the dates because it had all the travel / booking information on it. Getting a group rate meant that my guests had 3 months to book in to guarentee a spot on the plane. I'm also having an at home reception following the trip and I hadn't booked the venue or anything yet so I couldn't sent out my actual invitations until I had that info too. It was so complicated. Oh well. In retrospect i'm happy I did it because I made some pretty cute save the dates

@@calgarybride2015 Ahhh thank you so much for those suggestions. I think I'm going to have to go to Cross Iron this weekend for sure! I just ordered a teal sash off of etsy so hopefully it arrives fast and I can go try it out with some little black dresses. I think my ideal is that color I saw at David's Bridal but definately not that price point. I know that my bridesmaids are prepared to pay more than I'm comfortable having them pay, which is what is making this difficult I think. Considering some of them are struggling to afford to come to the resort I can't possibly ask them to pay $150-$200 on a dress just for me. @@krystalball Thanks! I'm hoping that my bridesmaids are getting fed up with me haha. I keep sending them pictures like every day of different dresses hoping that they will just pick one and make my life easy haha. I actually found a great store online called lilly boutique that has reasonable prices and some super cute dresses! You should check it out. They have a selection of dresses in teal under dresses-->color-->green.

@@krystalball ah yes I looked at that dress and it was my number one pick actually but its the wront color. I ordered a sample and it came back really green. More like a Jade color unfortunately. I probably sound so picky. I dont care if all my accent decorations and what not match (teal, jade, turqoise, aqua, etc) but the only thing I want to match in my wedding is the Bridesmaids with the Groomsmen. But I really really love the idea of them being able to to chose how the dress gets work (strap wise). I'm considering black dresses (just like @@calgarybride2015 had mentioned) with a teal sash. I just ordered one on etsy so i'll take my MOH out shopping with it when it arrives. I think it would actually look really elegant if the bridesmaids were in black with teal sashes and the groomsmen in black suits with teal ties. I was also a little consered about how teal would photograph because when I was shopping for bridesmaids dresses this weekend the teal dresses looked blue on my phone camera. So we shall see. I imagine a professional photographer would do a better job than an iPhone haha.

@@calgarybride2015 I just was going through your planning thread and the dresses your bridesmaids wore is the one I've also narrowed it down to but in the color oasis. I'm either going to do that dress and also subsidize the cost or find cute black dresses and but a teal sash on them!

@@Catface1027 Well its only early because my seat blocking opens up to the public this saturday and if my guests dont book before then I can't guarnetee them a spot. They can book up until December I think but no spots guarenteed on the plane. I need to have 10 double rooms booked for 7 days Hopefully I can manage. @@calgarybride2015 David's had some beautiful dresses. Their color Oasis was perfect for my dresses but I just hate that they are so expensive when you consider how expensive it is for the bridesmaids to travel to mexico too I'm going to keep looking for a little bit but i'm so torn.

@@calgarybride2015 Thank you so much for this! I'll let my wedding party know. I wish the price were actually 125 pesos though haha Aslo, do you know if that day pass included food/alcohol? I would hope so for $125.

@@Catface1027 I know how you feel. We are at our last week for people to book into our group rate and i'm still not at 10 rooms yet. Hopefully more people sign up this week so I can save some money and do the free wedding. I'm also fretting about dress shopping haha. Excpet I'm doing bridesmaid shopping this weekend and becuase I've picked Teal as a color its so hard to find . Wedding dress shopping is next month, we'll see how it all goes! Good luck

@@calgarybride2015 Thanks so much for this information. I will let me wedding party know this. Its helpful for us. Actually, can you check your invoice for us, it says $1000 pesos for a wedding guest to come from off resort for the day. Seems kinda steep considering its only $125 pesos for the day otherwise.