Dreams Punta Cana Brides

[Amber 5678]

How have you been doing Mel? I haven't looked for sand yet for the sand ceremony, but I will definitely let you know if I see anything in your colors! Maybe check out http://www.save-on-crafts.com/ I love this website! I don't know if you have seen it yet.

[mel72683]

Amber, thanx I haven't check that yet but I def will, thanx.  This thread is really quiet lately .  Hope you have a great weekend though.  Happy planning .

[BrideJul2012]

New to the forum and impressed with the wealth of information, it is definitely helping us with our choice of resort.   We are considering Dreams for our July 2012 wedding and have already heard back from the WC.  Now just need to bite the bullet and commit

[ska2m]

This site has gotten really quiet! Where are the brides getting married this year? I have my wedding on November 5! Can't wait. Just finalizing all the details for the welcome dinner and the wedding day. So far 70 people confirmed! It's getting so exciting!

[mel72683]

Wow 70 people so far thats a lot.  Is your planning going good? 

[ska2m]

haha, yeah, i know! it's crazy and getting expensive. They have yet to give me any offers, like a free one hour open bar or something, so i think i will wait until i personally get there and basically show them the total revenue that the 70 guests that i brought to their resort is bringing them and even the possibility of repeat customers. Maybe that will make them think twice, it's much harder to try to negotiate over the phone or email. =)

 

Plus the other thing i did try to "reconfirm" with my WC, which i love her, she is great and responsive, but i asked again about the whole new policy about not charging for photographers anymore for a day pass and she said that this is not true, but i printed out the FB page where the concierge states that there is no charge any more, therefore i am not going to bring that up until i am in there in person. SOmetimes the communication amongst them at the resort is not always consistent, which is fine and also i am glad that i saved all emails i exchanged with them, so if anything changes, i can say that they stated otherwise. But i will not hold my breath, i think they change their minds whenever they want and there is nothing you can do about it. Oh well.....

 

But other than that, yeah, everything is going great! Got all my oot bags, that i ordered from oriental trading, very cheap, but cute, i didn't care that it wasn't fancy, i figured it was good enough, especially since the guest list is sooooo big. Plus we are going to send them personal luggage tags we had created, they are so pretty and they can use them anytime, we didn't put like our names or wedding date on there, just so they can reuse them. The design is the custom logo i have for my picture and it's embroidered. Very pretty, i ordered them through a wholesaler in China, so they cam out to like $1.50 a piece, which is very cheap for luggage tags, i had to order a minimum of 100 though, but great deal!

 

Now we are trying to finalize centerpieces, i am going to have three vases per table (each of a different height) and have submerged calla lillies in each vase, then i will be using luminaries for my table number (a wrapped votive with vellum paper) and possibly the led candle will be a teal colored light since i am not dishing out money for colored table cloths or bows. Then i will have scattered rose petals around the vases, thinking teal and brown, but haven't confirmed (but those are my wedding colors).  This will hopefully add some color to the table and not be too white.

 

For tent cards, we wanted to be original, so we are making wine charms with a guests names and table number in there, and those will be hooked on a glass and they will take the glass to their table for their wine. =) We aren't providing any "favors" i figured there is really nothing worth buying that they will actually want to keep, also since we are having a cigar roller for the cocktail hour they will have that gift, along with everything else we have provided to them thus far. 

 

So all in all, everything is working out great, just wish i could be guaranteed everything i asked for and for the price they quoted me. So we'll see. But definitely when i am done with the wedding, i will give everyone on this forum all the details of everything i used and planned and cost. And i will share pictures of course as well!

 

How is everyone else's wedding planning coming along?

 

Originally Posted by mel72683 

Wow 70 people so far thats a lot.  Is your planning going good? 

 

[swojdyla]

Thanks for the save on crafts website!! I love it!! And Ska2m can you tell me a little more about your OOT bags. My wedding isn't until April 2012 but I just sent out my STDs and have 30 guests confirmed!! I feel like I'm going to hit 50-70 before I know it! Definitely wasn't prepared for that so I would appreciate any suggestions on how to save on OOT bags and how to get them all there!! lol

[mel72683]

BrideJul2012- welcome to the forum.  Me and my FH original chose a different destination spot but after hearing bad reviews we quickly started looking elsewhere and came across Dreams.  We absolutely loved it and the prices were exactly what we were looking for.  I hope you choose Dreams for your wedding . 

[ska2m]

Hi swojdyla!

 

Sure, this is what i ended up doing for the OOT Bags since we have so many guests! I don't want to sound cheap, but I would've loved to have gotten all name brand items and filled the bag with goodies, but instead, since i didn't want to spend so much on those items and instead utilize the extra cash for the actually wedding. Especially considering you actually have to do so much more for a destination wedding, the welcome dinner (where everyone is invited), we didn't have a registry since people were paying so much to come to the wedding, so i am going to assume the cash/gifts we get back from our guests will be significantly less if we had a local wedding. So with all that said, this is what we did for our OOT bags:

• Welcome Bag: http://www.orientaltrading.com/large-hibiscus-tote-bags-a2-34_737-12-1.fltr?Ntt=hibiscus+bag Plus sometimes you can find free shipping codes online, that always helps since sometimes just the shipping charge is not worth the purchase.
• We are throwing in some fans as well: http://www.orientaltrading.com/tropical-hibiscus-folding-fans-a2-34_102-12-1.fltr?Ntt=fans 
• For our First aid kit or hangover kit, instead of buying those plastic white cases that many of the brides bought, which i love, but just cost too much, we ended up buying white boxes from papermart: http://www.papermart.com/Product%20Pages/Product.aspx?GroupID=20580&ParentGroupID=34793 (the 6X3X2 size) Only cost $26 for 100 boxes. We already created our stickers that we got ideas from this site, and it will cover the entire lid of the box, very cute!
• Inside the hangover kit/bag, we are including:

1. Sunscreen: i didn't want to buy them big bottles, plus sunscreen is soooo expensive, i figured just give them enough to hold them over if they forgot it and then they can purchase at the resort, i can't imagine too many people forgetting! You are going to a beach, so i would assume it's on the top of people's list, so i didn't feel it necessary to give them too much of sunscreen, so we bought from minimus.biz the Safetec Sunscreen Lotion (packet) and they were .25 cents per packet and we bought 200 packets (free shipping) and we will give approx 3 packets per person.
2. Aloe: we definitely wanted to include aloe, but instead of buying individual aloe bottles (again pricey), we bought plastic bottles off of ebay http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=320713560769&ssPageName=ADME:L:OC:US:1123#ht_500wt_1209 We bought 3 2oz packs totaling 90 bottles for $28.00. As for the actual aloe, we went to drugstore.com and bought Fruit of the Earth (20 oz) 7 bottles for $35 and will use this to fill up the plastic bottles and label the plastic bottles with our own custom label.
3. Tylenol: Again, we ordered this together with the Aloe at drugstore.com . We found Tylenol Extra Strength Pain Reliever in individual packets, 50 packets per box. We bought 3 boxes, totaling 150 tylenol packets at $14.99 each box ($44.97 for the 3 boxes)
4. Pepto and bandages: we haven't ordered yet, i think we may have forgotten, but we will order individual packets to include in the welcome bag
5. Powdered Drinks: we went to "deals" a local discount store and found boxes containing individual packets of crystal light (that make one drink from a water bottle per pack) and bought over 200 packets (3 different flavors) for only $17.00. we will give one flavor of each to each guest.
6. Lanyards and Key card holder - We ordered this from ebay. we got 100 lanyards for like $12.00 and 100 Key Card holders for $12.00 http://cgi.ebay.com/Lot-100-Neck-Lanyard-ID-Card-Badge-Holder-Strap-10-C-MM-/130490617153?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item1e61d8cd41#ht_3020wt_990  and http://cgi.ebay.com/Lot-50-Vertical-Business-ID-Card-Badge-Holder-w-Zipper-/130489885394?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1e61cda2d2 We printed up business size paper to put in the card holder so folks know what this is for. We got the idea from a thread on this site.
7. Welcome Letter: Still working on this, but it will be included
8. Itinerary: Still in the works, but will include one for the guests and a specific one for the BM/GM
9. Who's Who: Still in the works: but we will have a directory of who is there, with their picture and how they are related to the bride or groom
10. Spanish phrases, we though it would be funny to have one normal one with a few basic words, and then a funny one for our single folks attending, like "What's your room number" I'm free tonight". I think our friends would get a kick out of it!
11. Some sort of game, maybe cards or crosswords, still not sure, working on this.
12. We were going to add toothpaste and toothbrush, but the resort actually has those already in all the rooms for free, so one less expense for us!

 

I think that is everything in our welcome bags. We also decided not to do a room drop for the bags as the resort is charging something like $2.00 per bag, so instead, we had asked our guests who have RSVP'ed for their flight information and we will be greeting each of our guests upon their arrival in the lobby with drinks and giving them their bag. I know it'll be a lot of work, but i think that will be a great added touch and they will be nicely surprised. =)

 

Hope this helps out! If you or any brides have any additional suggestions, feel free to post them!

 

Thanks!

Originally Posted by swojdyla 

Thanks for the save on crafts website!! I love it!! And Ska2m can you tell me a little more about your OOT bags. My wedding isn't until April 2012 but I just sent out my STDs and have 30 guests confirmed!! I feel like I'm going to hit 50-70 before I know it! Definitely wasn't prepared for that so I would appreciate any suggestions on how to save on OOT bags and how to get them all there!! lol

 

[wen2012]

HI!  I'm a June 2012 bride!  I have been looking at this thread for awhile getting information.  I noticed it kinda of died down so it was time for me to speak up!   Are yall having the ceremony on the beach or gazebo?  I think we are going with the beach, after all that is why I wanted a destination wedding.   I just wanted to say hi and hopefully keep this thread going!