Dreams Puerto Aventuras Brides - POST HERE!

[MrsRobinson12]

Hi 604. Glad everything went well! How was the weather? Looking forward to reading your review

[AlisonDawn]

Ohh CONGRATS! 

I am so happy everything went well for you! Enjoy your honeymoon!

[Allie2012]

Congrats on being a Mrs! Awesome that everything went well, hopefully your day was rain free!? Enjoy the rest of your honeymoon, and pop back in here when your home to give us the details!

Originally Posted by 604bride2be 

Hello ladies,
everything was perfect. Dream come true....
A few minor glitches but can't really complain. The biggest was the minister didn't say the vows we chose, which sucked but no one else knew.
I will put up more info when i'm back home, got free wifi at or honeymoon so thought id pop in to say it was fantastic.
Got to watch a few other weddings too, wonder if any of the brides are on here!?!
happy Valentines day

 

[AlisonDawn]

Hey ladies!

 

I am off to Mexico tomorrow morning! YAY!  I'll try to get back on here as soon as I can to let you all know how it went  

 

Also, make sure you guys keep your passports in a spot where water can't get on it.  I managed to get mine went and had to get an emergency passport made. I only just picked it up this afternoon. I don't think I have ever been so stressed out in my life!

 

Talk to you all later!

 

[MrsRobinson12]

Good luck Alison! Hoping for nice weather for you

[Allie2012]

Wow Alison, your date seemed to sneak up so soon! Have an amazing time and amazing wedding

[Julie Carson]

Hi girls! Hope all is well. I've chimed in a few times on this thread and just start having it update me every time there is a new entry. Little about me... We're getting married August 14th we have 20people booked right now and estimate another 10 to 15 people so we'll be about 35 guests booked. We booked the dreams of love package. I just talked to Jacki and we're going to change our dinner to a buffet. We don't like the idea of only one food item and I'm a little nervous about having enough time for speeches, dances, and everything if we had the 5 course meal. I've read so many times that most people pick the reception site once they get there but we are leaning towards the room on the second floor with window views that has AC. We want everyone to be comfortable and to be able to dance. Which leads me to another issue... to get a DJ or not. We would like someone to be the MC transition between speeches, dances, etc but I don't like the idea of 220 an hour for it. So I think we are going to find a family member to do it and then bring iPod for dancing music. I've got to start working on the playlists! 

 

Another issue I'm dealing with is flowers. They are super expensive! Anyone have ideas to deal with this? Center pieces are another issue.. I think I'm going to make them but not sure what will be easy to pack. Any other decorations people are brining? 

 

Anyone find a trick to getting room upgrades? I've read from a few brides here and there that they were able to get room upgrades but not exactly sure how. 

 

OOT Bags anyone? Working on these too! Anyone doing anything fun? 

 

How about tours? Suggestions? 

 

Whew! Lots of planning! I thought I picked destination to lessen the planning but it seems like there is just as much. 

 

Happy Planning! Love to hear anyones thoughts on these things. 

 

Julie 

 

 

[MrsRobinson12]

Hi Julie! Congrats on your wedding date.

 

We are getting married on March 14th and we have about 20 people coming. I believe we are having our receiption outside on the beach. Having a DJ or not was a big decision for me, but it's just too expensive. Basically another $1,000.00 for something that we can do ourselves. I made a playlist a few weeks ago. Let me know if you would like to see it as a sample. I am going to try to keep our speeches short so that it does not take up too much time. I have heard that dancing on the sand is fine and fun!

 

I did not ask about room upgrades. We are hoping to be upgraded once we arrive, I think that's the best way to do it.

 

I agree, the flowers are SO expensive! I got silk flowers from a place near my house. I got all the flowers I need for under $300.00. Also, centerpieces are expensive too - I tihnk about $75.00 per. I am not sure what to do here... I might just go to Walmart and get a vase and some shells and see what I can do it with. I am not too worried about it becuase I am sure the tables will be decorated nicely with what they have in the package. I have seem some picutres and ever without centerpieces, they still look nice.

 

For tours I would suggest Xel - Ha and Xplore. We went to Mexico in 2012 and did both of those and they are AMAZING. So much fun and totally worth the price. This time, I am going swimming with the dolphins for sure, as it is only a 5 min walk. I have also set up a fishing trip for the boys a short distance away.

 

I decided not to do OOT bags. I think it is some what unnecessary and costly for things that people will probably end up bringing themsevles.

 

Hope this helps!

 

Amanda.

 

 

[604bride2be]

Helllo ladies!!!!

 

I am just so excited for each and every one of you who are next..... It was a perfect day for us.

 

We saw a lot of weddings happen too, and my family even talked to one brides family who didnt have the best experience - so I will tell you what we did and what we saw to hopefully help in any decision making!

 

First off, Jacki is fantastic. She's an Aussie and is straight to the point, I loved her. If you want something else and want to change anything - shes totally flexible. We met her the morning after we arrived, sat down, went through the day or what we wanted - then did a walk through the site to see exactly where reception locations.

 

We had the Dreams of Love Package. And it really was enough for us. We had 37 guests total at the wedding.Styling Trio did all our hair and makeup. They were efficient and did a great job. I did a hair trial two days before the wedding.

Sascha Gluck was our photographer. He showed up an hour early and stayed a bit late too as we ran over our time with speeches.

 

We did a walk through rehearsal the night before. I'd suggest doing this. WE timed the whole walk to one song, so i listened on my ipod while we all walked and then everyone know waht time to walk etc. Even if your group isnt walking to one song, id do rehearsal. It takes like 10 minutes.

 

Ceremony was at 3pm at the Gazebo. (we originally wanted it on the beach, set up columns but it was $300 and when we got there we didnt really see the point since the Gazebo was free, and everyone LOVED the gazebo - but evvvvvvvveryone gets married there. we were luckily the first couple out of that week to get married so we got lots of cheers and claps when we walked out of th hotel)

I wish we had the ceremony at 4 pm , only for the fact that we cut our photography session VERY short with the photographer because we were all sweating like pigs. In hindsight I wish we sucked it up, but my makeup was being wiped off and our hair was sweaty and it just wasnt pretty any more lol. SO i think if we had it at 4, with the sun setting and air cooling we could have lasted longer BUT oh well, we have lovely photos already and havent gotten any from our pro.

 

We did the symbolic ceremony (non legal) but no one knew the difference. Its basically a ceremony we would have at home, we even got to sign something like in a legal ceremony. Alejandro Monroy was the minister(hes provided by Dreams) ,and he was great however he didnt say the vows we chose. He gave me a list of like 8 to choose from, and we wanted the one about friendship and love..but he spoke the traditional one "to have and to hold" bla bloa. It was super disappointing but not a deal breaker. It was still a lovely ceremony.

 

We had requested a champagne toast on the beach, right after the ceremony but this didnt happen. I wasn't pleased about that. But again, in the moment you dont care!

 

Then guests went to Baraccuda Swing Bar for cocktail hour. We had appies and they set them up, and guests loved that. *Note other guests at teh hotel will be at the swing bar too. This one couple sat there forever with us, and someone kindly asked them to leave. They werent happy about it, but eventually left so it was just our group at the location.  But for a smaller group, id say people will be there.

 

We ended up getting El Patio for the dinner. (and for those of you who have read my previous posts, i had requested it, then told we couldnt have it. But upon arriving Jacki told me they would do it for us). We paid the $750 and I'm telling you it was SOOOOOO worth it! The reception was amazing. I am so happy I didnt do it on the beach, It gets very windy at night and ALL of the weddingreceptions we saw (mind you this is february) that were on the beach didnt look that comfortable. Also, there are usualyl nightly shows. With music. And its loud, so some receptions had their music going and you can hear the music from the hotel going as well. If you want a slow song, the hotel might be playing dance music. So its not super private or intimate,  (BUT, im not trying to talk anyone out of their dream just letting you know how it is!)

Our other choice was Oceana Restaurant - which is the adult pool side. It too is gorgeous BUT be warned the adult pool side stays pretty rowdy till about 6pm. Those old people stay in the pool and just drnk and "woopp woop" all day. So had we chose Oceana (or the location next to Oceana wihich is near the hot tub at the adult pool) we would have had drunken people partying while we were eating out meal. It wouldnt have been a wise choice.
At El Patio They have the windows wide open and fans going,. was it hot? Yeah a bit, but that's because we danced for hours. The service was fantastic and yhou really dont have to worry about  a thing!!!!

 

 

We used a DJ, Dj Doreemix. For anyone contemplating DJ or not, PLEASE go with a DJ. It makes the reception. If you have a crowd that likes to dance, and will dance - a DJ is what you need. They were $800 for 5 hours - and they were there at 4pm setting up and didnt start till 6pm. They have the mic for the speeches too. They brought balloons, masks, glow sticks and set up lights and smoke machine and it just made the dance party even better.  Our friends and family couldnt stop talking about how fun the reception was  - and it was all thanks to the DJ's. They even had a fire show display that went off at the very end, right outside the reception location. It was AWESOME.

 

Put your money into reception location and a dj. you will not regret it! 

 

One of the girls my family talked to said the hair and makeup crew from the hotel weren't very good, and they were not happy about it. But some people are pickier than others, so I'd do a trail and get out any reservations about your "look".

 

 

Hmm, what else.../:

I brought down my own fake flowers for the centerpieces and candles etc. They turned out fabulous and looked great. They assembled them all with our name tags, table tags and maracas. They did a great job!

 

Also, my bouquet was exactly what I wanted.

 

We got the cake for 20 people. and didnt get the bigger cake - and for anyone who has guests more than 20 people you dont need a bigger cake. they just want the $! the cake size was plenty big.

 

Not sure if anyone has any specific questions or not, but seriously any thing I had worried about before - was not necessary. It was awesome.

 

 

 

[604bride2be]

What we did for ours is our dinner right at 6pm. I took away the soup course, so we have appy, salad, main and basically once the desert was served we started our speeches. We had 6 people speak, including our Emcee. Took about 25 minutes. But everyone kept theirs pretty short too.

As for room upgrades, we asked once we were there. Now, they told us we got a nice "upgrade" and it was a lovely room (we booked garden view room) we were on the 5th floor over looking the Marina Side..HOWEVER, 6 other couples were in the exact same room. Being the bride and groom I expected our upgrade would be a bit better than our friends rooms. And they told everyone in our group they got an upgrade lol. SOoo, They lied and didnt really give us an upgrade, but they made it seem like they had. The next morning a lot of people changed their rooms cause couples were in two bedded rooms etc, and I went down to ask about their honeymoon suite. First he said it wasnt available, then after 10 minutes it was available. Would cost us $55 extra a night, and it was lovely but TINY. the view and the patio were fabulous with a jacuzzi tub(but its right next to the patio of your neighbour so cant get too frisky in it) but wasnt worth it as i wanted the bigger suit just to get ready in, on the wedding day. I didnt care that we didnt have ocean view to sleep in.

SO, What we did for the wedding day/night is booked their master suite for 24 hours. Its huge. It cost us about $250, but it had a huge living room, bedroom and bathroom so we could all get ready in comfortably. There was 13 of us total with girls/parents, hair/makeup and photographer.  So we needed the space! The honeymoon suite we were shown wouldnt have accomodated us getting ready at all.

 

As for centerpieces, we rented the vases from them at $5. And I did the floating flower/candle. Brought my own fake orchids from Michaels. Filled the vases with water and voila! (i actually left ll the fake flowers with Jacki so maybe one of you can use them! lol) The flowers were easy to pack, and lightweight. The floating candles were easy too.  It was very inexpensive. They still put a huge real flower centerpiece on our head table as it comes with the Dreams of Love package.

 

As for tours, Im against the dolphin swimming (super cruel - google The Cove and you'll never look at them the same way) so if youd like another friendly tour take your group snorkeling in the cenote! We went to Dos Ojos and I have been there twice. That or Grand Cenote. Its amazing. Google them both.  They can accomodate big groups, and its about $35-40 per person.  Our boys did the fishing trip, its fun but note theres only like 6 rods so not everyone really gets to fish.

 

I too didnt do OOT bags. You can bring a note or something but I felt it was just an added cost, and I wanted to put any money towards the actual wedding day.