DREAMS PUERTO VALLARTA "thread"

SarahBen2011 · June 21, 2011

SarahInLove - how many strands did you have, 2? How many do you think is needed for Las Palmas? We're having 50 guests. I might buy lights like this instead of the lanterns, just waiting to hear back from Fatima. Have other brides had good contact with her? I haven't heard from her since she took over in early June...

http://www.restorationhardware.com/catalog/product/product.jsp?productId=prod1677161

Dreams2011 · June 21, 2011

We had 23 people total sitting in a 'U' shape with the dance floor in the middle and I think there were only 4 lanterns around the edges, but we had enough light...it was perfect actually. I think a couple only had 2 lights each then the others at the mouth of the "U" had 4. If you are having double the people and using a larger area then I'd probably use a couple more lanterns, but 6-7 is probably good.....

mllek1986 · June 22, 2011

Hi SarahBen2011,

We are using DJ Reventon. Louise (the WC before Esman) quoted us $100 for outside vendors to come in so it will cost us $100 per each outside vendor we decide to use plus their food at the reception (outside guest so $65), they get water and pop for free.

Originally Posted by SarahBen2011

Hey mllek1986 ! What DJ are you hiring? Is Dreams charging you a fee to bring in an "outside" vender??

mllek1986 · June 22, 2011

Have you tried emailing her first? No one contacted me until I sent them an email and now I get responses within a day, sometimes within the hour

Quote:

Originally Posted by SarahBen2011

SarahInLove - how many strands did you have, 2? How many do you think is needed for Las Palmas? We're having 50 guests. I might buy lights like this instead of the lanterns, just waiting to hear back from Fatima. Have other brides had good contact with her? I haven't heard from her since she took over in early June...

http://www.restorationhardware.com/catalog/product/product.jsp?productId=prod1677161

SarahBen2011 · June 22, 2011

We emailed back and forth at the very beginning of June and have not heard from her since. I wrote her again over the weekend and still nothing...

vollydolly · June 22, 2011

We are back and had the time of our lives!! I will post my review soon! I can't even express how beautiful and amazing our wedding was and to share it with friends and family is priceless. All the future brides you have nothing to worry about. I'll answer what I can below:

I agree that Las Palmas is too small for a big wedding. We had ours at Seaside beach and we loved it. I think it is better than Oceana and at this time of the year there is more sand over there. Don't worry about grading the sand, we came after Adrian and left right before Beatrix and the sand was fine. Unless there is an actual hurricane you will be fine.

I wasn't happy with Fatima - She is very sweet but very new and messed up quite a few things but it all turned out fine anyway. If you are working with her make sure you have everything down and you have to remind/follow up with her constantly. I absolutely loved our photographer - Cristheel. I hope you can see our video below. I think I posted it right. She is the best and well worth it. She stayed for almost the entire reception and took over 750 photos and we didn't even tell her we would upgrade. If I can help any future brides please let me know.

http://180611aimeejason.drepvphoto.adventurephotos.com.mx/#/home-11/

vollydolly · June 22, 2011

Congrats Sarah! That is so funny about the cake. We cut our cake for pictures and then it started to rain lightly and they took it away and we didn't find it until 2 days later. What is up with that??? We tasted it and it was ok. We had the cheesecake.

Originally Posted by sarahinlove

That tractor price seems crazy, hey? I bet it is just there as a last resort. They have an army of guys who grate the beach every single morning by hand. So it would have to be pretty crazy to need to have a tractor come in. As for Las Palmas, it is sooo beautiful, but I agree that it might be pretty squishy with 68 people. We had 40 and it seemed like a perfect fit. The weddings we watched on the beach seemed to be pretty awesome. A bonus of the beach is that you get the breeze. It was so hot at Las Palmas, whereas the beach was beautiful weather.

We decided not to pay for extra cake. The two layer cake was HUGE anyway. And you know what, we didn't even get to cut the darn thing. We were all SOO full from dinner, heck its a 4 course meal, that we had the wedding cake brought to our after party at the sports bar. The groomsmen saw it leave on a cart en route, but it NEVER showed up! My husband spent an hour trying to track it down, to no avail. 4 days later they called us and said they found it and asked us what we wanted done with it. Are you kidding me??? So, ya, we didn't taste it. No one missed it though!

SarahBen2011 · June 22, 2011

Ohh congrats Aimee!!! You look SO happy :-) Can't wait to read the review!

vollydolly · June 22, 2011

I think there is plenty of light. We saw a wedding the night before ours and they had at least 5 poles of hanging lanterns with at least 4 lanterns on each pole and their dance floor had the techno lights. I thought it was too bright as it was a full moon when we were there and there is lighting from the resort that reflects down on the beach.

Fatima told us that we didn't need any extra lighting and for some reason our dance floor didn't have any lights. I don't know why we didn't get any. The only reason I could think of is if there is any chance of rain, they don't risk putting lights and electricity out there. She didn't tell me this though and our dance floor looked like a little stage with nothing. I was the only one that noticed though and once it got dark, we got lucky because there was a fireworks show from another party. It was amazing. I agree that white lights would look better than the colored lighting on the floor. I think it looked a little cheesy. I think maybe 2 lanterns would be nice. More of an intimate setting. Also remember the sun doesn't set until at least 845-9 depending on when your wedding is.

I didn't see the lounge chairs so I can't comment on that.

One more strange thing..we had an ipod and there was a "dj" that was there to work the ipod. I didn't pay for that but he let me play what I wanted but at some point he did play celebration. That's funny because I hate that song and why he played that I have no idea...

Originally Posted by mllek1986

So we have decided to move to Seaside beach as we do not want to be squished by any means and this just seemed like the best thing to do. Our reception is 4 hours long (we're paying for the extra hour) as we wanted to have it as long as possible. We are just getting 2 sets of lounge furniture, each set seats 7 people (3 mini couches, one chair and a table), each set costs $165, plus we are getting some coloured pillows to go with it ($4-7 each). I am hoping this is not a waste of money for the lounge sets on the beach - any other girls out there use them? If you could do it over would you have cut them?

Also- what's the lighting like on the beach- we are getting 4 hanging lights like the one's below. Plus our DJ has lighting. Do you think this will be enough light?

Dreams2011 · June 22, 2011

Here is a pic of our layout with lanterns. I guess we actually had 5 lanterns (3 with multiple lights)... it was plenty bright, however, we only had 23 people so not over a large area.