April 2010 Brides

[GregsBride]

Welcome amcarter!! You are really on top of things

[doblauvelt]

Awesome pic Erin!! I really love the backdrop, how did you guys get the bridge all to yourself? Were you guys waiting for cars to pass by?

 

I just sent my STDs on Saturday and people have already started to recieve them yesterday, wow. Now I have to play the waiting game to see if anyone starts booking. I'm sure I'll be on the same boat as you, Michelle and Christina. It can't be helped, I have information listed on my STD, website and will be sending reminder notices to have people start booking. Hopefully people won't wait until last minute. gRr!

 

Welcome amcarter! I love your BYF idea. My STD didn't have an rsvp date or anything but instead a preliminary "will you please rsvp on our wedding website to give us a heads up" for a head count. I hope your BYF will get your guests off their butts and book their flights!

 

Some of my guests are already planning to book their own travel, not through my TA. I just hope that I won't have the same problem with my TA not being able to help my guests with their flights, that's their job isn't it?

 

A DW shouldn't be stressful at all, but there are times I'd like to rip my hair out!

[ndinn]

DW are still defnitally stressful. In terms of people booking it is stressful. You cannot please everyone. That is what I have learned. I've always been the "people pleaser" type person but I'm getting sick of it. We had a hard time deciding on where to go for our DW. We wanted to make sure that people could afford to go and also enjoy the destination. As I said before we have only 6 people booked (FI and myseld included). FI parents are a big source of stress for us. They say they are not going becuase they do not want to go to DR or anywhere else down south that is AI. There is no real reason. Money is not an issue or health problems. They are young people who are able to travel but decide not to because they did not get to choose the spot. When I say they I mean his mother. The father does not say a word. She wanted us to get married in Florida. We got engaged at Disney in Florida and they expected us to go back to get married. It would be way more expensive to do this for ourselves and our guests (if they stayed on resort). FI's cousin is bringing her daughter to Disney in April 2010 before she gets married in July 2010. Everyone is telling us to just go down with them and get married. I'm sorry but I don't want my wedding revolved around someone else. FI's mom would rather go to Disney with her neice and great-neice than go to our wedding. We called her on it and she did not deny. She said from day one that she was not going to our wedding. Her excuses were: there would be nothing for her to eat (as she is an extremely picky eater) and that there would be nothing for her to do because she does not drink or want to lay on the beach all day. She had a bad review from one person at her work who did not enjoy DR. I'm not even sure where he went or what kind of resort he stayed at (this person complains about everything) and she is taking his word like the word of God or something. FI said that she was being selfish and she replied "if you want to twist it that way."

 

I made my STD's and worked very hard on them. I gave them out to everyone. Even people I know who cannot go because I did not want to exclude anyone. That was approx almost 4 weeks ago. I gave one to FI's mom. She has not spoke to us since then. She is acting like we are the ones that are in the wrong. It is her decision not to go and we are the bad guys apparantly. FI was wondering if there is anyone else out there with a similar situation where parents refuse to go for no good reason? He is really hurt by this. Me.. I could care less since their being so mean about it all. I only care for his sake. I'm sick of our wedding being a taboo topic that we cannot talk about when we are around his parents.

 

Sorry for the rant. I'm just very frustrated with the new "in-laws". Looks like rough road ahead with them I think.

[ebredhawk]

on a completely unrelated note, i posted some of my BD pics this morning:

http://bestdestinationwedding.com/forum/t45897

 

also, tonya, to get the bridge shot we had to play our own real-life game of frogger. we'd jump into traffic when no one was coming and jump back off. this was especially difficult for the kissing pictures because we couldn't look to see if someone was going to run over our photog, but it looks like they turned out great anyway!

 

so it looks like all of our planning/weddings follow the "same sh*t different bucket" mentality. in the spirit of comiserating, the following is a list of the set backs and obstacles we have had:

-FI's dad is extremely overweight.. will prob 2 plane seats

-FI's mom had her right leg amputated below the knee 3 weeks ago

-In order for all of our family to go my parents are paying for 18 people

-FI's daughter is not allowed to go to our wedding because her mom won't permit it

 

it sucks that we all have these things to deal with and sometimes people just aren't happy with what you're planning. the thing is, it's YOUR wedding.. don't you hear stories all the time about brides to be or married women who didn't enjoy their weddings or the planning because they were too busy worrying about everyone else? we definitely don't want to fall into that group! just think.. it's their loss that they want to try to mess up something that could easily be the time of their lives!!

 

thank goodness that we all have BDW so we can vent to people we know will understand. as much as i love my family and friends, there are a lot of times when they just don't get it!!

[chevy14]

Hello Fellow April 2010 Brides

 

I am getting married on April 27th, 2010 at the Iberostar Laguna Azul. We booked at the beginning of June and so far have 50 friends and family members booked to join us. One of my best friends is also getting married the same week at the same resort and she has about 40 booked, so there with definitely be a lot of familiar faces!

We haven't sent out of invites yet - I have a huge family and my fiance is a social butterfly lol so word-of-mouth was all it took. We do plan on sending out invites in the next couple months.

The only let-down so far has been that our tour operator is only allowing 50 guests to book at our group rate price, so I know a few people have called since we hit 50 and have decided not to book since it is almost $300 more Not much we can do though.

I have my dress but that's as far as we have gone. I have an idea for bridesmaid dresses, flowers, welcome bags and favours, but feel like it's too soon to make those decisions in case I see something in a few months I like better! We have booked out photographer as well, he is a friend who has offered to photograph our wedding if we paid his way. Good deal!

 

It's fun hearing of the trials and tribulations of other destination brides, all going through all the same things as us! I'm glad to be here

[jk1101]

Erin - your pics are awesome - I can't wait to see the rest of the engagement pics!

 

ndinn - I'm sorry you're having such a rough time with the future in-laws. It sucks how some people aren't happy unless they aren't in control and that they are hurting their son in the process.

 

Welcome Chevy14!

 

Christina - I wish I could stop caring! I think if I was working it would be easier, but I'm home and think about wedding planning and am on BDW alot, I think it makes me focus on it more!

[ebredhawk]

welcome chevy!! nice work on the 50 guests booked so far! i can't say i've ever heard of someone having so many people book that they exceeded the # that could get the group rate. i'd say that's pretty impressive. you still have all the fun details to plan, so you've got to let us know how all of that is coming as you figure it out!

 

michele, i'm still keeping my fingers crossed for you that stuff starts happening soon. sometimes i make myself WAY too anxious on here so i have to find non-wedding threads to read to distract me. sometimes i honestly don't know how i'm going to make it 9 1/2 more months!!

[jk1101]

When I come back from this weekend I'm going to focus on invitations and travel booklets. I think if my guests get real invitations and travel info with that BYF that amcarter suggested, MAYBE, just maybe, I'll get someone to book!

[ebredhawk]

michele, that's an awesome idea! hopefully it will encourage your guests to book, plus it will give you a project to focus on!

[jojo194]

Hey everyone...I know I am coming in late, but I just joined this site today. I am also a April 2010 bride to be. Specifically April 24, 2010 (I know someone else in this group is on that day too)...

 

My fiance was actually the one who really encouraged a destination wedding, and especially the cruise wedding (it saves a lot of money, he has been wanting to go on a cruise, and requires less stress planning (kind of, haha)).

 

When we got engaged in March, we knew we were going to do a cruise wedding. After researching all kinds of options and travel agents we finally found someone to help us. We also decided we would rather do the wedding on the beach than on the cruise ship. Then we picked a cruise that was more 'friendly' for our guests (shorter, over the weekend, from a relatively close location) which limited our options for beach weddings. Finally we figured out a way to have our cruise and our beach wedding ceremony too (although we may have had to sacrifice a reception since we are not using Carnival's wedding planners...I am working on that).

 

Within that month or 6 weeks we found a travel agent, booked our cruise, and made our own save the date magnets (I will have to post a picture once I figure out how to) with the 'engagement pictures' my mom took of us at our local beach.

 

It took about a month of spreading the news, making the website, mailing out the magnets with a friendly letter, but then people started booking like crazy. Right now we have 41 cabins booked and 96 people coming. This is way more than I expected and kind of makes arranging the wedding a little more difficult (the package was designed for 10 people and I told her we would probably have 40 people). Oops. Oh well, I am sure we will have a blast on the cruise with so many people and I will have to just work on all the details.

 

My fiance and I are hoping to have an at home pre-party as well where we can go over any final details and so on. However, we still have to plan that one.

 

I have been loving thinking about putting together OOT bags and this site has been awesome for getting ideas for that. I am still trying to figure out my color scheme though so I can't really purchase anything.

 

I am excited to have so many people to share ideas with!