Any Gran Bahia Principe Runaway Bay Brides out there?

[akua420]

 

 

Originally Posted by katelynn 

 

 

I was also looking and there was nothing I saw that I liked. Someone else on here said Tai flora was really expensive so I did some investigating and found an amazing flower shop - however I just found out its in Negril!!!  way too far away. What is everyone else doing for flowers now as I am a bit lost...

 

 

 

I know, I'm in the same boat.  Some other people used Jans Flowers, and apparantly they are cheap.  So Ive look around for bouquets I like, adn I just emaield the flower shop to get a quote and find out about delivery.  I want pink stargazer lilies and small white orchids.  So If I hear back I'll let you know about prices/delivery what not.  She's located in Ocho Rios.

 

I booked in April I think, for a Feb wedding.  but we, like Katelynn, had very specific weeks beacuse of school/work, if you don't care about specific dates then you could probably wait a bit, I just wanted to know it was booked so I had less stress, and I could do the invites super early for people to get their finances in order.  I mailed the invites last month

 

[mekanabr]

We haven't even gotten to book our stay yet bc the rates just came out for next July when we'll be there.  We've been waiting FOREVER for them to release the rates so I'm so happy they finally did!!  Now I can send out my save the dates this week and ppl can start booking...YAY!!!!!!!!!!

 

I haven't really heard good things about the resort photographer.  I read somewhere that the photographer never even showed up for the wedding until after the ceremony (luckily they had brought their own).  You don't have to pay anything extra to bring in an outside vendor so we are flying our photographer in with us.  She is awesome and I can't wait!!  I had also asked Beverly if I could sub something for the photographer and she told me no, however I read about other brides being able to so I'll ask sooner to the date.

 

As for flowers, I read that Jans was cheapest as well.  I wish I could find a local market day of or day before that I could go to and get great flowers for super cheap and just make something out of them but I haven't been able to find anything like that yet unfortunately.  I think I'll just suck it up and pay for the extra bridal party flowers from wherever but as for decorations and stuff I'm not spending money on flowers, especially since noone can even take them home after.  I'm thinking of doing pictures and basic but pretyt stuff for the tables and then just getting pretty colored toulle for the gazebo and chairs during the ceremony.  And for the reception at the gazebo, I want to use luminaries, either with candles or those electronic luminaries you can get from Michaels for a few bucks. 

 

 

@missy&eric2011- very pretty BM dresses, they will look so pretty in the colors you described!!!

[kerrij]

Hi Brides!!  Wow I just got caught up on the last 14 pages of posts! oy!  good thing it's quite at work today! heheheh

 

I'm so excited for everyone! i was just looking at my aunts disk of pics of our wedding week...you guys are going to LOVE IT!!!

 

I've said this before and i'm going to say it again and I want you all to live by this....NO WORRIES!!!  No problem!  Just RELAX!!  seriously, you don't need to worry about anything for your wedding day!  If you really want to go all out and do center pieces and extra decorations and stuff, you're just going to stress yourself out!  I wanted a relaxing easy beach wedding, one i wouldn't stress about (because really, if you do all that stuff that you would normally do at home you're going to stress yourself out because not knowing every detail of the venues and not being able to talk to Beverly any time you want, will kill you and make this so much harder!!) and that's what i got... i didn't worry about anything (other than preping the OOT bags and a couple games i organized for our group) and the wedding was honestly more beautiful and special than i could imagine!  I also did write our own ceremony script cause the one that Rev Owen Watson has was awful and he's totally willing to do whatever you want. 

 

Poster above was worried about the horrible wedding bouquet pic....i'm positive that is just one of the many choices you can have! (I'll see if i can post a pic of my bouquet now that it's this new website) my FREE bouquet was amazing! full of red roses and purple orchids. which happened to match my 33 yr old flower girls dress perfectly!  there were probably 15 styles to choose from, from the long cascading 80s style bouquets to just a beautfiul handful of flowers.  So before you go outside...confirm with Beverly that she still has the cataloque of choices...which i'm sure she still does.

 

It's been almost 6 months since my wedding and i STILL don't have my pics from the photographer that was included in my package and i still haven't recieved my wedding certificate....BUT you do get a copy of your certificate at the wedding (or after if you don't want to worry about it) that you can use to change your name legally, etc.  For the Alberta bride who was wondering about if it's legal here...yes it is...it's just not registered but that didn't matter to us.  it's LEGAL and that's what matters....it's the same as if you got married in BC, it's legal, and it's registered in BC, but not registered in AB.  Just call the govt or embassy and they'll fill you in!

 

There were some worries about your wedding dress on the plane...we flew with Air Transat and they didn't have anywhere for us to put my dress and we were in first class...we had to store it in the overhead bins!  I had to fold mine in half and lay it up top. ugh! but the dress was fine i wasn't worried about it!  But a bride in the regular part of the plane was NOT allowed to put her dress up front. silly!  but i guess they get so many brides that they can't accommodate all dresses.  they should figure that out!

 

GBP only had ONE wedding per day when we were there 6 months ago....and not even everyday...there were 3 the whole week we were there....and the funniest part, all 3 of us brides were named Kerri and our color was yellow! hahah  sure made you feel more special being one of a few weddings taking place where most resorts have 3 weddings per day!

 

So please just relax....don't worry about extra decor or center peices or programs or anything of that (fans are prob a nice touch for the ceremony but there is pretty much always a light breeze anyway) you are in Jamaica and it's so beautfiul you should just let that be your decor...we didn't do any decorations at all and everyone said it was the most beautiful wedding they've been too.

 

I'll try to be back more to see if there is anything i can help you guys with   but being almost 6 months preggers I'm on baby websites these days....yup, do that math, that means Weddingmoon Baby!  we call him/her our Rasta Bean. heheh

 

Good luck!!

[kerrij]

[kerrij]

Oh boo! it didn't include my comments of each pic!

 

TTD!! soooo fun! my dress was more clean after all the swimming and playing in the sand we did! and I got the entire wedding party to join in too!

 

My welcome letter which included the wedding ceremony info, time, BMs GMs, locations etc...and a list of all our guests and how they were related to us, a thank you, a resort map, and details for the games i planned for our guests.  Put these in the OOT bags that we handed out on the bus.

 

we didn't pay extra for flowers for the guys or girls. the girls had parasols for the walk down the aisle and fans for in the gazebo! was so cheap and looked awesome!

 

So pretty and didn't even add any extra decorations other than what was included.

 

Steel drums! a must! i joined in for a little jam session! lol

 

Our cake included in the package! you get to pick the colors and flavors when you get there.

 

Look at how far out the gazebo is from all the half naked people! haha this is what sold me on the resort!

 

Nice long walk down the aisle

 

Oops and my bouquet pic didn't go through...this is my bouquet that was included in the package!!  LOVED IT!

[akua420]

Thanks so much Kerrij!  I emailed Bev asking about the colours, I don't care much about the type (although I do love lilies) I just want to make sure its the right colour, and I want to get an extra one for my hair.  That makes me feel relief, I'm glad all the decorations and everything are included.  I called the embassy and they told me to call Jamaica, so I called Jamaica and they told me to call Canada, but whatever I don't care, I"m not chanigng my name so it really doesn't matter. 

 

You scared me the the photographer comments.  it said on the brochure that you get them within 2 days, so good to know thats a lie.  I've started getting price quotes.  I don't want to pay more then $750 for the pictures.  I want simple simple pictures, no TTD, no reception pictures, just a few getting ready, the wedding, and the cake after.  Thats all I care abuot. 

 

It all looks so beautiful,  I am not even MORE excited to get married!

[kerrij]

Well if you are supposed to get them in 2 days they didn't tell me that!  Would have been nice to go home with the pics...but considering i never even got to speak to the photog before or after, how would i know when to get them. hahaha  Infact i didn't think that he even showed up for the wedding until later when i said to DH that I'm glad we didn't go with the hotel photog cause he didn't even show up...but apparently he did, just for the ceremony.  But Beverly told me a month after our wedding that she'd get him to send me the disk of pics...and still nothing yet. so i emailed her again today. hopefully i get them!!

 

I'm sure you won't have a prob finding someon for $750 if you just want a few hours of pics.

 

so funny...call jamaica, call canada...thanks guys! hahah  but i did confirm it is fully legal worldwide

Yay!

[mekanabr]

Hey Kerrij!  So nice to hear from you, hope the pregnancy is going great!!  I have a totally random question... For your reception at the gazebo, did you actually dance in the gazebo or do they set up an area with lights or something to the side in the sand?  It just doesn't look super huge so I wasn't sure if it could hold many people dancing.  Sorry if that is a dumb question but I'm just not sure what to expect.  Also, are there lights down there at night?

 

Thanks!!!!!!  love the pics!  

[AshleyL]

Thanks for posting all the pics Kerri! And thanks too for the reassurances - I wasn't planning on taking extra decor either so it's a relief to know I won't need it. And I'm so happy we decided to bring our own photographer! Whew! Congrats on the honeymoon baby!

[StephAli]

CoNgRaTs Kerri!!! Thats super exciting!!!!

I LOVE your pix!! I can't wait! Only 3months and 7days! ...hey, I guess thats right around ur due date! So fun!

 

As for flowers I was planning on bringing down some fake ones from Michaels. I want blue flowers and didnt notice any in the pictures, so I felt this was the safest bet!