lbcs

No problem Nicky! We had our rehearsal dinner at Ivan's at Catch a Falling Star resort. Their prices were very reasonable, they were able to work with us on specific menu choices and drink menus and the place was SO CUTE and the food was tasty!! They even provided transportation for everyone and it's just right down the road. I would highly recommend them. They were very available by email throughout our planning which also put us at ease. Let me know if you have any more Qs. Lauren

Hi Scottwashington, I just sent you a message with the link, let me know if you have trouble viewing the pics. Hope it helps! Lauren

About the chairs... I remember being bothered by this as well. I wish they didn't add that on. We ordered 38 chairs and the transportation fee was $70 on top of the chair charge . On a positive note, I will say there there were no other unexpected or hidden fees when we checked out of Moon Dance. I was worried about this when they told me about the transportation fee for the chairs - it made me think, oh great what other random fees will there be. But really they were upfront and honest with everything. A couple of our guests even saw charges they didn't recognize on their bills and they were taken off right away with no question. Hope that helps... Lauren

First let me say, Dreamstar I was so sad to read your posting. I really can't imagine how that must have been for you. I am proud of you for still going to Jamaica and trying to make the best of it. Mallory - - I am so happy you are enjoying the pictures! - The little lanterns along the edge belong to Moon Dance. I had no idea they were going to have those. The tea light candles were ours, they put them on the tables and also on the edges. I brought at least 55 of them - I ordered them online and they came with the tea light candles and the glass candle holders. Probably didn't need so many! I left all of the glass holders with Kerry hoping she would let you guys use them and then you only have to bring the candles, which is much easier for travel. - The red bubble lanterns that are hanging around the dance floor - I brought 20 I think. I don't think they used all of them. But I thought they were a great touch. I ordered them on the knot store and they were really cheap. I also left these with Kerry in case anyone's color is red! - For your sign, there are many places you could put it depending on where most of your guests are staying. If you want it along the walkway where you can see the groomsmen and groom walking in the pics then yes I would have it pointing left. That will be so cute! Keep asking if I can help with anything else. I will keep adding pics as my friends send them to me! Lauren

Hi ladies! I got a bunch of pics back from the wedding and would be happy email the link to my facebook album to anyone who is interested. Just send me your email address and I will get it to you, since many haven't been able to see the attachments. Lauren

Thanks Christy. We still can't believe how great everything was! I know they will do a great job with yours too. After having a destination wedding, we can't imagine doing it any other way! Lauren

Hi Meitra, Our ceremony was set to start at 5pm, I think it actually started around 5:15. It depends on what it most important to you - the pics during the ceremony or the organized pics after. The pics during the ceremony were great for us because the sun was starting to go down, but it was definitely rushed afterward and we did not have time for as many pictures as I thought we would. To avoid this, you could start at 430 or so? But then the sun would be pretty bright during the ceremony... Also, you can plan to do many of the pics before hand that don't require both of you - like bridesmaid and groomsmen pics, and I also had Chris do his own family pics before the wedding and this saved a lot of time and allowed the photographer to take her time on those. We did use the minister they recommended. I would definitely meet with him in advance. He gave us a sheet of what he usually says during the ceremony and there were a few things that we really didn't like and I am very happy we were able to tell him not to say some of those things - such as "if anyone in the audience disagrees with this union please say so now" - I mean who wants that said at their wedding, I think I have only seen that in the movies! He did a great job in the end. Oh and we really liked the sand ceremony and he did a nice job of explaining its significance during the ceremony. And we did do our own vows that we read to each other ourselves which was really special and made it a more intimate ceremony. We also had two readers of poems that we chose. Hope this helps, let me know if I can answer anything else. I know lots of questions come up in the final planning! Lauren

Mallory, Here are a couple pics of the gazebo so you can see their decorating. It was nice and simple. I will definitely post more pics for you guys once I get them from the photographer. Or just let me know if there is anything else specific that you would like to see. Lauren gazebo.doc

Mallory, Don't apologize for a second! I pretty much planned every detail of our wedding with the help of this forum, so I am more than happy to contribute! We did bring a lot of stuff with us for the wedding day. I actually had a lot of the stuff that I ordered online sent to my bridesmaids to bring. Because with decorations and all of the OOT bag stuff, it ends up being too much to bring yourself. So for the wedding/decorations - you provide all of the decorations yourself - we brought the tulle, fans with personalized ribbon, bubbles, a wish box with cards for people to write on, sand ceremony frame and the sand, personalized napkins, confetti, red lanterns, cake topper. Kerry just took all of this stuff from me right away when we arrived and had it set up on the wedding day, which was SO NICE! They even put the tulle on the chairs. They decorated the gazebo with flowers and the white drapes - they charged $50 for this. The signature drink is such a great touch. I picked a drink to match the our color (red). They are happy to make any drink that you want. I would recommend not having rum in your signature drink b/c you will be drinking tons of rum already on this trip! Here is what we chose and it was SO good! Pomegranate Margarita Recipe : Danny Boome : Food Network * Lime wedge, plus more for garnish * Salt * Ice * 4 ounces white tequila * 2 ounces Triple Sec * 1/2 cup pomegranate juice * 1 lime, juiced (optional) * Club soda The dance floor was plenty big for us. We had 40 guests. The nice thing is that the bar is right on the dance floor so your guests don't have to leave to get a drink. You can pretty much keep dancing while they make your drink Feel free to ask anything else! Lauren

Miss Myries told us $7 per person and I think she added $1 each since we chose the rum frosting. I agree that her pictures were not too great but I could not have been happier with our cake! So definitely find a picture for her to go from. I will say that her cakes are very large so you may want to order for fewer people than you actually need. Our entire wedding group was eating the cake for the next 2 days. But it was kind of fun to have left overs! Ok I tried to attach some pics in a document - first one is of cake, one you can see gazebo, one dance floor, and the signature drink I chose to match the dresses . If this works, I will attach more. I don't have the professional ones yet, so these are just ones our friends have emailed. Let me know if you guys have any other questions. I will let you know about the video when I receive it. Lauren forum pics.doc

Hello ladies! We are back from Jamaica and thrilled about our entire wedding weekend. I will try to give as much info as I can, but feel free to ask any questions that you may have. Arrival: We were greeted with rum punch, happy faces, and Kerry was there to meet us right away which was so nice. Check in was seamless - we didn't have to do a thing - the concierge Richard was wonderful and knew everyone by name and made sure we were happy during our entire stay. The grounds: WOW! The minute we walked into Moon Dance Cliffs, we were blown away. The pictures surely do not do the place justice. The villas, the rooms, the pool, everything is so gorgeous! Brides - stay in the Poinciana villa - it is very nice, has the best views and the most privacy. Welcome night: You definitely want to organize a welcome party to get your weekend started. We left everything in the resort's hands and they did such a wonderful job. EVERYONE had a blast. We just had rum punch all night and they had an MC (Rachelle) who organized drinking games, dancing, great music/sound system, and the resort went well out of their way to keep us entertained. Rehearsal dinner: IF you are doing your rehearsal dinner outside of the resort, I have a few recommendations. We had ours at Ivans at the Catch a Falling Star resort and the food was wonderful and it was such a cute and intimate environment. The staff bent over backwards to make sure everything was the way we had described. They even hooked up a microphone for our toasts. It was just great. I will also say that we were able to eat at the Rockhouse and Pushcart and I think either of these would be very nice for a rehearsal dinner. Wedding: Kerry is absolutely wonderful. She is very organized, will plan meetings with you in the days before the wedding to make sure she knows how you envision your day. Even the things that I brought to do myself (fans, sand frame, tulle for the chairs, wish box) - she took it all from me on day one and prepared it for me and set it out for the wedding day. I didn't have to do a thing! They even distributed all of the OOT bags for us to our guests rooms. Kerry was present for our entire stay and always available so it became very clear to us why she may take a little while to respond to emails, it is because she is there for you for every minute of your wedding weekend!! Spa: Make sure Ross does your hair/make up, he is so good! I have never been so happy with my hair before and all of my bridesmaids were as well. One thing to be careful of is the time. I probably would not have had him do all of my bridesmaids and myself and mother if I knew he was going to be doing all of them himself - he needs more assistants to get that many people done on the wedding day. But he does a GREAT job. DJ: We used Kevan Stewart ([email protected], JA Wedding DJ - Jamaican Dj, Jamaica Wedding Music, Weddings, Parties, Jamaica Wedding Photographer, Music Equipment Rental). I would definitely recommend him. He has a really nice sound system, it sounded awesome for the music we chose for the ceremony. Also, we paid him to stay thru 10pm and then planned to plug in our ipod after that, and he stayed until midnight and kept playing!! His music choices were perfect, he really kept everyone on the dance floor all night and made fun announcements about us and was really interactive. Cake: We used Miss Myries ([email protected]) and were so happy. Not only was our cake the cutest wedding cake I have ever seen, but everyone was raving about how good it was too. We got chocolate cake with chocolate filling and vanilla rum frosting. So good! I recommend giving her a picture if you have something in mind. We did that, I found a photo on the knot website and the one she made really looked EXACTLY like it! Flowers: We used Rosemarie Williams with Floral Fantasy (Floral Fantasy; Flowers for All Occasions from Negril, Jamaica, [email protected]). We went pretty simple - red and pink roses for myself and the bridesmaids. We also got table centerpieces for the reception and wrist corsages for the female family members. Everything was very reasonably priced and beautiful. Photography: We brought a photographer from home and I would not recommend this. We were really looking forward to the trash the dress day and it was a big mess just because she didn't know the area at all. We were driving around in the heat trying to find places and it was a long and exhausting day. I know it would have gone smoothly if we had used someone local. The people I talked to before we decided to bring someone were Brian Nejedly and Stacy Clarke ([email protected]). Videography: We used Roxroy. Not sure I can comment yet, as I did not see him very much on the wedding day and I won't have the video for a month. Let me know in a month if you are considering using him and I can tell you how the video turned out. Overall Moon Dance Cliffs was an absolute dream wedding venue. The people were wonderful, the grounds were beautiful and our guests are telling us it was the best wedding they have ever seen! Let me know if I can help in any other way! I don't know if this will let me post pictures, but if I figure it out I will do that soon. Lauren

Thought you guys getting married at MDC would like to hear that I received the most organized "overview" of our wedding weekend from Kerry. It even included things that we have planned the days prior that don't involve wedding events. I am so impressed - it really leaves no questions unanswered! Now I can relax a little. Yay!!

I just emailed the wedding coordinator and she is going to arrange a room for my fiance to sleep just the night before the wedding, and then the first time we will see each other that day will be when walking down the aisle!

I am getting married at MDC soon and also have 40 guests. We are doing the rehearsal dinner at Ivan's. They have been great about communicating by email. It's really casual, outdoors with great views and has GREAT food reviews!! Check them out on trip advisor.

Of course Meitra, I will do my best to post a "review" after my wedding like some of the previous brides have, of all of the vendors, resort, etc. That way those of you who haven't decided on vendors yet will have some input. Happy planning!

Thanks for these postings, and thanks for posting the email Mallory. I like the idea of there being a designated event director. That will definitely help keep things going smoothly. I really hope the brides from last weekend and this weekend post about their experiences (and say that all went great! It definitely helps to get advice from those who just got married at your resort. You guys can count on me to fill you in after my wedding! I just got some of my OOT bag stuff in the mail and that got me really excited. If you guys haven't used the etsy website yet, check it out, there is some really great personalized stuff you can order for your wedding. I just ordered my caketopper on there and I can't wait to see it. Hope planning is going well.

So I did hear back from Kerry. I was happy with her email and she does seem pretty organized as far as everything we have planned for the 3 day wedding weekend. So I feel better! She told me there was a wedding this past Wednesday and another one this weekend. So hopefully those brides are on here and will post. Please let us know your experiences and what you are happy you did and what you wouldn't do again and pictures!

Wow that is tough. I think you need to figure out a way to make the veil work (even if just for the ceremony) since she made the nice gesture. Do you have a picture of the side hair you are wanting to do?

Still nothing from Kerry and Linus.... Mallory57, thanks for posting the DJ info. We booked him yesterday! Great deal and I think it will be totally worth it so that we don't have to worry about downloading songs at the last minute!

I sent Kerry and Linus a long email today with all of my questions/concerns. We shall see...

Did anyone see the trip advisor wedding review posted today? Makes me a little nervous considering that my wedding is at MDC in only 3 weeks!

milejilo, everyone is raving about your wedding pics and I can't seem to view them anymore through the link. It is asking me to enter your email address? I would love to see them!

I felt the same, but thought I shouldn't skip it all together. So I am doing a split dance with my dad, uncle, step dad. At least it breaks it up and its only one awkward minute with each of them!

I thought it would be fun for the guests to get out of the resort and see more of Negril. I was also a little worried about it feeling just the same as the wedding reception dinner, which would make the wedding night less special if the guests were feeling like it was just the same as the night before. Those were just my thoughts, but I am sure MDC would do a great job with a rehearsal dinner!

Hi Meitra. We looked into both the Rockhouse and Ivans. Ivans is at the catch a falling star restaurant. We ended up choosing Ivan's because it was cheaper, better food reviews, and more casual. They are working on getting us a microphone for speeches and even decorating in the colors we requested. BUT Rockhouse has amazing views and looks like a really nice atmosphere. Hope that helps!