Moon Dance Cliffs

[claudette]

Quote:

Originally Posted by big3n09 Claudette CONGRATS!!! everything looked very nice, especially you! I have a question I have the option to do AI for $125pp per day which is a bit much to me because I don't really like AI since I'm always on the go but do you think it's worth it and how was the alcoholic beverages if you or any of your guest had them, that's the real question, LOL

Thank you! That's a really great question - and one that was sprung on me at the last hour from a couple of my guests who went to the Cliff's website and saw that it was all-inclusive so they thought that what they had paid for was AI! It was kind of a mess but everything worked out! Just a word of caution - Miriam told me that if one person wanted to do AI, the whole group had to do it! That's why we ended up NOT going with the AI option.

Because we did the rehearsal dinner at The Rockhouse, which my hubby and I paid for, and because the reception dinner is obviously already paid for as well, I just did not think it was worth doing the AI option. There were some drinkers on the guest list, who were slightly surprised by how expensive the alochol was, so what they did was go into town (about ten minutes away) the first day we arrived and pick up their own alcohol. That worked out very well and I personally would recommend that. You could save time and just do it on your way to the Cliffs from the airport, which is the something I would change if I could go back and do it all over again. We just wanted to arrive to the resort so badly that I didn't even think about stopping for groceries!

Hope this helps! Good luck planning and send over any other questions you might have!

Claudette

Oh, one more thing! Richard, who I just cannot say enough great things about, planned special all-inclusive dinner which included certian drinks, for about $30/person which we loved! We did one on Thursday night and it was delicious with jerk chicken and jerk pork and then they had this rum dance party afterwards where they had all sorts of games for us to do and it was SO much fun! He also did another all inclusive dinner on Monday night for the guests that were still there. So that's another thing to keep in mind when you're thinking about the AI.

[big3n09]

Thank you so much for the help, I was leaning towards not doing it cause our normal routine is to stop by the local store and get our own supply, LOL. I wasn't sure if it was one near but I will def keep that in mind and hopefully Richard will offer us some of those AI dinners during our stay. I'm so excited and I want to start putting our information out there to our guest but I want to make sure we are clear on our plans before confusing anyone. I want to do TTD photos so if you don't mind letting me peek at yours my email is misstiewill@aol.com. One last question before I let you be off to being wifey, I wanted to do a welcome dinner at Rockhouse cause I heard it was a nice and fun spot, how was that carried did you have a set menu or what. Thanks for ALL the help!!! Happy wishes goes out to you and your hubby for a wonderful life!!!

[claudette]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neha Claudette, gorgeous pics! You look amazing! Congratulations- glad the wedding was everything you hoped for. =) My update: still in planning mode... we got our plane tickets and so have our parents, so we're definitely getting married in November at MDC! (no matter who else shows up =) ). We are trying to figure out our reception decor right now...I really like the table runner with a few centerpieces look. I think we're going to go with that. One question- what is everyone doing for favors/welcome bags? I'm trying to find something small and useful for our guests! I found some seashell bottle openers that are cute, but I don't know... Anyway, I'm starting to get excited! Time's flying by! Hope everyone else is doing well.

Hi Neha!

Thank you! It certainly was everything I had wanted and hoped for! And I am sure that it will be the same for you!

My favors, which were the sandalwood fans that my friends and I had tied ribbons to in my colors, did not arrive until AFTER the wedding, so that's when I gave it to them! Lol! BUT I must say that there was such a nice breeze the wedding day that it may have been a blessing in disguise to NOT have the fans or they might have all over the floor in the pictures blowing away!

As for the welcome package, I went very simple but one thing I HIGHLY recommend, especially if you have family and friends like mine who always want to know what's going on, is putting a copy of everyone's flight information (I also emailed them the copy a couple of days before the wedding and a lot of them were on each other's flight and had no idea! This really helped with figuring out transportation, which Miriam and I arranged for everyone) and an itinerary - very important for the day of the wedding! Even with the itinerary, I felt like I was going to lose it with the amount of questions everyone was throwing at me! So I'm VERY glad that I had the itinerary or else there is no telling what I would have done to all the guests!

I also included a small picture album for each room in my color. I can attach a picture of the favors and the "welcome package" I did for everyone later as I'm not on the computer that has all the pics!

Hope this helps and good luck!!!

Claudette

[claudette]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sparkles8300 Claudette- Your wedding was out of this world BEAUTIFUL!!!!!!!!!!! I have the same colors and I am sooo glad that I do, because everything turned out so amazing. I love the rose/starfish arrangements that you had on the chairs lining the isle. Your dress is so pretty and you are one skinny bride (your pictures motivated me to get to the gym)! It looks like all of your guests had a blast! Where/how did you book DJ Paul? I really want to make sure that our DJ is really good and I watched some of your video and he seemed really fun and like he had good energy. Your cake was so pretty. I am trying to figure out how to steal a picture of your cake table b/c I want my cake to be that exact same thing (if you have a pic you could send me that would be so awesome Sparkles8300@hotmail.com). I also love the fact that they pulled off that slideshow for you. How cool is that!!!!!! At what point in the night did you suprise everyone with the fire dancer? After the cake cutting? Also, (sorry for a million questions) could you email me the link to your TTD shoot. We are doing our TTD at Moon Dance Cliffs & Villas during our honeymoon so any location suggestions would be awesome. I def want a picture of us holding hands and jumping off the cliffs. I am so happy for you guys & wish you the best with your new live as husband and wife!

Hi Leslie!

Thank you so much for the comments! And GREAT choice on the colors (haha!) Everyone LOVED them and while my mom was a bit hesitant that they too "loud" in that kind of environment they looked PERFECT! I was extremely pleased with how lovely everything looked! And Kerry really went above and beyond with making it look that way!

I was very pleased with the rose/starfish arrangment and loved that Rosemarie from Floral Fantasy did such a great job with it! I have to add however that we had been in contact beforehand and I wasn't sure how many rows of chairs we would have (b/c I didn't know how the Cliffs would arrange them). Rosemarie told me that it wouldn't be a problem and that if more were needed she'd have them ready. Well if you look at the rows, you will notice that the back row did not have them. Not a big deal at all and nobody really noticed. I didn't even tell Rosemarie - actually, I didn't even see her! So she might have corrected it had I told her. They were $35/piece and I was glad to see that the Cliffs moved them over to the reception site without me saying a thing!

I loved my dress! However, I got in an argument with the owner of the store I got the dress from - long story short I bought a dress off the rack, left it at the store for my dad to come by the next day, and when I came in the next day I had changed my mind and just did not want the dress! Well she was all huffy and puffy about it saying they have a strict no return policy which I said, well I don't want to return it, but can I exchange it? Well we went back and forth for awhile, but she finally let me exchange it for the dress you see in the pics - and I LOVED it! However, I think she deliberately ordered me a dress one size too small! I watched her measure me and I had to keep on correcting her! She would say a smaller number than what was on the tape! Then she was like, okay based on these measurements your size is X. And I was like, um, I think I should get size Y since it's easier to take something in than let something out. Well she ordered the smaller size! Ahh! But I made it my determination to "show her" by fitting into that dress!

Here's the link to my dress: ASM3050 - by Sottero & Midgley Absolutely LOVED it in the end!

I LOVED DJ Paul! He was AWESOME! THe MC was Oliver and he was quite hilarious! I absolutely love music so I actually created the list of songs I wanted and the order of them, and Paul was really happy with that! He actually said that he made a bunch of CDs from my songs for himself! Here's his email:

soundillusionent@hotmail.com

Oliver was with DJ Paul and had great energy! Very funny and danced with a lot of the guests, including my mother in law! Too cute! The only thing was that he had his wife/girlfriend with him - which was fine - but she actually caught my bouquet which I thought was a bit inappropriate. Going so far as to snatch it out of my friend's arms - yikes!

LOVED the cake! Turned out prettier than I imagined it! As I told Neha, I don't have the pics on this computer, but Brian mailed me a DVD with all the jpegs (and they are not copyrighted so I can share them with all my friends which is really nice!) so I will email you a picture when I get to the DVD! If you just want to let me know the number of the picture, that would be great!

As for the fire dancer, Oliver and Paul said that they would bring him out when the energy was down - well the energy was actually never down! So at one point (definitely after the cake cutting) they just asked us all to leave the dance floor for the surprise - turned out perfectly!

Okay, I think I covered everything except for TTD, which I am going to put in a separate post...

Please don't worry about the questions! I was JUST in the same position so I understand the millions of questions that go through your mind at any given moment! Hit me with them all!

Hugs,

Claudette

[claudette]

Since a couple of people have asked, I decided to just go ahead and post the TTD picture password here! It's junkerttd

 

The ones on the beach took place about 10 minutes up the road in just a public spot that Brian took us to. We were going to do it at the Villas (so Leslie I am sure that spot will be beautiful!) but there was a wedding going on that day and I just did not want to be on the beach in my wedding dress on someone else's day, you know what I mean?

 

The others are all taken in this amazing cave that Brian took us to! I am so glad because we would have never known about this place! It's so hidden and looks like someone's home! It's right across the street from PushCart Restaurant (right next door to The Rockhouse) and it's called something like Johnnys Cave and Bar or something like that...it's just an elderly woman who owns the property and charges $5 for you to go down into the cave. Warning: she will charge more if she sees you in a wedding dress!

 

The cave is something I recommend to everyone even if you are not doign a TTD shoot - it's a super fun excursion to do with the group and I highly recommend it! I'm sure if you come in a group, she'll give a break on the price too! Bring your snorkel gear and fyi while we were doing the TTD shoot there were actually a couple of snorklers who were dropped off by a glass bottom boat (since the cave opens up to the ocean) so that was actually very funny to be posing in a wedding dress in the ocean with snorklers next to us! Felt like a true model shoot! Hehe!

 

TTD was a blast and is something we will remember for the rest of our lives! It was sooo amazing and was so different - exceeded my expectations! If you can do one, please do! Oh, and the dress is completely fine! I immediately hopped in the shower after the shoot (I wish I had gotten a picture of that! It was so funny to be in the shower in your wedding gown!!!) and it was actually cleaner than the night before from the reception! So if that is your concern, don't let it be or just get a different dress.

 

Hope you like the pics!!!

[claudette]

In case you couldn't tell, I'm totally procrastinating from the real world of Thank You cards and work!

 

Okay, Rehearsal Dinner! Big3n09, I LOVED the restaurant at The Rockhouse - it was delicious! Since we were paying for it ourselves, we wanted to limit the menu a bit and so we created our own. My contact at The Rockhouse was Dwight Jackson. His email is: dwight@rockhousehotel.com

 

A word about The Rockhouse - I did not find them nearly as nice as the Cliffs or the people at Tensing Pen which is where we honeymooned for 3 nights. I might be biased at this point, but the people at the Cliffs were by far the nicest! Perhaps because they something to prove, but either way they were the nicest!

 

The Rockhouse has a beautiful location and the restaurant view is breathtaking at sunset but again I was not impressed by the staff - in fact, some were downright rude. They've won so many awards that I feel they just don't need to be nice anymore, which is a shame, but great for the Cliffs! I really want to see them succeed!

 

I can send you a copy of the rehearsal dinner menu - a lot of what we put was based on what we were eating the next night at the reception so we didn't want to repeat it. All in all the menu was a success and the rehearsal dinner beautiful!

 

The Rockhouse restaurant cannot do a private dinner, which was fine for us. But if you do want a private dinner their new restaurant, the Push Cart - located right next door is available for private dinners. Their food is more casual and more authentic, and with us having very picky eaters as guests, we opted for the regular restaurant.

 

I would definitely recommend the Rockhouse restaurant for the views and the food! Everybody had a great time and it was nice to be out and about and see some more of Negril!

[big3n09]

Claudette -Thanks for all the advice and sharing your pictures.

[negrilbridetoo]

Wow Claudette! You did an outstanding job in planning your wedding. You looked absolutely stunning!!!! You guys are a very cute couple. I have chosen the same colors for my wedding at the Moon Dance Villas. Your pictures are so beautiful!!

Congrats to you and your new hubby!!

[negrilbridetoo]

How was your cake? It looked beautiful!! Who was the baker? Thanks!

[big3n09]

For the those of you that have already booked DJ/Band what was required to book them a deposit or anything? I want to book the music and photographer first then the rest should be easy.