Generations Riviera Maya 2015 Weddings (And 2014 Too)

[rtscent]

@@CnBWedding you should consider asking a wedding guest who is not apart of your wedding party to host your wedding reception. Maybe a funny uncle or a friend who is good on the mic...you will also have to prepare a timeline and a script for your host so he knows when to make announcements and what to say.  A tip for your playlist is to consider Spotify. I had family members from Panama who wanted to hear songs you can't find on Itunes and we were able to find just about everything on Spotify. You can download the app onto any computer, ipad, or phone and have your DJ pull songs from there. We sorted our playlists by themes. For example (dinner music) (dance music) (cake cutting music) (line dancing) etc. This way your DJ and Host can switch gears really easily throughout the night. At my wedding everybody kept wanting to do the wobble, so we kept playing it! We had a nice reggae mix for my central american and west Indian relatives too. You can also make the playlists available offline so if there is a WIFI issue, it won't stop the music. Good luck, everything will be great.

[rtscent]

@@Christinagiovanni your pictures turned out gorgeous. I agree with the flowers and gift favors, a huge stress over nothing.

[acw271011]

I got married in August at generations. We did the chapel for the ceremony (I wanted a traditional feel in a destination) and it worked perfectly.. And guests were nice and comfortable in the air condition.. Cocktail hour was on the rooftop and reception on the pier. Luiz was our butler he was amazinggg.. Coordinators on site were okay they did their job. I worked with Ingrid the whole time planning and she's an off site coordinator i would of liked her to be my onsite but it was fine. The hotel was beautiful majority of my guests had the rooms with the pools on the balcony they loved that. The restaurants were very good, hotel overall was very clean and everything is brand new and very modern. ive attached some photos for you future brides any questions about the hotel feel free to ask

 

I saved a lot of money by not doing flowers for the tables or bouquets for the girls (it didn't even matter no one noticed and the money was saved) I didn't do welcome bags and no one cared I did a favor at the wedding instead. There's so many things to cut out and save money on .. Originally I had everything u could imagine planned and as we got closer I realized it was a waste so I saved the money on it.

 

I had 80 guests come and everyone had a great time... If anyone needs help email me cferraro722@@gmail.com for a quicker response Enjoy the pics

 

Your photos are beautiful! Congrats!

[girlinthecity97]

@@CnBWedding - I agree with @@rtscent regarding having another guest who isn't in your bridal party emcee.  That's what we did.  One of our guests is pretty chatty and whitty so we asked her in advance if she would do the honors then let our onsite coordinator know who she was.  In case she was tipsy we also had a friend who doesn't drink on hand as back up.  The backup also was helpful in making sure our friend and the coordinator connected.  

 

As for songs I like @@rtscent idea of checking Spotify.  I just used iTunes to make sure I was capturing the right song title for the versions I wanted played.  I wasn't sure how/where Mega DJ would be pulling from but figured as long as I snagged the official title we'd be ok and we were. 

 

I can't believe you are only 5 weeks away! SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO excited for you! Are you getting nervous/excited? 

 

Married life is going well!  Dear hubby has traded one round of stress for another. We've been on a whirlwind trying to finish decorating/furnishing our house. We have both sets of parents coming for Christmas so that should be interesting (and exhausting) to say the least.

@@Christinagiovanni - CONGRATS! I love your decorations!  Your pics are awesome

[CnBWedding]

@@rtscent @@girlinthecity97 thanks for the tip re spotify.  That will probably work better, I'm sure I can find more of the obscure stuff on there.  Unfortunately we don't really have any other viable options for an MC.  We have less guests than expected and a lot of the guests on my side aren't the best public speakers or have really strong accents.  There is no one else we feel comfortable asking.  We will figure something out.  I'm staying positive!

 

I am a little nervous and excited but can't wait for the time to come.  I'm kinda over planning at this point, lol.

 

@@Christinagiovanni your pictures are gorgeous!  I think I saw some of your pics on ig while browsing the Generations hashtags.  I hear you on the money saving stuff.  In retrospect we could have gone much more simple and not done welcome bags or flowers.  But we found a vendor (not Vanessa) who quoted us MUCH cheaper than Generations and even Vanessa for ceremony, centerpieces, boutonnieres, etc. the whole bit.  In the end one thing I've heard from several brides on here is that lots of things turn out to be not as important as you think.  All people really care about is good food and music.  One question: did you get to rehearse?

[Christinagiovanni]

@@CnBWedding

 

Yeah for the menu we had the the Italian family style dinner but I had them plate the appetizer and pasta and not just leave it on the table for my guests to serve themselves. I had them place 2 large plates on the table for the main course and that's all my guests served themselves was the dinner .. I added in the lobster tails and lamb chops as extras which was veryyy goood.

 

We did have a rehearsal .. I grabbed my guests the night before and we went to the chapel and I organized it all. Didn't need a coordinator to be there with me or anything we did it on our own .. It's important to go through the motions with your bridal party so they know what to expect and what to do. It worked out great everything was wel organized

@@CnBWedding I browsed through some posts and saw u were concerned about the beach.. The beach is fine I attached a picture for you.. And honestly majority of my guests were with me for 6-7 days and we never went to the beach we hung out in the pool the whole time and at the pool bar .. No one cared to much to be on the beach when everything is by the pool.. Even the outdoor BBQ spot is on the side of the pool so it was convenient to jump out of the pool and grab a bite to eat

Also I must add that I was very happy choosing the end of August for a wedding date. It rained one day the whole week for a couple hours in the morning and that was is. The hotel itself might of had 10 people there other than my guests which I LOVED. I had 80 people who everyday whether we were at breakfast or at the pool or at dinner or in the lounge at night it was always all of my guests everywhere .. We basically had a private event every night .. Lol, may June July are popular months but busy months as well so there's always going to be more people booked at the hotels. There always wasn't any lurkers or strangers in any of my Pictures from guests outside of my wedding party because like I said maybe there was 10 people there lol

And the only flowers I did was

 

Rose petals for the reception tables

Bouquet for my maid of honor

Boutonnière for my dad, my husbands dad, and the best man

Corsages for my mom and my husbands mom

@@Kalie25

 

Don't get your heart set on locations until you go to the brides dress rehearsal. Even after I attended I still changed my locations lol. I originally was doing sky deck for ceremony and reception on pier but I ended up doing the chapel for the ceremony & pier for the reception. I attached pics in the above posts.

 

Dont waste your money on flowers if you don't care for it I also attached photos of my decor in the above posts. I only did rose petals on the table and saved myself $1500 in Centerpieces. I also did large vases next to my Dias and only my maid of honor had a bouquet. At the end it made no difference and saved a lot of money.

[girlinthecity97]

@@CnBWedding - I think you will be just fine having your bridal party member doing it. Keep in mind this is a destination wedding and more importantly, YOUR wedding so there are no hard and fast rules to follow. Go with who you think will do the best job. Everyone will know that person is part of your party by their attire and the fact they saw them stand with you guys!  Everyone is right re not sweating things like that. As the clock wound down on me, I started picking and choosing what mattered most (e.g., ditched doing programs & my own menus b/c I figured they'd just go in the trash and the resort provided menus for free).  It sounds like you have everything under control so just savor and have fun!  

[CnBWedding]

 @girlinthecity97  thanks for the reassurance!

 

@@Christinagiovanni it's interesting you noted how the Hotel wasn't busy during August.  I thought that wouldn't be a problem for us either since our wedding is in November but it turns out Generations and quite a few of the hotels in the area are sold out!  So looks like we will have packed surroundings.  I totally did not expect this but I'm ok with it.  It caused a few problems for last minute guests who wanted to book and now have to stay at other hotels miles away.  El Dorado, Azul, all sold out! 

[ErinSullivan]

@@girlinthecity97.  Thanks for the tips!  I feel like I have no clue what I am doing.  So if I use Mega DJ, they play music, but don't talk at all?

 

@@Christinagiovanni.  How did you get the candles and everything down there?  Did you mail it?  I want to do my reception on the Pier as well and your tables looked beautiful!  Can you send me your outside vendors contact info?  The Lomas flowers are so expensive!

 

@@CnBWedding.  What vendor are you using for flowers?

 

THANKS!!!

[Christinagiovanni]

@@CnBWedding i dont know what they consider "sold out" because they had said that my hotel was sold out as well.. & there was 10 people there besides my rooms lol. I mean i know the hotel only has 144 rooms (which is another reason i choose the hotel) but my guests only took up about 40 of them. I guess it depends on the check in/check out dates. try searching different search engines, I know the hotel sells rooms to search engines and maybe thats also a factor?? but there was no way my hotel was sold out even though thats what they said.
 
@@ErinSullivan the pillar candles are part of the "Pure Glamour" package. I also purchased a case of 75 votive candles from quickcandles.com  that i added to the tables as well & i brought those with me. My outside vendors are based in New york. My DJ & photographer are some of the best ones here in New york.. if you pay flight & hotel for them it waives the outside vendor fee. email me at cferraro722@@gmail.com if you want me to pass you their personal information. 
 
I attached a close up photo of my tables. Pillar candles (Pure glamour package) but you can ask them to quote you just on the candles if you don't want the entire package, along with votive candles, table numbers and some rose petals. It was perfect;)