Bo59rt

Didn't hit me until like, this week (I'm getting married on 12/7/2013) lol. Trying on the dress and all that was like ok, i'm getting married, but now that i'm doing all the planning with Royal Romance and doing the favors and what not its like holy crap I'm getting married! lol

Less than two weeks! Congrats!! yeah I would be probably freaking out by my two week mark.

 

How early do you plan to get your dress? My BFF is coming to visit in a few weeks to go dress shopping with me but I'm wondering if it's TOO early to actually buy it. Should I wait?

 

Anyone want to post pics of the dresses they are thinking about?

I started dress shopping 11 months out. Bought mine at 10 months. You want to give yourself time to have your dress cone in and get it fitted. Mine took exactly 3 months to ship in. Bridesmaid dresses were 5 months. I'm not staying the fitting process until January though (wedding is in April).

Oh and no pictures since my fiancee is a cruise critic wedding board stalker. But as I have said before, I went with Stella York as the designer since they are very destination wedding-ish.

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Congrats!!!! Yes time is creeping closer and closer. But it still feels like its in slow motion because of the anticipation.

Second that! I have five months also and it seems far away but there is still do much to do. I'm staying to feel a time crunch because of that!

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yeah under tori bodin, pretty sure its a holloween profile picture

Any luck?

yeah she finally got back to me, supposedly we are handling full payment the day of and I guess talk times closer to the wedding or on the actual wedding day.... I'm getting slightly anxious since we have no contract for this, no money down, I know I probably wont, but I feel like we are going to be stranded. One good thing though is that I'm seeing her a week before for the wedding.

I am getting married while sailing on the Liberty next April. I am NOT Getting married on the Liberty for the exact reasons stated in the post above. We are getting hitched during the stop in St. Thomas and having ceremony and reception the island. You can go cheaper and have the ceremony on the island and the reception on the ship. But I want to have control over my wedding and I feel that with a ship board wedding you are just picking what options they will give you (to me seems very limited). So just throwing that out there.... there are other options to get married during a cruise. The only downside is that we will only have guests who are able to sail.

I always use a previous email when emailing Elisha or Janelle. I'm just going to keep emailing her weekly I guess.

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so I am getting slightly (probably closer to very) annoyed with Elisha right now. It has been about a month since I received the email from Elisha that the 7th was good, she could pick us up from the ship and it was XXX.00 amount of dollars. I have emailed her back a few times about updating the contract and setting up the initial payment for the second shoot. No word. don't you think she would want half of the payment now??? I'm just following the same route we took handling the wedding day photography.

Sorry to hear you aren't getting the answers you are looking for. I know it sucks when people take forever to get back to you. I'm in the same situation with my photographer. It will all be worth it though.

Hey girly....r u excited or what?!? Did you book second cruise yet?

 

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Yes, the second cruise is booked and so is Elisha! She agreed to pick us up from the ship and take u around before heading to a beach to do the trash the dress. Now my thing to worry about is if I can wear a swim suit under my dress so I can switch out of my dress on the beach, and not wear a sopping dress in a car. haha that would be a sight to see! My Fiancée and I are more excited for the vacation then the wedding, (well as of right now. we are getting sick of wedding planning :p) I love looking at Elisha's photo blog it gets me so much more excited!

Congrats! There are very few men who post on this forum so it will be interesting to see how a guy's take is on planning a wedding. I hope you do find some information on a Bahamas wedding, sorry I can't be of help all my research went into St. Thomas!

first things first.... Congrats! and what an awesome date to pick (your wedding will share the date with my birthday! :D) I don't think you are going to get any help from an "event coordinator" on the ship since you are not paying the ships outrageous prices for their weddings. I have heard of brides contacting the salon and having appts before they open if they have hairdressers who are willing to start early. I will be looking into that for my wedding since my normal hair dresser is one of my bridesmaids and she wants her hair done by someone else.

As for leaving on time, That will be on your guests. I would have them all meet in the atrium 10-15 mins before they are supposed to be off the ship. Then they can all walk off together. I would have a family member or a trusted friend lead the way for everyone else.

As for the farewell meeting. If you have a group booking of rooms I know you can call the groups department and set up an open bar hour in a lounge. The cost isn't super high. I think for the hour and passed apps it is around $12-15 a person. I don't think you will be able to have an actual private meal unless you book out the steak house. That's what we are attempting to do right now for a rehearsal dinner. you could always try and have everyone meet for a lunch at the fish & chips/pasta bar (whichever your ship has) since that is usually tucked away and not super crowded.

Hope this gives you some ideas!

We are getting married aboard the Carnival Liberty on April 5th, 2014. I ma very excitied as we have 7 rooms books, 18 people attending, colors picked out, and a theme. It is a 7 day amazing cruise that I cant wait to set sail on. I have been reading many threads about how beautiful the Liberty is. I am very nervous about the location as they are limited to venues. Does anyone know of someone getting married on the Liberty? How is the Taestry room?

I am on the sailing right before you. I am not getting married on the ship though, I am getting married on st Thomas. Liberty is a gorgeous ship, anywhere you are placed for your ceremony will be great!

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How long did it take for the "oh s*** I'm getting married soon!!" feeling kicked in???

I cannot believe it has been 10 months since we decided on a Caribbean wedding and only 5-6 more months to go! I guess it finally kicked in this weekend since we booked the 2nd leg to our wedding/honeymoon B2B, purchased our "so very us" wedding bands, had our last of the wedding party book; and pretty much finished all four bouquets. It has been a busy wedding weekend! now it is setting in...I'm getting married! :D

Bo59rt, your 100 percent right. No matter where you have your wedding something can happen and you just have to roll with the punches... So sorry to hear your Best Man backed out, don't worry a better option will come along. I love your positivity and I'm sure your wedding will be great. You sealed the deal for me I'm going to chuck it up to faith and roll with it. Destination shoreside cruise wedding here we come. What's meant to be will be. Thank you

I'm so glad I could help you out! (but if you do happen to have a huge problem with your wedding...shhh I didn't give you the ammo to make your mind up :D)

Your wedding will be great! you have so many more options with a shoreside wedding then one on the ship. I'm not going to lie, you can make this really stressful on yourself too; so just take it easy and attempt to enjoy every moment.

Since January I have had many highs and many lows, but all of this could happen with a normal stateside wedding. I'm not going to blame on my choice of a destination wedding. Don't take the same road as me and decide to handmake EVERYTHING! I am right now finishing my bouquets and in the middle of making my boarding pass invitations (including making my own envelopes to fit these things!) But I am having fun now and will be proud of myself when I look back and say I did it my way. and believe me, my fiancée can back this, this whole wedding is being done MY way. I don't do cookie cutter :D

Have a blast! I will be keeping an eye out for your progress and of course (hopeful) review with lots of pictures!

Bo59rt, Thank you so much, your explanation is perfect and extremely helpful. ... I have read great reviews about Janelle. I like that you were able to customize her set packages. I would prefer to go with an island coordinator but I'm worried what would happen if we missed that port for whatever reason.

I have that fear also, but you have to be able to roll with the punches I guess. I have heard of Embarkment weddings going haywire and island wedding with issues but it's something you have to be able to deal with when you don't have full control over your wedding. I asked Janelle about this and she said with hundreds of weddings under her belt only a handful have missed a port. And if your ship was to miss the port she attempts to refund you as much as she can. She told me usually the cake and flowers are what cause an issue then.

My problem is I'm afraid we are running the wedding too close to a time limit. If the boat is late to dock up, I am short shifted my reception; if there is an accident on the road back to the ship, we miss catching the ship.

I'm actually excited to see what life can throw at me with this wedding, heck we have already had our best man back out, what's next!

Bo59rt, Sorry for the gazillion questions, but thank you in advance.

JAC1213,

im going to break down your post....

did you book through the ship or an island coordinator?

I booked through Janelle at Island Bliss weddings I have the "Ultimate Cruise Ship Wedding Experience" which is on her website lists everything that it includes. (Inculdes transportation which was mentioned before as an "expensive" per person expense.)

Does your current cost include the cruise itself?

Nope, of course my fiancée is hooked on aft wraps so that bumped up our price by a pretty penny also.

Are you having music with dancing at your reception?

With my "Package" ( I say that lightly because I have pretty much changed everything on this package to suit what I want, with no issues from Janelle) I have a full blown reception which includes three hours of a DJ.

Does your price include round trip transportation for you and your guests?

Right now it includes two private cars from the ship, one for me and one for my groom so we can go to the court house to sign paperwork and not see each other. Also includes RT for all the guests from Ship, to beach, to reception site up on crown mountain, and back to ship.

Are you planning to tour the island on the wedding day, if not how do you feel about not being able to tour the island on your wedding day?

We will have little to no time to do anything other than the wedding. our schedule goes as:

10am ship docks

10:45 groom/best man leave ship on private car to go to Court house

11:00 bride/MOB/MOH leave ship on private car & Guests leave on safari buses

11:30 Bride arrives at beach, ceremony starts

12-1:30 Transportation to reception site/pictures taken/ Cocktail hour passed hour'dorves

1:30 -4:30 Reception (package also includes 3-course lunch and open bar, middle to top shelf alcohol)

5-5:15 guests back at dock

6pm ship leaves

I don't feel like they are missing out on anything, because this is my wedding day and that is what they are ultimately there for. However, they will get to ride along the coast to the beach, be on the beach for the wedding, take a "very scenic" ride up the mountain and have vista views at the reception site (Villa Botanica). The site is also an old plantation and National botanical garden which to me will be a lot to peruse and has gorgeous views of Charlotte Amile (Cruise ship bay).

Does your beach ceremony include chairs for your guests?

yes it does. If you wanted to look more into the package its all on Island bliss Weddings website.

Hopefully you get some help from all of this!!! We had to make a compromise between my Fiancée and I, He wanted easy going, I wanted traditional so this is how we worked it out. He has beach and I have a full blown wedding/reception!

We are still in the planning stages with our wedding planner on St. Thomas for our April 1, 2014 wedding and our total so far is closer to the 11k mark. We can have 30-45 guests in this price range and this is including the beach ceremony (was an upgrade cost from a cliff side wedding) and full 4 hour reception. Also upgraded to a photographer more to our style, and an upgraded food and cake option. Lets see if this goes any higher, still a lot cheaper than a full blown stateside wedding!

Congrats!!! I can feel all the excitement of the weekend just from reading your first post!

we have the wedding day booked and she is aware of the second day but I told her I wouldn't book until with book the second cruise. We are planning on booking the second cruise by the end of the month so hopefully she is still available.

Jaxie thanks for getting back to me! We are debarking in Miami and then flying to san Juan and doing a southern carib for a honeymoon. Or first stop is st Thomas again, and since it's just going to be us I was hoping she could "escort" is to the best picture spots she can think of! I just felt weird asking if it didn't seem like a normal thing.

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Jaxie!

Hopefully you are still lurking the boards!

I know we have discussed your gorgeous wedding pictures by Elisha Orin a month or two ago, and I have since booked her for my wedding but I also want to book her for another day for a trash the dress. I think I recalled you saying that she picked you up from the ship. Did she include this in your time or did you have to pay anything extra? Did it seem like this is something she does often? Thanks!

And we're doing the get married then kick everyone off so we can be alone on our Honeymoon :). Don't want a family Honeymoon.. Lol

Congrats! I'm guessing your talking about an embarkment wedding and then cruise on your own? Should be fun, we wanted to get married on a specific island so everyone is coming with us! But then we get off the ship fly to PR and do the cruise by ourselves. So I def agree with the honeymoon has to be family-free. I keep justifying a b2b because I will need a vacation after the wedding vacation! Happy planning!

Ps- the only thing I know about weddings through the ship is that pictures get really expensive, so keep an eye on that.

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And Bo59rt- We have been thinking of doing an aft balcony...we may have to upgrade.

I have never been in a straight aft balcony (have many first timers in them tho, hope they like them!!), but we have done an aft wrap before (and for the wedding) and def worth the splurge! Our best man has the "bowling alley" balcony on the port side of us, and a bridesmaid next to him....which means get the dividers all opened up and we have one majorly long balcony!

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Smart thinking on the cabin location :)

 

We started out cruising years ago, first ocean view, then we would only do balcony cabins......now all we do is suites! I'd definitely say that you are in trouble ;)

we are hooked on aft wraps which is my wedding cruise room! (haven't booked our (different ship) b2b yet for the honeymoon room:D:D) and we have most of our party booked right near us.... never thought of having everyone book away from us as a good thing (possibly reconsidering that choice).

It will be interesting trying to find the room big enough for all the girls to get ready in.... we have the aft wrap, extended balconies next to the wrap and a lot of aft balcony rooms between two floors. Will be an interesting day!