My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Where does the time go? It has been such a whirlwind that I am only now settling down and turning to this -- plus, I wanted to post a link to pix, which I did not have for a LONG time (more on that later).

There were so many little things that went wrong on August 21st. . . it rained, my cake was hideous, my florist forgot a boutouniere, my slip, which I changed at the last minute, was about 3 inches too long for me, so I had to cut it, and at different points in time, it was ragged under my dress (the list goes on)...BUT, glitches and all, it was one of the most amazing days of my life. The feeling of the day, of standing beside my husband under the huppah, are permenantly etched in my brain. So...to all you 'yet to bes', my advice is do everything you can to make it a great day, and realize, as one of my bridesmaid's said to me, of the rain that forced us inside that day, 'It's just g-d's way of showing you that you can't control EVERYTHING.' Try to savor the moments -- and try to spend as much time as you can with your new spouse (I know that sounds crazy, but I feel like I logged only about 20 mins with mine).

I decided to grade on a 'pass/fail' recommend/don't recommend basis, but to provide as much detail as possible since I have found that I tend to read these reviews more to learn about everyone's experiences overall.

First things first. My husband and I did a secular form of precana (sp?) that I would highly recommend to anyone interested in something like this. It is a company called Marriage Success Training and it's overall goal is to equip you with skills you will need to enjoy a long and happy marriage. The teachers, a married couple, were wonderful, and I actually ended up learning a thing or two about my then husband to be. I definitely recommend it -- as well as recommending some sort of premarriage counseling in general.

Rev. Laurie Sue Brockway -- I could not begin to say enough wonderful things about the Rev. Laurie Sue. She met with us several times in advance of the wedding, really invested the time necessary to get to know us a little and personalize our ceremony. She did a spectacular job of helping us structure a ceremony that was personal and meaningful to us -- even sent us a script of it to have as a momento! We got a lot of rave reviews of her, right there on the spot, and so many people told us afterwards that there wasn't a dry eye in the house during the ceremony! We loved her, and I very highly recommend her.

Macy's Bridal -- got my veil and dress at the Macy's Manhasset. They were silmultaneously the best and the worst. Again, I think the answer is that you get what you pay for. I got a dress that I LOVED, and would have paid a lot for, on sale for under $400. So that's part of the best. Since I live in DC, I had hoped to work with a local Macy's, but they turned out to be incredibly disinterested in servicing a dress they didn't sell me. So, the Manhasset Macy's took me back for alterations and final cleaning/servicing. That's the rest of the best. Unfortunately, everything after that was horrible. The seamstress was lazy, and did not want to make alterations to the dress for me beyond that absolutely necessary, with the result that my dress bodice did not fit (because I had lost weight) as it should have, and when I went for my final fitting, the dress was uneven in the back (which she tried to convince me was deliberate, and that I would actually thank her for it). There are actually pictures of me that I can't use because my dress front is gaping, and others where my dress looks tipped backwards, higher in the front, longer in the back. Unreal. In addition, despite making clear that I had a time constraint, and needed it by a certain time, my veil was late, and would have had to be rushed out to me in Montauk by Macy's if I hadn't had family who were able to pick it up for me. The worst, though, is that my dress was DIRTY when my step mother went out to pick it up. They spot cleaned it right there, but I was astounded that they would have released a dress for wear in that condition. I would not recommend them.

Glass Slipper -- I found these guys on the web, but they had a store in Alexandria, VA, close to me. It's a cute store, exclusively dedicated to bridal wear, with tons of shoes and handbags. I recommend it to anyone who's looking for a concentrated selection of bridal shoes and accessories.

Iliene Florals - Teresa is a miracle worker. She did such a spectacular job for me, within my budget, all things considered. The day of my wedding, after setting up on the beach, she hauled butt to move everything inside and make sure everything was perfect. She is a dedicated, beautiful person, and I was thrilled with everything she did. She is very professional, as well, and presented me with written, detailed estimates, for everything -- and redid them 4 times for me to try to accommodate my desire to stay within a particular budget. She worked creatively with the flowers that were available at that time to create the effect I desired. She is an artist, not just a florist, and it shows! I highly recommend Teresa.

JadeArtFX -- I used Jade for my make up and was thrilled with her. She did airbrush for me, and did exactly what I wanted - nice and natural, enhancing what I am without covering it up. She is another true artist (and she has very gentle hands, which was huge for me!) I highly recommend Jade.

Gurney's Inn -- we chose this place for its water views, in hopes of having an outdoor ceremony. That didn't work out so well, and unfortunately for us, many of our pictures are marred by the somewhat unattractive interior at Gurney's. Their main ballroom was/remains just fine for our purposes -- doesn't really stand out one way or another. Now, the people were great, and did a terrific job, overall, hustling around to make it all work (including finding a loaf of bread just before the ceremony for the bread blessing that I forgot to tell them about!). My maitre d' was AWESOME -- and he ran his butt off all night keeping everything just perfect. The thing I am maddest about, I guess, is how horrible (and I'm not exaggerating here), my cake came out. An honest word from them, and I would gladly have outsourced the job, but my coordinator talked their pastry chef up as though he were the next Martha Stewart. 'He can make ANYTHING,' they told me - -just give us a picture of it. Famous last words. I ended up with a cake that looked like it had been made by a 7th grade home ec class (and that's being generous). OK, enough said. Bottom line: you get what you pay for. I had such a spectacular experience overall that I would not change a thing - except that *&^% cake. (I'm SO not exaggerating about the cake by the way -- people who love me enough to tell the truth have looked at pix and said 'that is one UGLY cake.' )

Music by Michael -- like many who choose him, my husband and I were looking for someone professional, who would not be center stage during the wedding, but who would keep things moving. Michael delivered all that, and then some. We sought, and received, a total class act. Plus, despite my having done almost NOTHING in advance to choose music, he completely worked with me at the very last minute, literally up until the day before the wedding, to nail my ceremony music. I had made CDs as wedding favors that included certain 'mandatory songs' (first dance, father dance etc) as well as other songs that were somehow representative of something about my husband and myself, or our relationship. That's pretty much all I gave him -- and told him to do his thang. He wove so many of our songs in -- it was amazing -- and managed to figure out who we were from those selections and play music that was just exactly right. There was never a moment when I was aware of the music being 'wrong' and, to me, that means it was always just right. I highly recommend Michael -- he's the real thing.

Duet Photo/Video -- I have had a rocky road with Duet, but I'm still keeping my fingers crossed that I will like what I end up with, so I'm not going to make a recommendation just yet. Two disclaimers. First, I'm very into photography, so my standards are very high. Second, I get very frustrated by vendors that provide what I think is poor customer service. Like Macy's, Duet has been a good/bad situation for me. On the plus side, I have quite a few pictures that I think are really really great. The day of the wedding, Sung, Alberto, and Hong could not have been friendlier or nicer. They could, in my opinion, however, have been a little more 'take charge' of things. They get lots of raves on here for being 'inobtrusive' which is great for photojournalistic stuff (which I think they do best anyway), but IMO, they were not proactive about posed shots. There are posed pictures where people are not looking at the camera and they snapped the picture anyway without 'directing' the scene. They took no initiative to seek out a 'rain' alternative for the pictures, despite having shown up HOURS before we were scheduled to start my pre-wedding shoot. As a consequence, and to be 'quick and easy,' all of my family portraits with my husband and I both in them are in front of a hideous dark paneled wall with glass and brass portholes in it that was just outside our reception area. Beyond cheesy, and unnecessary as there were other sites that had better light and were more attractive. In addition to hating my portraits, they took almost NO pictures of our non-family guests. The only table shot they took was one that our cousin had set up already and was taking for himself. I think it's more of the 'inobtrusive' stuff. I didn't have a lot of tables. I just think that they could have taken a candid or two of the room, in segments, to cover it -- I have essentially no idea who was even there. Now, here's, in my eyes, more poor customer service. I had read someone's review that they filter their pix, and emailed them to see if they had any pictures they hadn't given me. In response, they contradicted themselves and claimed that, no, they don't do that -- they now claim that the only pictures I don't have are those that didn't develop properly. They also claim that I don't have table shots because they didn't get to spend as much time with me before the wedding because I live out of state and so didn't KNOW to take them. Again, on the flip side, I got some AMAZING photojournalistic shots from them, but I'm not sure which I'll want more 10 years from now.

In addition, I had an overpayment situation with them which could have been an honest mistake, but it kind of disturbed me that they never mentioned it until I mentioned it. I overpaid them by $1000 dollars!! And only did so because my sister in law, who was handling my money, didn't know that I had prepaid by check more than a week before the event - and since they came up to us to be paid, apparently neither did they. Nicole actually told me at one point that she wasn't sure if it was their tip, suggesting to me that they did, in fact, know that I had overpaid, but decided to just keep it. Then, after all that, it took almost 2 months to get my proofs in -- and then, after I gave them the TY picture, they screwed up the order and picked the wrong picture. Luckily I had it all in emails that I could send to them, but I was not happy -- and was even more unhappy that I had to argue with Nicole about it to PROVE that I had ordered the correct photo. She kept saying what I picked was a group photo and did I want 'a group photo as my thank you?' She only conceded their mistake when I scanned the proof I had picked and sent it to her SHOWING her their numbers on the backs of the pictures -- but she then blamed it on their lab. She did, however, immediately correct the situation. So I discovered the screw up on Saturday, told her about it on Monday, and by Thursday, had my corrected thank you pictures to begin sending out.

I know it seems like I'm ranting, but I'm actually just trying to give full disclosure about what I've experienced. I am still hopeful that everything is going to work out great, and that I will get everything I've ever hoped for. I think it's possible that, with all the fans they have on here, they have just gotten far busier than they are able to provide good customer service. I'm meeting with them in early Dec. to go over my proofs, the album etc. and will report more later. In the meantime, here's a link to the 'best' of my Duet pictures. http://www.ofoto.com/BrowsePhotos.jsp?showSlide=true&Uc=r7w0n7r.82yvg6bf&Uy=-kdfgqc&Upost_signin=BrowsePhotos.jsp%3fshowSlide%3dtrue&Ux=0

Those are my main vendors -- I had a lot of help with other aspects of the wedding. My sister in law needlepointed a personalized ring bearer pillow for me, one of my bridesmaid's got me really cool flip flops with Swarovski crystals on them (they were amazing!), and my brother got us our crystal toasting glasses.

I used the internet a lot for everything else -- I got bubbles, bridesmaids gifts, and seating card holders from The Knot, ordered starfish from some biology website and made starfish magnets with supplies from Michael's, burned CDs (made labels with Acoustica software), ordered a wholesale lot of flip flops from Ebay, got single pack suntan lotions from a school health website, ordered my signing platter from WeddingShowerGifts.com, and got beach balls and water guns from Rhode Island Novelty.com. I ordred bags and tissue paper from NashvilleWraps.com, and got little gift bags to hold the magnets at the dollar store.

Hope this all helps -- mine was a magical day, and I wish each of you out there the same sunshine that rained down on us all day.

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

I am glad that you had a great time.

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

I am so glad you had a magical day. Congratulations to you!!! I too am a Duet bride using Sung and I appreicate your honesty about your experiences. I hope they can compensate you in some form for being disappointed with your portrait-type shots.

I would love to see your Duet pics, but the link you provided requires me to create an account, and even though it is free, I am wary of giving personal information unless absolutely necessary (every website seems to require this nowadays and it can get out of hand). Any chance you could paste some into the thread or use shutterfly, which doesn't require a password or sign in to browse? I really would love to see the bride!!

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Thanks for letting me know - it doesn't do it for me when I test it, but that's probably because I'm an AOL member! I would never have known. . . I'll try to import everything to OFoto ASAP.

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

congrats!

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

I've updated the photo link from AOL to Ofoto -- let me know if it's still acting funky. Thanks all, and thanks for the warm wishes. It was definitely therapeutic writing the review -- like, at some level, it's officially 'over.'

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Congrats!

I understand where you are coming from with Duet but those Ofoto pics look beautiful to me.

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

congrats...

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Sorry about the Duet thing.....but it sounds like everything else was great! Ok, except for the rain!!

Congratulations to you!!

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Thanks Diamondgrlie!!

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Everything really did go great overall LeighDVM -- the rain only bummed me out because of its disasterous impact on my pictures.

The ceremony ended up being even more wonderful, I think, for being squished into the little space we had to use. It was really warm, and intimate, and I'll remember it forever. Not sure being out in the vast expanse of the beach would have felt quite the same (there's my silver lining!).

How was your wedding Janine??

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

everything sounds like it went beautifully! sorry about your duet experience though....
they're actually my top choice for photography/videography, but your experience has given me second thoughts...

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Thanks for posting the pics on a different site. I think the ones you posted are beautiful and enjoyed seeing them. You looked beautiful. Congrats again on your marriage!

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Looks like you had a wonderful time!!! Congrats! You look beautiful!

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

the pictures are beautiful and I loved your table with candles and everything, looked amazing

Re: My August 21 Wedding Review - With Pictures

Thanks Aga - I have to say that I loved our little sweetheart table. It was set up beatifully, and our vantage point in the room was amazing. It was like this really cozy little home base for us!!