5/16/08 Larkfield Manor, ADA Studios, Infinite Video, FM Entertainment, Flower Barn, Royalty, & more!! PLUS SANDALS ANTIGUA!
LIW – My wedding would not have been the same without all of your help and inspiration! I picked all of my vendors based on reviews on this site and I’m so glad that I did! It was so nice to have a place to talk about everything good and bad about planning a wedding. Thank you to all of you and I wish you all nothing but happiness and love!
Save the Date Magnet
Magnetstreet.com – 10
I loved our STD’s! I loved the gerber daisies, they just screamed spring to me, so I ended up with that as our theme based on this magnet! They were great to work with and everything came on time and perfect!
Bridal Shower
George Washington Manor (Roslyn) – 10
I loved my shower! I actually researched places for my mom and Bridal Party to have it at. I found GWM and checked it out with my mom and we loved it. They have so many different rooms. We picked the Teddy Roosevelt room. They did a great job the day of, the service was unbelievable! The food was delicious and so was the champagne punch! I highly recommend them for all occasions!
Invitations
Now-and-forever.com – 10
I looked at invites online for a long time. I finally found one that DH and I loved! It was elegant and had a small picture of daisies on it. Exactly what I wanted. I loved the sample, but when I went to order them, silly me changed the font style and color, thinking it would look better. The next day I looked at the online proof again and I didn’t like it. I called customer service in a panic and asked if they could change it back to what the sample looked like. They caught everything right before they were about to be printed! They called me back and said that they caught them and that everything would be fine. I really appreciated their customer service. They were so nice, even though it was my mistake, and called me back right away when everything was done. When they arrived I felt like it was Christmas! I loved the quality and everything was printed perfectly!
Mother Nature…..well she can bite me! In the end, the weather really didn’t matter, despite the fact that it rained alllllll day! It actually created a whole new vibe to the wedding (in a good way) and it was such a beautiful day!
Hair & Make up
Tapestry Salon (Centereach) – 10
They did a great job on both my hair and make up! It was exactly what I wanted and held up all day, even with the rain! They also did the two girls in my bridal party and their hair was gorgeous. They did my mom’s hair and make up too and she loved it. There are a great group of ladies working at this salon and I highly recommend them! They also did my color a few weeks before the wedding and that came out great too, since I’ve been dying it myself for years! Their prices are very reasonable as well.
Bridal Gown, Veil and MOB Gown
Paradise Bridals (Patchogue) – 9
I’m probably one of the few girls on here who have given them a good review, but they did do a great job with my gown. From the start, Elaine was awesome to work with. I went there three times and tried on a lot of gowns every time! I actually found my dress at another store, but wanted to order it closer to my mom’s house so that it would be easier for her to come to my fittings. They matched the price from the other place (since it was cheaper), so I thought that was nice. The reason why I didn’t give them a 10 is because sometimes they don’t seem to care after you’ve ordered your dress. I hadn’t seen my dress in 10 months and when I went for my first fitting the woman was like “OK go in there and tell me when you need help”. I was like “OMG that’s my dress!” I was all excited and she was like “Yeah, let me know when you need help”. I felt like they could’ve been nicer. But overall they did a great job on the alterations. I also loved my veil, which Elaine helped me pick out. I kept it on all night!
My mom’s dress was beautiful too, but SHE had to tell the seamstress what to do! If my mom didn’t speak up they would have just hemmed it. It needed to be taken in, in a lot of places and when they finally did it, it came out great. You just have to stay on top of them, and check everything that they do.
My dad also got his tux from the shop inside Paradise Bridals. They were great to work with and my dad looked great! The price was very reasonable as well.
Bridesmaid & Flower Girl Dresses
David’s Bridal (Westbury) – 10
I really wanted a certain shade of yellow for their dresses and I loved David’s Bridal “canary” color. We ordered the dresses and they came in two weeks! The flower girl dress was so cute too and that came in really quick as well. None of them needed alterations so that was great!
Shoes
Sandy’s (Massapequa) – 10
I loved my shoes, even though no one saw them! They’re prices are really reasonable. I saw the same shoe at a few places and it was five dollars more than Sandy’s.
Headpiece
Barrons in the Tri County Flea Market – 10
I loved my headpiece and DH actually picked it out! Barron’s has so many and I couldn’t decide so I brought DH and he picked the perfect one!
Tuxedos
Tuxedo Park (Carle Place) – 8
I did read a lot of good reviews about Tuxedo Park, but I wish I would have looked around before just choosing them. In the end our tuxes looked great. I had to buy the two yellow ties because they didn’t have the exact shade that I wanted. DH looked so handsome! The first time we went there we didn’t wait too long to be helped. We don’t know very much about tuxes, but we liked what he showed us and ended up ordering them. We didn’t even know the price until we got up to the counter. They were $230 each which we thought was a little steep for a regular tux. But we did like them so we got them. Every other time we went there they were pretty crowded and we had to wait a bit to be helped. When we picked them up a few days before the wedding, DH inspected his tux and found a lot of stains on the shirt and the pants were very wrinkled. They fixed everything on the spot and we left with perfect tuxes.
Flowers
Flower Barn (Seaford) – 10
I posted on vendors helping brides and Mike responded to me with a great quote for what I needed. I then did a search on them and found a lot of great reviews. I absolutely loved my flowers and wouldn’t change a thing! Mike was great to work with and really knows his stuff. I showed him pics of what I wanted and he made some suggestions and I trusted his judgment. I loved my bouquet so much, it looks awesome in pictures. It looked perfect the next day too! Not one mistake was made by them. They even went to the reception hall the day of and put the petals on the tables and decorated the cake! I asked if he could incorporate a necklace that my mom gave me as my something old, in my bo-k and he did a great job. I highly recommend them!
Limos
Royalty (Franklin Square) – 9
I thought that Royalty did a great job. We just had a pick up/drop off with no stops in between. They arrived early to my parents’ house. Since it was raining the driver had a HUGE umbrella and helped me to the car. I really appreciated that. The photographer had my dad grab the umbrella and he got a nice pic of him helping me into the car. The limo was nice, we didn’t order anything out of the ordinary. I am a little disappointed that he didn’t play the “Here comes the Bride” car horn. But I didn’t remember to ask him if he had it. No big deal really. DH said that his limo came early, but that it wasn’t that great of a car. He said that it looked old and that none of the controls in the back were working. But our flower girl had a blast in it! They sent a town car at the end of the night and it was fine. For the price we paid, I feel we got exactly what we wanted. To me, the biggest deal was that they were on time, and they were, and the drivers were really nice.
Officiant
Reverend Deb Viola – 10
Reverend Deb did a really nice job on our ceremony. We met with her twice before our wedding and she was great to work with. She’s very down to earth and just a really good person! She was always easy to get in touch with. Our ceremony was really beautiful, and before she left she gave us a print out of it in a binder, which I thought was really nice to have.
Photographer
ADA Studios – 8 so far!
We picked ADA after reading a bunch of great reviews on them. When we went for the first meeting they showed us a few of their photographers work, and we chose Eddie. He is such a great guy to work with! He did our engagement pictures and they came out amazing. It was nice to work with him once before the wedding. The day of the wedding he was on time and took a lot of great pics with me, my girls and family. However, after seeing the proofs, i don't feel like we got enough pictures of DH and I together and with the Bridal Party. I really feel that because it rained, we got jipped on pictures. We have a total of 2 pictures of the whole Bridal Party and the background is not nice. There is not one picture of DH and his two guys together, just separate shots of him with each of them. My family was late, so all i have is one group photo that we took right before the photographer left. DH and I were able to take a few photos under the awning and the background looks so nice with trees and flowers, but we only have a few like that. The rest are all inside, no natural light, and they're just not what i thought my pictures would be like. I know i can't control the weather, but i wish we had a better indoor place to take pictures that day, or i wish our photographer got a little more creatvie and took more pictures. I know in the end our album will be really nice, but i know it could have been a lot nicer had we be able to take pictures outside.
Videography
Infinite Video Productions – 10
Our video is absolutely amazing and totally made up for the fact that we didn't love our still photos. He captured every moment that our photographer did and didn't. I’ve known Mike (the owner) for ten years! We went to college together and worked together for a while too. I’ve seen his wedding videos before and he is extremely talented! He is such an easy going guy to work with and doesn’t force anyone to be on camera. He works really well with camera shy people and makes everyone look great. I love our video so much and when i watch it i feel like i'm a guest and i get to relive it any time i want! He was by far one of our best vendors!
DJ
FM Entertainment – 10
Again, based on a lot of great reviews on this site, we decided to check out FM Entertainment. We went to their showcase which was a great way to see a DJ! We booked with them that night. Frank is awesome to deal with and his prices are so reasonable. We got the extra club lights which really made a big difference in our room! Frank was our MC and did an amazing job! Paul was our DJ and he was awesome too! They played every song that we wanted to hear! They did a great job on our ceremony, introductions into the reception and all of the other little details. I wanted to do a special dedication to my parents since it was their 43rd wedding anniversary that night and he did a great job with that too. Definitely check them out, I know they are in the process of updating their website so just go to a showcase and see for yourself!
DIY
Favors & Table Numbers
I had fun making our CD favors! It was really easy and I felt that it gave a personal touch!
We also gave Hershey’s Bliss Chocolates in a chiffon drawstring bag along with the CD’s.
I also made 13 children’s favors. I got everything from Michael’s. They’re dollar section is awesome!
The table numbers took me about 15 minutes to do! I got the frames from IKEA (they came in packs of two for $3.50).
Cake Toppers & Sign in Frame
theweddingoutlet.com
I loved our cake toppers! DH picked the palm trees, but I also wanted a bride and groom. I thought these were really cute! I also loved our sign in board. It looks so cool with all the writing on it!
Larkfield Manor – 10
I have to give them a 10 because our wedding did go really well. We had a few minor issues, but they really weren’t that big of a deal. We worked mostly with Marianne before the big day and she is really nice. There was supposed to be another wedding going on, but they cancelled a few months before. So they gave us the big cocktail hour room which I was really happy about. Also, since it rained we had to have our ceremony inside and I loved the way they set it up! We had the ceremony in the smaller cocktail hour room.
Frank the Maitre’d is AWESOME! Soon after we arrived, a button popped off of my dad’s tux and Frank himself took a button off of his back up tux and sewed it onto my dad’s! I thought that was so great of him to do and he did it in like five minutes! He kept everything running so smoothly and dealt with my crazy family really well! Also I know some guests at the wedding were sneaking in the bridal suite and, well I’ll just say doing some bad things, and Frank had to play “bad cop”. I felt bad that he had to deal with that since it’s not his job to baby-sit, but I really appreciated him taking care of it. He was also really nice to our 6 year old flower girl and made her comfortable with everything she had to do. We had two bridal attendants who were so nice. One of them did the bustle on my dress and I have to say that she did it better than the people at the bridal gown store did! I don’t know how she did it, but it looked the best I had ever seen it!
We were supposed to guarantee 100 people, but unfortunately we ended up with only 82. In the end only 79 actually showed. Also DH’s dad decided last minute that he couldn’t make it from Georgia because he is suffering from cancer and was afraid he would be too sick at the wedding. We explained all of this to Larkfield and were hoping they would throw something in to make up for the 21 extra dinners we paid for. We didn’t get any extras, but I can’t complain too much about that because we did get exactly what we paid for.
They included the ice sculpture and DH asked if they could do two palm trees. It came out really nice! Also I gave them a picture of the cake that I wanted and wasn’t sure if they could do it. They immediately said no problem, and the cake was gorgeous, and also delicious! I really just wanted fresh flowers on the cake, but they put some yellow ones with icing too. I would’ve preferred they not put the ones with the icing, but it still looked really beautiful. Everyone raved about the food; the amount of it and the quality. Also the service was excellent. One minor problem was that they never asked us if there was any particular beer that we wanted. We found out later that they were supposed to go over that in the final meeting. During the cocktail hour, the two guys in our Bridal Party asked the bartender for Bud Light and the bartender was a little rude and told them that he didn’t have many and they were for the groom only. DH had to talk to the bartender and told him to give it to them. Had we known, we would have told them to order more of that.
In the end we are really happy that we went with Larkfield Manor. The price was very reasonable and there really was so much food! I really wish we could’ve taken pictures outside by the gazebo, but that rain didn’t stop for a second! Anyone who is having there wedding there is going to have a great day. They really cover all of the important details and I put all of my trust in Frank to run the show, and he really pulled through. I wish we could go to someone else’s wedding there so we could actually eat! My dress was too tight to fit anything in my belly!
Honeymoon
Sandals Grande Antigua - 10
We had an amazing honeymoon! Before we left we read a few not so great reviews about Sandals Antigua and I was a little worried. Well this place totally exceeded our expectations. The grounds are gorgeous. DH couldn't stop talking about how every plant, tree and shrub is different! I never felt like there were a lot of people there. It was always quiet when walking through the paths. Just the sound of frogs and birds, which I loved! The beach is so beautiful. We spent our first night there watching the sunset while floating in the ocean. It was unbelievable. The food was awesome! All of the restaurants were great. Eleanors was the only one that we thought was just ok (Caribbean food). The reservation system was easy, you can make them up to two nights before, so every morning we would call for the next night. All of the restaurants were so good! Every night we would go to the Cricketers Pub for a late night snack and get nachos, wings, burgers, chocolate creme brulee, cheese cake and so many other delicious things! The drinks were made really well too. Everyone is so friendly and they really go above and beyond to make sure everyone is happy and having a good time. We did a helicopter tour which we booked on our own before we left with Caribbean Helicopters. That was the most amazing experience! We did an Eco tour with Island Safari, that was so much fun! The party at Shirley Heights was so much fun too! I would definitely recommend this place to honeymooners and couples of all ages! We would like to go back some day.
view from the helicopter
On the eco tour
more pics at Sandals
On our balcony
Message edited 6/12/2008 2:01:05 PM.
5/16/08 Larkfield Manor, ADA Studios, Infinite Video, FM Ent... 
Posted 6/12/08 1:49 PM 
