My late Wedding Vendor Review-now with some EastWind pics

My wedding was on August 24 but I wanted to wait until I had all my vendor jobs complete before submitting my review and a problem with the video delayed it (see below).

Ceremony and Reception: Estate at East Wind. 99 % perfect. What you’ve heard about the food and service is true. The only glitch was they served the cake and coffee earlier than usual because they needed to turn the room over quickly for a larger wedding that was coming in after mine. That was a little disappointing because once my Italian family gets their cake, it’s their signal to leave. East Wind had food waiting for us in the Bridal Suite, which was a very nice (and welcome) surprise. The matre’d even found my mother a pair of slippers for when she took off her shoes. They packed up all the extra food (from the no shows) and the extra cookies from the Viennese, too. Aside from the early cake, everything was top notch.

Ceremony: We had Reverend Joe and Judy and they were marvelous. Everyone complemented us on the ceremony and really enjoyed it. I recommend them very highly; they know the ropes inside and out. The only glitch was I rewrote one of the readings. The first time I sent it to them, AOL gobbled the text and they only got half the reading. I then faxed it and re-emailed it, but I didn’t follow up to make sure they got it (the fax went through so I just assumed-bad me). So they substituted a longer reader than the one I wanted, but since I (and the reader!) were the only two who noticed; it was a minor thing.

Flowers: The one thing I stressed about the most was the flowers. I had nightmares of them not showing up. I used an unkown florist to these boards: Dix Hills Florist, whom I met at a Wedding show and who happened to literally be around the corner (within walking distance) of my Mom’s house. To my surprise and delight, Eric, the owner, did a beyond fabulous job and at a very reasonable cost. I had 14 centerpieces with 24 roses on 4-foot brass stands with 4 candles swirling up the base and rose petals on the tables for only $75 each (no rental fee). He also used extra rose petals to decorate my mailbox/gift table and our head table at no extra cost. My bouquet was white and light shades of pink, about 30 roses, exactly what we had discussed. He even made an extra corsage and 2 extra boutonnieres for the guys (one was a refresher for the groom). The mother’s corsages had 4 roses each. They turned out to be a little heavy and big for our petite moms, but they were still gorgeous. I was lucky in the fact that he had never done a wedding at East Wind and had been eager to show them what he could do, so I think he may have done a little extra to impress them as much as me. I did stress the last month about whether or not he’d come through, because he had shown up late to two of our meetings, but since he runs the business himself, I could understand him getting caught up in other things. Plus, he took another $50 off for being late to our first meeting. I’ve included a pic of my bouquet and centerpieces below. Overall, even with the stress, it was worth it.

Photos: VIP Studios. John is very good and the package deals for the price can’t be beat. I would definitely recommend a two photographer shoot. I know I’m not always comfortable smiling at a camera, so some of the second photographer’s shots of me (when I didn’t know he was snapping) really captured me best. Overall, we had about 500 great shots, out of which only 6 were shots I wouldn’t show people.

Limo: I only needed one 10-seat limo to take me, my bridesmaids, and parents to the site. We used Mayfair Limo in East Northport. They were early and the driver was very careful with me and my dress and long train (he warned me about the grease on the tires and helped me into the car). I think it was $150 for the trip to East Wind (about 50 minutes). We drove home from the reception ourselves.

Music: We had Rhapsody, one of the Skyline bands, and were very happy with them. They learned about 10 songs for us (including our first dance song) and played everything on our Must Play list. We had a wide range of ages at our party (from 10 years to over 80) and all were happy and dancing. Rhapsody sounded great and really listened to us and gave us the reception we wanted. My only (minor) complaint was their booking agency, Skyline, promised us 'continuous, live' music, meaning when the band took breaks, they didn’t do it all at the same time. Someone would always be playing live. Instead, they used tapes/CDs to play while they took a break. I didn’t mind, but when you pay for live music, you expect live music. But since the band really went out of their way to learn our songs, I would still recommend them very highly. Just make sure you have 'live, continuous' music in your contract if that is important to you. Everyone we contracted with showed up (no replacements).
Mike, the keyboard player, also did our ceremony and cocktail hour. He arrived early and also learned a song for me. Again, everything went smoothly.

Hair/Make Up: Cactus Salon in Dix Hills. I was very happy with how my sister’s and nieces’ updo’s and make up came out (they had up do’s). I was OK with my hair and makeup. They did a good job, I just wasn’t assertive enough with what I wanted. I have naturally curly hair and had been torn between doing it myself and having it done. I decided to have it done so it would stay all night and have it look a little different than I do every day. I probably would have been more comfortable if I had done it myself. The salon staff were nice and accommodating, though it was a little expensive. Again, they were within walking distance of my Mom, so they were the best choice for us since we had to get ready so early (starting at 7 a.m.) and there wasn’t going to be room in the house to have someone do our hair there.