I just got married on 12/10/2011.

One of the top 3 pieces of wedding advice I got was to get a coordinator for Day Of services. Man, am I glad I listened to my friends!!

I found Katie through Paul PK Kim of Prokreation Productions. I had called quite a few coordinators before deciding to go with Katie. Some simply wanted WAY too much money for their services (and they didn't wouldn't even stay till the end of the evening!) and others were very very nice...but Katie and I just hit it off from the very beginning. Working with her is like hanging out with a girlfriend who happens to know how to pull off a wedding.

Here's why I like her and why I recommend her :

1. She promptly returns all my emails. I started to wonder when she sleeps because no matter time I email her, I get a response in a very timely manner.


2. She's VERY detailed and detail oriented. She showed me MULTIPLE examples of various combinations of linen colors, pictures taken at my wedding venue to give me ideas of photos, had checklists and checklists and checklists to organize the day.


3. She collected EVERY SINGLE THING I had asked her to and then some from my wedding.


4. She is the reason why I did not have to talk to any of my vendors besides saying "Hi, guys!!!!" because she took care of all the details. My only job was to enjoy my day and, because of Katie and her assistant, I was able to do just that.


Granted, she was only supposed to be available for Day Of services but she ran our rehearsal multiple times until I felt I was ready for the wedding and was always accessible by email or phone. I feel like I got more than what I paid for because she was always there to give me her opinion and thoughts by email or phone. You really can't get more for your budget in terms of the attention and time.


She was there first thing in the morning and was the last person to leave. Katie and her assistant not only packed up EVERYTHING on the list I gave her in the ORIGINAL BOXES I had provided her with but they delivered it neatly to our room.


She kept track of every single detail I could think of and then some. She even fielded near disasters (the napkins did not match the chairs like we thought they would have so she somehow managed to find a very chic alternative with our venue coordinator, our guestbook attendants did not make it in time so she lassoed my cousins into manning the station) with precision and ease.


I never would've known if she didn't tell me about it later.


Katie made our day run EXACTLY on schedule the way we had planned and that's why our wedding was so much fun. :)


Thanks again, Katie!!! You so rock.

PK is one of the reasons why our guests had so much fun at our wedding. How do I know? I've been approached by many of our guests, Asian and non-Asian alike, asking me "Where did you find your MC?! He's f***ing hilarious!!!"

He had everything set up because he arrived early to make sure everything was working. He had homework for my husband and I to do so that he could be prepared for our wedding. PK did our ceremony AND reception music. He also played our engagement video during our reception.

He was one of the last people to leave the reception because he and the Dj wanted to make sure everyone had a great time till the literal last second before the lights came on.

He responded well to my frantic, last minute emails and worked it into the wedding. I literally sent him stuff at 1:30 a.m. the day of my wedding. ^____^

He entertained our guests with dance and hula hoop contests, he made up a few songs, he even did one of my favorite PK comedy skits.

He is a true professional and ran our wedding just the way I had only imagined it could be. There were no awkward moments. He kept everyone laughing and now a bunch of them want me to take them to see him when he performs.

If you want your guests to laugh, have a good time and enjoy your special night, you should consider Paul and his DJ. My guests told me they had so much fun dancing the night away and how much their feet hated them the following days. That's right. You heard me. My feet still hurt. I've been married for 4 days now.

Thanks, Paul. You and the DJ really made our wedding fun, enjoyable and memorable not only for us but for our guests. :)

ElmanAdam Films, thank you SO MUCH for making our wedding so memorable!! The best piece of wedding advice we received were :

1. Try to stick to each other or else you'll be looking for each other all night. (Alas, our super glue super powers weren't working that night. Too many revelers wishing us well!)

2. HIRE AN AWESOME VIDEOGRAPHER!!!

I cannot stress how important it is to have a good videographer! Here are the reasons why.

1. A good photographer is important because I want beautiful images of us to put into picture frames and place around our home. I can look at them every day and be reminded of the wonderful day in which I married the most wonderful man on earth. Alas, pictures are static images. A great video is something you can watch every year on your anniversary and something you can share with your kids when you have them. That's our plan.

2. It serves as a GREAT backup hard drive for the very blurry night. If you're anything like Clyde and I, we don't really remember much of what happened after a certain point. :D

So why do I recommend ElmanAdam Films so highly? It's not because they're so much fun to work with. It's not because they cracked us up and had us rolling around laughing. It's not because their business manager, the awesome Kirsten, is so friendly and nice and accommodating.

Those are all great reasons for wanting to just hang out with them.

I think they're the best videographers in the world because they're just so good at what they do. Have you looked at their blog? Have you seen their work?! The meticulous attention to detail, the amount of effort they put into making YOUR most memorable day into a jewel you want to watch over and over again is what makes them stand out.

You don't get a DVD of every single minute that happened during the day. What you get are the highlights, the parts that stood out and you WANT to remember. We just saw our preview and I cried. It was just that wonderful. They listened when I asked them to please, if they could, capture the total lunar eclipse on our wedding day....and they did.

Our engagement video was a work of art and editing magic. It was a huge hit at the wedding and our guests keep asking me who the geniuses are behind it. I'm happy to say it is ElmanAdam Films. To this day, our friends and family keep asking us to show them the video because it was that funny. We opted to do something COMPLETELY different from the standard photo montage / "How We Met" video. We gleefully decided to throw caution to the wind and ElmanAdam Films were more than happy to go with our crazy idea.

They have multiple packages you can choose from to fit your budget. Our budget was rather modest and yet we were able to work with them. I would highly recommend getting adding an engagement video if you can. They have a wide range of extras to choose from to add your DVD.

Kirsten, Zach, Rob, RYDER....thank you all so much. We feel like we won the lottery when we married each other but you guys are like the cherry on top of our wedding cake sundae. We can't wait to get our DVDs!

Brides with small budgets who dream of getting married with their friends and family in attendance, beware! Consider my tale your warning.

I got engaged in November 2010. One of the first things we did that week after sharing our wonderful news was to do our budget. We paid for our entire wedding by ourselves. When we were done crunching numbers, we realized that, while it's not woefully small, our budget was definitely not nearing 6 figures either. The budget we quoted all our vendors was $18,000.

Needless to say, we had our work cut out for us but I was optimistic.

I called this business to ask about wedding packages. I spoke to someone who was later identified as the manager. He started off very helpful and asked me about our budget. I told him "$18,000". He asked me about how many people we're expecting. I told him "about 200". He was pretty enthusiastic at first because he thought we had $18,000 to spend for the reception. When I corrected him and told him that $18,000 was our ENTIRE budget, things immediately went south.

He ceased being helpful and, in my opinion, very rude. He told me that there's no way we can get married with our budget, much less in Temecula. He said there's no way we can book a venue, pay for a ceremony and feed 200 - 250 people in addition to doing everything else we need to do with a budget of our size. He even helpfully suggested we cut down the amount of people we invite because "that's where your cost is."

I locked myself in my bathroom and cried. After I was done, I emailed their general email address and told them what our conversation was about, how I felt and how distressed I was after this conversation. I would have been done with this establishment had it ended there.

Instead, the owner then told me that she thought the manager (she's the one who identified him and his position) was not rude and that he was being "honest and upfront" about their pricing. She said that she was walking next to him during our entire phone conversation so she heard everything he was saying to me. She said they pride themselves on their exceptional customer service to their brides, that she was sure he was not malicious in his comments and DEFINITELY was not being rude.

This is where we differ in our opinions. I think it's rude to tell your prospective clients they don't have enough money to make their dreams a reality and imply they should look elsewhere. I also think it's incredibly rude for the OWNER of the establishment to think treatment of prospective clients in this manner is not only acceptable but to stand behind it.

I also think it's pretty craptastic to make a bride CRY because you, the owner, and your manager are telling her that SHE'S TOO POOR TO GET MARRIED!! How is this acceptable? And you pride yourself on your "exceptional customer service"? Maybe this exceptional customer service is only extended to those who actually become customers. However, if prospective clients are treated the way I've been treated, then I am amazed they have any customers to give this much lauded service to.

I'm sure the brides who have gotten married here had a great experience. I just can't help but wonder if it's because they had a bigger piggy bank than I did and that's why they received this "exceptional service."

It should go without saying that not only did I cross this venue off my list of possibilities (and yes, there are possibilities. There are other venues who are willing to work with me and have never made me feel terrible) but I will also never give them business of any kind.

In case you're wondering if we ever did manage to get married, we did. Not only was A 4 DIAMOND RESORT willing to work with our budget but they bent over backwards to ensure all 170+ of our guests had an amazing time. Guess what? They did.

I suppose I should thank Villa de Amore for making me cry, refusing my business and refusing to work with me because how else would I have been so determined to prove them wrong and pull off the wedding of my dreams?