My husband and I stayed at the Contemporary Resort at Disney for our honeymoon, and it was AMAZING! Everyone there was very friendly, and went out of their way to help us in any way they could because we were honeymooners. They gave us ‘Just Married’ pins when we arrived, and were given countless congratulations and free gifts while we were there. We also were put in a room that faced the castle (because we were on our honeymoon), so we were able to watch the fireworks show right from our room which was great. It was a little bit more expensive for us, because we purchased a package that included our meals, but because of it we were able to go to the nicest restaurants and order whatever we wanted. There are so many things to do (i.e. massages, swimming with dolphins…etc) that you wouldn’t think that you could do at Disney, which also made it fun. It was so nice to go somewhere with so many people making us feel like we were the only ones there. I would highly recommend coming here, It was Incredible!

Brendan was just AWESOME. Just awesome. I think if it’s possible to know every song ever made, he does. He definitely is the kind of person that, once he’s met you for 5 minutes, can make a mix that will only include songs that you’ve ever loved. He played everything that we requested, and was really good about filtering for the type of music that we didn’t want played at the wedding. He was such a good DJ because he made everyone at the wedding feel so comfortable. He mingled and got to know people and what they’d want to hear, and even taught all of us how to do the Cupid Shuffle! At the end of the night, he even went out of his way to play the song that my sister and dad had danced to at her wedding (and her wedding was 6 months before mine…good memory!). He’s a very cool person, and did above and beyond what we asked of him!

I had Lori at Todd’s Room do my makeup for my sister’s wedding, and then my own. I never wear makeup, so when she asked what I wanted done I had NO IDEA what to tell her. She knew as soon as I told her that what she was going to do and it looked PERFECT! I looked very glamorous (fake eyelashes and all), but didn’t look like I was wearing a ton of makeup either, which is what I was worried about. The makeup stayed in place all night too so I didn’t have to worry about reapplying it, and the mascara never smeared like I’ve heard so many picture horror stories about either. I did have to reapply my lipstick, but she gave me a free sample of it for that reason. Todd’s Room was a very cool place, and I would definitely recommend Lori. She just knows how to make you look your best, now how to make you look like you with makeup on.

A woman named Michelle at the wedding shoppe altered my dress (and my sister’s at her wedding) and she was GREAT! You can tell within the first 5 minutes that she really knows what she’s doing, and she always knew what would look best. Plus, she did all of the alterations quickly so I never had to worry if she would get it done In time. My bustle stayed up the whole night, and I got soooo many compliments on how pretty it looked (she did the French bustle on my dress).

The alterations are a little bit more expensive there, but it was definitely worth it to know that you’re not going to have ANY problems on your wedding day. Michelle was such a fun person to be around too, which made the whole experience even more enjoyable!

Men’s Wearhouse did a really good job with the tuxes. They had all of the right colors and styles that we were looking for, and were very nice while we were there. All of the tuxes came in on time and fit everyone right too, which was good. Price wasn’t too bad either, and all of the guys got a discount card that lets them get a gift certificate in the mail for so much money for spending what they did to rent the tuxes.

David’s bridal is a great store, but you have to be prepared for the customer service there. As far as the actual dresses went, David’s had everything I was looking for and it was very easy for the bridesmaids to go and pick out their dress…etc because of the multiple locations. I gave only 3 stars because their customer service was really bad sometimes. The store was ALWAYS packed and they never had enough associates to help you (even if you made an appointment). The dress that I had picked out also had an ink stain on it, and they told me that if I couldn’t get it off by myself then that was my problem, and they fought when I tried to order the dress and not take the one that was in the store.

If you’re just going in to pick out a dress and purchase it then they’ll have what you need, but if you’re looking for someone to HELP you pick out a dress or anything else you may need, then you don’t want to go there; at least during normal business hours.

We REALLY loved the Canterbury Castle in Canterbury Village. It was SO beautiful, and we had a deck attached to our room (we had the DaVinci Room) that all of the guests really loved. This was the perfect setting for a wedding reception!

The reason I took off a star is because over the course of the year and a half that we were booked there, they changed management about 5 times. Each time, we would get a phone call because the new management didn’t know what was going on with us and wanted to make sure that they had everything in order. This was fine the first couple of times, but the management that was working at the time of the wedding was particularly confused. They had our whole menu messed up, and tried to tell us that we couldn’t have what we signed the contract for because that’s not what they offer at that price anymore. In the end, we ended up a couple of items short, but they did give us prime rib at no extra cost which was very nice.

The food was GREAT, and everything went smoothly the day of the wedding. The only thing is whether or not you want all of the stress leading up to the day or not.

I really like this church, because they really make you feel welcome. I’m Catholic and my now husband is Methodist, and we decided to get married at his church because there were less hoops to jump through there than in the Catholic church. This, of course, made me nervous at first but everyone was very nice and it never seemed to matter that I wasn’t a member there. In fact, the Reverend offered to do a couple of things differently in the ceremony to incorporate a little bit of what my church is like if I wanted.

The only reason I took away a star is because we were supposed to attend a counseling type of class first (which they really pumped), but never did because the church was supposed to let us know what day to come in for and they never called. We asked about it numerous times and each time we were told to wait for the call that never came. This isn’t anything huge, but it meant enough that they somehow were too busy to let us know when to come in.

Overall, the church was BEAUTIFUL (great for pictures), and everyone there was very warm and accommodating. They made it very special for us.

I was really Impressed with Thrifty. I originally went to see them because we were on a tight budget and thought we’d at least see what they had to say. I worked with Linda, and she was amazing. She sat down with me a couple of times to try and get as much as we could for the money that we had to spend. We ended up getting all of the bouquets, boutonnieres, corsages, and pew bows for about $500.

I took away a star because while they were easy to work with, it would have cost us a lot for centerpieces and they ended up getting the drop time wrong on the day of the wedding. Our ceremony started at 4pm and that was what they had as the drop off time. I called around 2:30 when the flowers still weren’t there, and they had them to me by 3:00 which was good (you could tell she tried really hard to hurry them over).

All in all, Thrifty did a good job. The flowers were beautiful and just what I asked for. Just make sure you double and triple check what time they have down for drop off!

We used the Sweet and Savory bake shop in Oxford, and the cake was DELICIOUS! We used a 3 tier cake for our cake table, and a large sheet cake that was kept in the back with the same design (for the remainder of the guests) for our wedding. Doing it this way saved us A LOT of money, and the 3 tier cake that we did have on the cake table still looked huge. They took a lot of time to find out exactly what we wanted, and made sure that they gave us everything we asked for at a price that we could afford.

When you go to sample the cake, they ask you to pick 3 choices (and they have many) and then make you a cake of each choice for you to sample. We loved this because we were able to get more than one taste to make up our minds, and were able to share it with our families to see which flavors our guests would like as well.

On the wedding day, the cake was PERFECT!! Everything was just how we pictured it, and they decorated our cake table for us too which they didn’t need to do. It was beautiful, and tasted even better than the sample cakes did (we chose to do half of the cake one flavor, and the other half another flavor).

For our 1 year anniversary, we get to go back and pick up the equivalent of the top tier of the cake too so that we don’t have to eat freezer cake which is awesome. They were GREAT!