kohler44's reviews

April is fantastic!

We were referred to April through a mutual friend and I am so glad we were! She made planning our honeymoon a breeze! She was prompt in returning calls and emails and is extremely knowledgeable in destination location information. She was able to provide us with several options and suggestions based on our budget and our wants for our honeymoon.

I would DEFINITELY recommend April to assist you with the planning of your honeymoon or destination wedding!

Thanks again April!

Just to add to HERHAR1's and Nikolae's reviews, the original owner of Bliss, Nancy, has not owned Bliss since September 2008 and so the owner HERHAR1 experienced was not the same one Nikolae experienced.

I happened to buy my dress from Bliss when Nancy was the owner and would give it 5 stars but cannot comment on how the store may be now. I only give it three stars as a happy medium.

I met Laura through Project Wedding as a fellow bride. When my wedding day became close, I realized that I could not DOC my own wedding and that I would really need someone as a go to person for the day.

Fortunately for me, Laura was just starting her business and was willing to come out to my wedding as my go to gal for experience. She helped make my day go smoothly including helping my gals time their walks down the aisle and saving my luminaries from blowing away!

Thank you Laura for helping me on my day, it was wonderful to have you there and be a a part of it!

My now husband and I went to the Royal Cancun for part of our honeymoon as we LOVED it! From the champagne toast with cool towel, to our suite and ocean view to the restaurants, everything was wonderful!

The hotel itself is beautiful with a stained glass ceiling when you first enter. Everyone is so nice and accommodating.

Do note though, we were up-sold on our room. After speaking with several other guests, it sounds like this is something that they do to everyone...

However...we loved our room. We were on the eighth floor, personal floor concierge, GORGEOUS view of the ocean, mini fridge (which is completely stocked with soda, beer and snacks PLUS "mini" bar that housed 4-5 full sized hard alcohol bottles to consume at your leisure. The bed was uncommonly comfortable. We had a double jacuzzi right in our bedroom. The marble walk in shower was to die for and we had to sinks so that we each had our own space.

The pool is great and the swim-up bar is really fun. There are lounge chairs and cabanas to lounge in. There is beach, but it is small.

The restaurants are VERY good for an all inclusive and they have a wide variety of restaurants. Even the buffet breakfast at their restaurant "Spices" was good. 24 hour room service and its actually good and they will pretty much make you what ever you want!

We had a fabulous time and would highly recommend this hotel to any couple honeymooning in Cancun and looking for an adults-only, all-inclusive.

This hotel is very nice, but after staying at another adults-only, all inclusive the first half of our honeymoon and then the Hideaway the second, we liked the first better.

The Pros: The room is very pretty. You have a concierge for each building that is there every day to answer any questions you may have. The grounds and the main hotel are gorgeous. They have a really fun little bar with a live band that is actually quite good! The best food is at there Italian restaurant. AWESOME, hands down. There more casual food, located at "The Deck" and "Spices" is okay. They have a breakfast buffet every morning, which is nice, but I don't suggest the eggs, have them make some for you fresh. The lounge chairs around the pool are SUPER comfy, the beach is nice and they've blocked part of the ocean off so you feel safe frolicking around. I liked that alot. And they have top shelf alcohol for drinks.

The Cons: The food, other than the Italian restaurant, is not very good. Room service is horrible and they will not stray from the menu whatsoever (e.g., I asked for chips and salsa). Also two of their restaurants were closed. Everything is very structured and we had all of our dinners pre-planned when we got there. Make sure to bring a pair of dress shoes for your husband to wear...they have a dress code and called our room SEVERAL times to confirm he would be wearing closed-toed shoes to the point where they asked us to go into town to buy him shoes. They did let him wear his leather dress sandals one night but continued to ask about shoes the second so we opted to go into town on the second night instead of eating there because it became such a bother.

Being a newlywed, they list you on their newsletter, but failed to do that for us. We also had purchased the romance package, which included wine in your room upon arrival, robes and bath things, a romantic dinner on the beach your first night there with champagne and chocolate covered strawberries in your room. We never made the newsletter, didn't have our dinner until our last night there after my husband reminded them of it and never received our wine or chocolate covered strawberries. They called our room constantly asking for vouchers and things that we had already given them upon checking in. They didn't restock our mini fridge and the options within it were not the best.

All in all, it is a very beautiful hotel, but we may venture to another adults-only inclusive instead when we return to Playa del Carmen.

Trisha is AMAZING!!! Oh my gosh. Ladies, if you are in the Sonoma/Santa Rosa/Healdsburg area, you MUST have Trisha do your makeup!

Not only has she been the first MUA that has done my makeup and I've actually liked it, she is so sweet and so nice. Not to mention she is absolutely beautiful! She was SO easy to work with, so accommodating and so go with the flow. She really was wonderful.

She made me, my mom and my girls look drop dead gorgeous.

If I could give her a million stars I would! I HIGHLY recommend her to any bride wanting to look absolutely amazing on their big day!

I would have to strongly disagree with aleewonder and agree with chersimon in that Spencer was very nice to work with.

Spencer also played acoustic Spanish guitar during our ceremony, which sounded beautiful and also during the cocktail hour.

He announced us and those who toasted us with class. He is not a cheesy DJ which we were so afraid of having.

He was very good and very professional and kept everyone dancing all night! I actually had one of the groomsmen come up to me and comment on how it was actually good music that was being played. He was very prompt in returning emails too. The only one thing I wished he would have done was to stick a bit more to my playlist because I had worked really hard on it. For example, I had said that I wanted a lot of 80s played during the reception and I didn't get too much and I also noticed a song was played that was on my do not play list.

Other than that, I think the night went very well and I would, and have, recommended him to other brides.

Like shesemail said, Park Ave did an amazing job! The food was excellent! My guests repeatedly told me that the dinner was soooo good and not just one thing, EVERYTHING! They also put together a fantastic bridal basket for us and we were able to take home all the leftovers. We were so excited! Ha ha! The only thing that I did not like was that they added white feather boas to the buffet tables, but those were quickly removed. ;)

I have to reiterate that the food was magnificent and I would highly recommend them to any bride. I would also ask for Denise, she was AMAZING to work with. Very efficient, easy to work with and very prompt with return emails. Thank you!

Oh my gosh! For a gal that isn't too in to cake. This. cake. was amazing!!!

The tasting with Michele was so fun. She was very easy to work with and knew exactly what we were aiming for regarding the style of our cake. The samples were FABULOUS and she even had some extras lying around for us to try!

Aside from the cake being amazing (that I ate for two days afterward...shh!) she was so accommodating. She ended up driving out to our venue and setting up the cake and adding the flowers even though her general policy is that she is unable to deliver for cakes that serve less that 75. We were so thankful for that.

Like ABride said, she returned emails extremely quickly. I would HIGHLY recommend her to any bride!

If it were not for Amanda at La Coupe Sauvage's Healdsburg location, I would not be able to rate 2 stars.

AMANDA. She is the absolute BEST thing about La Coupe Sauvage's Healdsburg location. From start to finish she was amazing. She is a phenomenal at what she does! Not only is she fun, super stylish and just great to be around, she is patient and understands what you want when you explain it to her. Not to mention she's a master back comber, ha! The day of my wedding she did an absolutely wonderful job and my hair looked beautiful. I would highly recommend Amanda to anyone, but aside from her, I would have to unfortunately not recommend this salon for the reasons below.

When I first went for my trial I, unbeknownst to me at the time, met with a jr. stylist. I spent about 3 hours in the chair as she tried to do a loose updo. It wasn't working and Amanda stepped right in and a matter of minutes was able to accomplish what I was after.

A couple months later, I called to let Amanda know that I had decided to wear my hair down and also to touch base and make sure we were on track for the big day. They had no record of me nor my bridal party in their system, which was frustrating because I had previously given them my name and everyone in the party that would be coming to the salon that day. They had given me a time frame and how many stylists would be available and everything and now, they had nothing. So, whatever, she was very apologetic and I was fine with everything (simply because they still had that time frame open...)and I gave her the info again. (Thank you Haley that usually answered their phones. She was always so nice and accommodating as well.)

The week of the wedding, I was told that my FMIL wanted to get her hair done. No problem, I would call the salon and see if I could fit her in. Right? Wrong.

When I called, I did not speak with Haley this time. Although I will keep her name anonymous, the person I spoke with was the most tactless and rude person I have ever come in to contact with on a professional level; and I use the term "professional level" loosely as professional she was not. When I inquired into adding an additional person to the list, namely my FMIL, she became extremely agitated and made some extremely rude remarks to me, of which included words to the effect that she was frustrated with me because I obviously didn't know that they were trying to run a business. She kept cutting me off and simply yelling at me. She told me that I would have to have a jr. stylist do my FMIL's hair and wanted to know what my FMIL wanted done. When I told her I did not know, she barked, well I can't book something you know nothing about and we don't have time for an up-do. I responded with, well, if you don't have time for an up-do, then haven't you just answered your own question as to what style my FMIL will have? I think this just made her more angry. She shouted, FINE! WHAT TIME?!? And I responded, well, whatever time you have open between the 9am - 2pm block you've set aside for me. (which, by the way, she had also commented on the fact that I had NOT rented out the entire salon and they had other clients besides me...I was never told that I could rent the entire salon out, not to mention I was bringing A LOT of money into their salon that day and this was the attitude I was being given.)

By the time I had gotten off the phone with her, I was so shaken and appalled that I called my fiance to ask him what to do. He ended up calling the salon back and speaking with her as well and she apologized...to him...if she "had" been rude (I don't think there was any question as to whether she had been rude and she obviously knew she was completely out of line). The day of the wedding when we were at the salon, she said nothing to me, which made it even more embarrassing for her that she did not have enough professionalism or courtesy to come to me and apologize to me, the one she offended.

I am embarrassed that this salon employs persons of this nature and I cannot recommend that anyone retain services here, unless you specifically ask for Amanda.

In addition to ALL of the above, the second stylist that was to do the party's hair that morning was admittedly "hung over" and one of my bridesmaids had to re-do her hair herself after leaving the salon and Amanda had to redo my mother's hair.