Planning Milestones - what came first?

View quoted message Ah I didnt think of shirts .


Oh that sounds similar to celebrity with the buffets. Brazillian bbq sounds awesome! Bbq anything usually is though .
Ah cool! I dont think they had bingo on the ship we were on; lots of slot machines and that sort of thing.
Yes, waterslide would be awesome! We have friends that just came back from a cruise and they had one and it sounded pretty sweet .

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Like a bag of individually wrapped candies like the merci chocolates or lindt chocolate balls

We were wearing our Mr. and Mrs. shirts haha

Ahhh yes, on the catamaran ride we were given free beer and margaritas as well as when we were on the private beach!

And okay, we will have to see about trying out a couple of different ones if we go on more Norwegian has all day buffet and they change from breakfast food to lunch/supper at around 12:30/1pm but have 2 sit down supper places that are free as well. Otherwise I think there was 4 restaurants you could pay to eat at which we had 2 nights of supper included so we went to a brazillian bbq and then some sort of oriental food place... not sure what it was... Husband picked that one

And ya, we loved playing "deal of no deal", there was bingo (I won $144 USD), trivia, games, and then karaoke!

Next one we go on (if we do) we really want it to have a waterslide haha, my Husband would LOVE that.

View quoted message Aw man that stinks! Ohh are you saying you brought individual candies and gave them to the flight attendants? I've never thought to do that 😅. How did they know it was your honeymoon, did you just tell them? It's so awesome that they were able to upgrade you, how kind of them .


Hey both sound good to me! I've never been to Mexico but I hear it's really nice. I think I would enjoy the snorkeling . We did that in Barbados and it was SO COOL getting so close to fish and turtles but they gave me a lot of rum punch before we got there so while I had fun, I wasn't as focused as I should have been so I definitely want to do it again with less rum punch in my system 😂.
Yeah the flights when we went were a kicker too; makes it hard to justify a trip when flights can be so stinking expensive.
Oh we loved Celebrity! (Granted we have nothing to compare it to ). A co worker of mine had done a ton of cruising and spoke highly of them; said they had some of the best food and we are both into good food so I think that is what was the deciding factor for us. I knew I wouldn't be happy eating processed food all week. When we got home I was actually sick of eating so well haha. I've heard good things about Norwegian as well; I believe they have open dining so you can just go eat whenever? Whereas celebrity they have a 6pm & 8pm seating so you sit st the same table every night and get the same server etc (I think offer open dining as well). Overall we really enjoyed it though; lots to do, they always had trivia or games or archery going on.

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My lord your venue is amazing!!

I completely get how stressful venue searching is - when I was doing that part of planning I made sure to ask the same questions to all the venues so that we would only visit the ones that would work for us... And we still had at least one venue that we visited give different answers once we were there!! Like??? We aren't just going to change our mind on the max. guest list?? Why tell us you can fit over 200 and then when we are there tell us 150 tops but our guests will probably not be as high as we think?? (We had over 300 people to invite and we had already assumed the number of people actually attending would be just over 200 or close to 225.)

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Ya, the flights (because they were also during the Christmas time...) were about the same cost as the cruise itself! At least on the way home it was a direct flight from Florida to Winnipeg - and on both the flight home as well as the Toronto --> Florida the flight attendants were super nice because it was our honey moon! On the flight there we were given free champagne and on the way home we got upgraded to the front with the hot towel and meal!! (Always bring individual wrapped candy/chocolate for flight attendants!)

My favourite... hmmm well on one hand Costa Maya was only for like 6 hours and we just sat on the beach with drinks (we didn't do an excursion on that one) so that was LOVELY. But on the other hand in Cozumel we did have an excursion that was a catamaran ride and snorkeling with the fish - even got a pic. And then that ended with a "beach party" at their private beach... And since we were there for 8 hours and that was only 4 hours we ended up going onto the port area and had authentic mexican food and it was SO GOOD.... Mexico in general was great (at least where we went).

The Southern Caribbean cruise is what we were originally looking at but unfortunately the flights for that would have been like $4,500.... so... (except on Norwegian)

That Alaskan cruise sounds amazing (then again my favourite season is Winter so I would like that one

Oh okay, what do you think of Celebrity? Is there a reason you went with that cruise line?

Our first planning milestone was picking the venue! Our venue is also our hotel, catering, and bar, so it covers a lot of the general tasks that need to be done. We LOVED looking at venues however it was also crazy stressful to make sure we were making the right choice.

I love love love our venue. Here are some pics!

Candlelit location for cake cuttingVenue at nightReception area during the dayWrap around porch area for rehearsal dinner and cocktail hourGeneral venue propertyReception area at night (I always wanted an outdoor tented wedding)Rehearsal dinner/cocktail hour locationCeremony location (we won't have the birds.. that was for a specific wedding)

My favourite part of the venue is the ceremony spot. The trees were planted in a row over 100 years ago, and the sun peaks through right at the archway around 4pm (ceremony time!).. it's honestly just so gorgeous I can't wait to get married there!!

View quoted message Ugh right? I don't even think it's the cruise per say that's expensive but the fact that there's no ports nearby so having to get a flight really adds onto the cost; sucks you had to fly all the way to Toronto to get to Florida
I hear port Canaveral is cool! Which was your favourite place?I'm not sure which cruise you're asking about (or which one you want to do next ) so I'll tell you both.

The southern Caribbean cruise we flew from Toronto to San Juan (layover in Miami, there was no direct flight for us), stayed in San Juan for two days before boarding and then went San Juan-Barbados- St Lucia- Antigua- St Kitts- St Thomas- San Juan.
For our Alaskan cruise we are flying from Toronto to Vancouver, in Vancouver for a day before boarding and then going Vancouver- Inside Passage- Icy Straight Point- Hubbard Glacier- Juneau- Ketchikan- Inside Passage- Vancouver
The cruise in 2017 was Celebrity Summit and the one we go on in July is Celebrity Eclipse I believe .

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Well first we had two flights from Winnipeg --> Toronto --> Orlando Florida. Then we left out of Port Canaveral Florida, stopped at Costa Maya Mexico, stopped at Cozumel Mexico, and then back to Port Canaveral Florida.

That's the kind of cruise that I want to go on next!! Not even kidding man - although we will probably not go on another cruise for another 10 years or so because of the price tag associated with cruising.

We went with Norwegian Cruise Lines on the Norwegian Sun, what about you?

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Good choice for a honeymoon! What were your ports? We did a southern Caribbean cruise in Nov 2017 and LOVED it!

We get married July 2nd and are going on an alaskan cruise from July 5th-July 12th 😊.

View quoted message Lol yeah cost of flights, rental car, hotel, & social. Plus we have 2 kids so that makes it so much harder to travel. There's so much with debt, as soon as you think you've got a handle on things, something goes wrong, either with the house or cars or you someone gets laid off. It's nearly impossible to get ahead.

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Lol that's amazing 😂

Where did you end up decided on going? Me and my DH did a mini-moon here in the city (Winnipeg) back in October the week after we got married but just recently did our official honey moon on a cruise in the Eastern Caribbean for a week!

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That makes complete sense - I didn't even think about the cost of flights!

But ya, it payed for basically half of our wedding which was a huge help seeing as how I'm only 22 years old and don't exactly have much money saved up because we bought our first house back in 2018

Now we just have to try and pay off our vehicles and then other than the house we will be debt free! Lol - so basically debt free by the time I'm in my 60's (assuming we will buy a bigger house and then a bigger house but then a smaller one? lol)

We booked our honeymoon first! 😂 Followed by the venue for Dinner...We mostly have been working backwards haha.

View quoted message I think you’re right - something about making decisions together is just super special! Especially when you both agree!!!

View quoted message My sister was really pushing for it, said we could make it like a mini wedding for those in MB. But it's way too much stress, plus having to pay for a trip back home & pay all that money for a social that will likely flop. Just not worth it. Those from back home who are truly important & want to be there for us will make the trip here.
That's amazing you got such a nice profit from yours! I bet that really helped out

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I like how you think - looking back that is for sure what I could have/ should have done. Instead we basically just made sure that we had enough in the bank to pay the installations for the venue and then pretty much all of our vendors were to be payed the week of or the day of which worked out since it gave us enough time to deposit our presentation and basically break even

I wanted to get all the big vendors out of the way as well but my DH is one of those people that "has a person" for everything so he just kept telling me not to worry and that he would talk to them.... I mean it worked out in the end but boy was I getting anxious since that was our Bar service as well as our DJ and Officiant!

First thing we did was venue as well. But we also locked down catering, photographer, officiant, bar service (we bring our own booze and bartenders), and rentals within the first 2 months of being engaged ONLY because we really wanted the big stuff taken care of early on.

My only regret is not taking time to meet with more photographers. I love ours and he has been amazing but I started seeing so many other styles/types of photographers. BUT with that said, getting the big stuff out of the way really made it easier to budget and therefore know exactly how much to put aside each month

View quoted message Omg that bouquet is beautiful!!!! I will definitely post, just getting my florist back on board, he's been a little MIA 🙈 but I'm sooo excited for the florals!

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That sounds great - I love the idea of going with a Plum and a soft lavender! I tried putting some in my bouquet too

Can't wait to see pictures if you post!!

View quoted message Ooohhh that's a beautiful combination!!!!


Yeah same lol we knew Fall (october) and we knew we didn't want to wait more than 2 years, nor did we wanna rush and do it in 8 months, so we opted for 21 months lol
Our venue is the same for the whole day, private garden at a golf club for the ceremony and then up to the upper level ballroom for the reception. The main colour is an eggplant/plum, we were gonna do hints of turquoise but it isn't coming out nicely as we plan it so we're doing a soft lavender. Maybe a touch of gold or rose gold as accents but very light. And we're using peacock feathers as accents for the centerpieces and one behind each chair tucked through the chair bands.

Welcome everyone!!! its so fun and exciting planning my dream day!! i have 211 days to go!!!

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That's too bad though, I know at my Wedding Social we ended up making in the 5 digits - but of course this is with having a DH who is 29 (almost 30 now!) who is quite the people person and has a bunch of different friend groups. I think we had close to 350 people at the social (sold out over a month before the event) and had people asking for tickets all the way up until the day of!

But it's true, some socials are for sure not worth it - back when my parents had a wedding social they barely broke even because it just happened to be on the same night as 2 other socials of people their friends were friends with Plus I have a couple of friends of friends that we went to their social and just based on the lack of people I can't see it being worth all the stress if you aren't going to have a packed social unfortunately.

View quoted message Nope. My sister really wanted me to have one, & I did think about it, but after my last visit with majority of people not even attempting to visit I know it'd be a flop & it would just cost more. My friend who's in BC now tried going back to have one & it was such a hassle & ended losing money.

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Totally get that - most venues (at least here in Winnipeg) max out at like 150 unless you are willing to pay for a $30,000 venue but that's without DJ, Photographer, etc.

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Oh cool! Will you be having a Wedding Social then??

View quoted message Lol fair enough. Ive never really heard of anyone who's from there so it made me laugh a little. I'm from Beausejour (Tyndall area too) but currently live outside Edmonton

As for the planning stages of a wedding, the first discussion was the guest list of knowing how many to invite and whom I have met from husbands side that time to attend. The friends I had met, they were welcome as to the others that I hadn't known of, they were not invited. This was part of creating the guest list to know what was affordable too to pay.

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Lol that's kind of how our conversations went with our vendors until we locked down a time We just knew the day and they wanted to know when they had to be there but... at the time we were just like... anywhere between 4pm and 7pm?? lol no idea!

I ended up picking one of the invitations on VistaPrint and then adding some flowers that I found on google images (had to use pixlr.com to get rid of the background though) - but it makes for that special touch of making it your own.

Can't wait to see what yours look like! (If you post, of course.)

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That's exactly the conversation I had with our photographer lol. I contacted him pretty much as soon as we got engaged, which was jumping the gun a smidge..

Invites are so much fun and it'd be so cool to actually design them! The designers are crazy talented. I've ordered a sample of the ones we want from Vistaprint so hopefully they arrive soon. There's the invite itself plus details and RSVP cards that I want to jazz up a bit into a package with some vellum and ribbon. Can't wait to put them together

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LOL Exactly!! Like ya, that's what I'm going to where when I get married - but this is where WE'RE going to stand when we say "I DO!" idk, maybe it's because it involves the couple rather than just the wife?

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Oh of course! Although we only knew the year (2019) and the season (fall) - the colours weren't really picked until about 8 months before the wedding We ended up going with my favourite colour (Plum) and his favourite colour (Teal) and then about 3 months before the wedding we decided on Copper being the accent (which then turned into our main colour)! Wish we would have talked more about it though since my DH's cousin had the SAME colours as us just 3 months before our wedding with gold instead of copper...

What colours are you going with? Is your venue the same for the reception and ceremony?

View quoted message Your venue was beautiful. I can see why you knew it was right even before it was built.