Our Aruba Wedding

A couple of great real wedding reviews have just been posted to the Aruba.com forum!

• Renaissance Island, October 2009 – Though this  couple brought their own photographer from North Carolina, the bride raves about working with Juney. They also decided to do the civil ceremony at home in NYC – like us they considered that ceremony a ‘formality’.
• Aruba Marriott, November 2009 – Serena raves about several of the same people we did: Desireé (of course! she’s awesome), DJ Mark Benson, Tico the Steel Pan, Dufy (sp?) the bartender, the Marriott’s food! (they had filet mignon & lobster), Bully the Taxi Driver, and Reverend Gibson. She also bride raves about her hair and make-up experience with Knipoog: www.knipoogaruba.com, 297-583-0221. Sure wish I would have known about them! (Here is her Knipoog review.) And she loved her photographer, Victor Winklaar – (I’ve mentioned before when it comes to island photographers, I’ve felt Victor’s work is the best. The photo, right, is uploaded to the post on the forum and links back to that original review.)

I just received an email from a bride that is considering a Spring 2010 Renaissance Island wedding. Since my experience with Renaissance Island is limited, does anyone out there have any advice or photos you’d like to share with her?

I was able to point her to this Renaissance Wedding Review, and this link to our site visit write-ups, but expect there may be followers with better Ren Island information to share. Have you had or are you planning a Ren Island wedding? Or if you looked into Ren Island and ruled it out, can you tell us why? You can reply as a comment to this post or send me an email. (While posting a comment does require an email address, your email address will not be public.) Either way your privacy will be protected unless you’d like me to pass along your email to her since you two may have plenty to talk about!

In short, we ruled Ren Island out because 1) I am paranoid about mosquitos (though I don’t know how big of a problem this is or if its a problem at all), 2) I didn’t want to be in the sand all night – I needed solid ground for my Jimmy Choos! 3) We didn’t want to stay at their hotels which we felt were dated. 4) I wanted nice clean bathrooms available as well as the ability to be able to sneak back to my room.

That said we definitely recognized what we saw as advantages to a Renaissance Island wedding, number 1) being PRIVACY! Luckily we weren’t bothered by the ‘tourists in the background’ but we’re surprised at how many there were given we were at the northernmost resort on Palm Beach and it was off-season! The music and set-up also drew spectators. Many pictures of us saying our vows have a spectator floating on a raft in the background (luckily I have much experience with Photoshop!). Really I felt kind of flattered by the attention and was able to laugh off the speedos that seemed to be trying to get into our wedding photos. 2) We felt the catering prices were among the most reasonable. And since the Marriott and Renaissance are owned by the same company, I would expect their food is probably really good since the Marriott’s was outstanding! 3) The downtown location is close to more affordable restaurants and plenty of nightlife (though we did feel like that nightlife would best be enjoyed by a ‘younger crowd’) 4) Just the idea of being able to invite everyone to your wedding on a ‘private island’ sounds so romantic and glamorous and will be a ‘once in a lifetime’ experience! Heck – you’re probably heard the superstar Timbaland got married there! (His song, The Way I Are, happens to be one of my favorites!)

I’ve really enjoyed sharing our experiences here on this blog. I continue to receive questions which I still delight in answering. It makes me feel good to think others might be helped by what we went through while planning our Aruba wedding. So, I’d like to dedicate a category of this blog to Questions and Answers. That may mean that you might find your question and answer posted here (in addition to the direct response to your email), though I will of course protect your privacy (your name, wedding date, etc). Of course there will be questions I will be unable to answer, so if you are a local or someone with more extensive knowledge of Aruba and would be willing to field some questions, please let me know. I’d like to have a few trusted, objective sources that can answer questions and share tips that I can not. Emails can be sent to: info@ourarubawedding.com.

Please note that I’m not looking for vendors that want to self-promote. It is of utmost important to protect the integrity of the blog. In many cases I think some of the most valuable information can come from vendors and welcome your tips, though in most cases I do not intend to publish vendor email addresses or websites unless I see something I think really stands out and warrants sharing. Thank you for understanding.

I know its been a little bit since I posted, but now that the wedding is a couple of weeks behind us, I’m ready to put together a short review with my overall impressions. There are also other reviews I intend to get to like the sailing excursion, the welcome bag photos and contents, and trash the dress shoot. And of course I’m planning to share photos, though want to figure out how to do so while respecting my guests’ privacy.

Welcome Party: We started our ‘Wedding Weekend’ with a Welcome Party at the Marriott’s La Vista Restaurant. We arranged this for Thursday evening, the day most of our guests arrived in Aruba. Eveline and her staff at La Vista did a fantastic job! She was willing to do so much to accommodate our group and next thing we knew La Vista felt like a home away from home. She let us take over the bar and lounge and they prepared some fantastic food and drinks! Since we were only able to pay for a limited amount, we were glad that our guests also had the option to order off of their menu. Here you can find the full La Vista Review»

Sailing / Snorkeling Excursion: On Friday we privately chartered Mi Dushi for a sailing / snorkeling excursion for our guests. We decided this would be our gift to our guests instead of wedding favors. (Does anyone really want a trinket with our name on it anyway?) I have yet to write a full review (sorry), but will say that this excursion was one of the best decisions we made! Aside from a couple of people that weren’t feeling well, our entire group participated. All from our 3 year old to those in their 80s had a day to remember! And it was nice for us to finally get to spend some time with them where we couldn’t ‘work’ on anything except enjoying our guests.

WEDDING DAY

Getting Ready: The wedding day started with my hair and make-up appointment at the Mandara Spa. I hate to say that hair and make-up ended up being one of my bigger challenges nearly putting me in tears twice. I had trials on both Thursday and Friday, neither of which went well or gave me much confidence. Saturday morning I was pleasantly surprised when my hair turned out awesome and held beautifully throughout the day. (Doesn’t look too exciting in photos but you have to understand that I have baby fine pin straight hair you can do almost nothing with.) Make-up didn’t turn out as well, but luckily I had a photographer that assured me that anything I would do myself would improve it. I brushed off a lot of the cheek color and re-worked the eyes a bit. I will say that the base they applied (I believe it was Bare Escentuals Mineral Make-up) held up beautifully throughout the day. Read full Mandara Spa review»

The Ceremony: The weather was gorgeous even though the famous Aruba wind seemed to have left us that afternoon. It was sunny and hot! Must have been at least 90º. Desiree collected the guests into the lobby and then walked them out when we were about ready to start. I walked down the aisle to beautifully played steel pan music. Reverend Gibson officiated and it was a really nice ceremony followed by the ’sand ceremony’ which is Aruba’s version of a unity candle. The decor was minimalistic – simple clean white folding chairs and a bamboo and white fabric arch provided by Edwina Werleman of E2 Events and Celebrations. Marriott’s had done a beautiful job grooming a path for the aisle (my husband was especially impressed!), and we lined the aisle with simple palms. I’m glad we didn’t spend a bunch of money on flowers – in my opinion they weren’t needed and might have just created clutter. Here are link for: full Ceremony Review», Reivew: Reverend Robert Gibson», Review for Edwina Werlemen and E2 Events & Celebrations»

Cocktail Hour: Following the ceremony was a cocktail sunset hour on the beach with some fruit and cheese provided and more steel pan music. I’m assuming this went well – we were busy with photos and went upstairs to change into our ‘reception clothes’. If I hear any specific feedback I’ll be sure to share. I have yet to ‘debrief my friends’… I’ll get the real scoop from them next time I meet them for drinks.

Reception / Dinner: After changing, we came down to the poolside reception. We were a little late because we took a few moment for an impromptu photo shoot in the entry to the hotel – hey – when your photographers are inspired you just go with it! Desiree had our guest seating at waiting. Edwina had set up the gorgeous canopy that helped give us intimacy created whimsy. The canopy combined with the contemporary nickel lanterns complimented the island theme beautifully. We were introduced, did our first dance, cut the cake and then joined our guests for dinner. The food was Unbelievable! I’ve never had food like that at a wedding and am still disappointed there were items I didn’t get to try. From rave reviews of the Indian food that is not on their catering menu to people who ‘don’t eat fish’ that went back for two helping of the red snapper, the food was an overwhelming success! Other than that first bite, we didn’t get to eat any cake but it was decorated beautifully and late at night we had arranged for a ’surprise ice cream sundae station’. Read the full Aruba Marriott Reception review»

Mark Benson of Elite Productions did a fantastic job with the lighting. At first I really wasn’t too excited about the lighting aside from wanting some indirect lighting instead of floodlights. I didn’t like the idea of colored lighting because so often I think its tacky and felt the lighting was really expensive. Now, when I look at the photos I really see what a difference that lighting made! I wouldn’t have expected the colored lighting to be done so well and to be so beautiful. Here is a full review of Mark Benson’s Elite Productions»

Mark Benson also provided the DJ which happened to be DJ Randolph. Though I had some reservations at first, I couldn’t have been happier! He did a fantastic job aside from the fact that whichever of the two introduced us as husband and wife pronounced our last name wrong! I had been warned that happens a lot… Read the full review of Cool Pro DJs, Mark Benson & DJ Randolph»

Farewell Brunch: On Sunday we had planned to have a farewell brunch at La Vista again. Most of our guests had breakfast included in their room package so this was a cheap way for us to offer another function. I’m kind of glad to say that there wasn’t much of a turn out. While we would have loved to spend more time with them, we were glad they were out having fun! We had a few joiners and many others that just stopped by to say “Hi / Goodbye”. It ended up working out really well as we got to dine with a couple that missed the sailing excursion and it so happened they were the only two that didn’t stay with us at the Marriott. (This person has a condo in Aruba and he was the one that insisted we consider it as our destination!) And by the way – Champagne mimosas are included as part of the La Vista brunch but they don’t seem to advertise that! Luckily my husband had found out about that. =) Food again at La Vista was great, though I have to admit we were a bit distracted, wishing we had the food from the night before! We wanted that Indian food again.

Trash the Dress: After seeing off our families at the airport, we hit the road for a trash the dress shoot which was so much fun! When I get to my post of “The Best things we did and things we could have done without”, the post wedding shoot will definitely be on the BEST things list! It was fun to put the gown on and spend time in unconventional settings. We went to some ruins and then went an ‘got her wet’ at Eagle Beach! Unfortunately it could be 4-6 more weeks before I see the photos.

For our wedding dinner we chose the Marriott’s “International Four Corners Buffet“, the corners being the “Asian Wok”, “Mexican Fiesta”, “Caribbean Warmth” and “Middle Eastern Oasis”. We liked the idea of offering different types of food and loved that they would be willing to swap out one of the corners for Indian food. We chose to swap the Middle Eastern Oasis for the Indian food. They do not have any Indian food on their catering menu but told us they sometimes do Indian weddings and can cook it when they need to. We were a bit skeptical but figured at least there would be three other ‘corners’ if it didn’t turn out great. Ordering something not on the menu seemed like we would be asking for trouble.

Our menu would have Indian, Asian, Mexican and Caribbean. Then a week or two before the wedding, I’m taking another look and realizing there will be several people I know that may not eat any of the food on the menu! (There aren’t many adventurous eaters in my family.) So, at practically the last minute, we asked if we can swap one more corner for what we expected would be a boring but safe “American Corner”. They were very accommodating giving us two entrees, three salads, mashed potatoes and two deserts! (I think they were generous with the American Corner because the Indian corner would be all vegetarian and relatively inexpensive for them to prepare.)

We didn’t get to taste any of the food before the reception so we were just hoping for the best. Does anyone expect great food at a wedding reception anyway? We’ve had few (if any) remarkable meals at receptions, but were expecting the Marriott catering would be above average. We thought it might even be “good” (the menu sounded really different and pretty good). We weren’t prepared for the food to be outstanding! I just left a couple of friends who are still talking about the food saying it was among the best meals they’ve ever had!

My husband and I started with the Indian food and were blown away! It was so good! He had emailed them the list of what he would like to see on the menu and they did a fantastic job. We were afraid they would be too conservative on the spices but they packed some heat into it! We had a couple of people tell us it was some of the best Indian food they had ever had. We both also had some of the red snapper and plantains from the Caribbean Warmth and again – oh my god - so good. We have a 13 year old that ‘doesn’t like fish’ who went back for two servings! And those plantains are amazing. I can’t even describe them but had two helpings!

The “American Corner” ended up being anything but boring as it featured a Beef Tenderloin Carving Station with Chimichurri and Bernaise sauces. I have one guest in particular who’s favorite food is beef tenderloin but he’s super fussy about how it’s prepared and isn’t shy about telling you if its not right. Well I visited with him tonight and he was going on and on about that tenderloin! And this guy – another person that ‘doesn’t eat fish’ actually tried and raved about the red snapper too!

The Four Corners Buffet is surprisingly well priced for the amount of food you get. (I believe it was $60 per person as of October 2009.) Each ‘corner’ comes with salads and / or appetizers, an entree, at least one side and one or more deserts. There is so much food its almost embarrassing. The deserts alone were an impressive display that I wish I had a picture of – all kinds of cute little desert ‘bites’ and ’shots’. The only bad part is that I have yet to talk to anyone that really even got to the deserts because they were so stuffed by the food! As you can see in the picture, there are 6 tables of food set-up. The next morning when my husband and I woke up we were both just wishing we could get our leftovers! I believe the chef’s name is “Francisco” but I’ll have to check on that. (By the way – the lighting is one of our touches – I don’t believe the buffet comes with the lighting under the tables. This lighting was something my husband wanted. I thought might be kind of tacky, but I ended up loving it!)

Like the deserts, I also didn’t hear much on the cake – many people were just too full. They did a beautiful job with the decorating of the cake and we did get that one bite we fed each other when we cut it. The bottom tier was white cake with strawberry filling, the midde was chocolate with chocolate filling and the top tier was carrot cake with cream cheese filling. We had a bite of the bottom tier (white / strawberry) which was ‘ok’. I remember thinking it was a little dry and typical of many wedding cakes I’ve had. Someone did tell me the chocolate tier was really good and I never got around to trying the carrot cake which is what I really wanted. We also had way more cake than we needed so they were going to box up slices of left-over cake for the guests to take with them (would you believe they don’t charge for that?). Well they forgot about that and we also forgot. We had just talked about it but it was never listed in the “BEO” (banquet event order). Three days later we mentioned we wished we had tried the cake and they told us they still had the cake if we wanted it – that they always take the extra cake and put it in the freezer. We said no thanks, but now I do wish we had them get us a couple of pieces so I could know how good the other tiers were. I also wish we had thought to have a slice of each tier sent to our room to enjoy later (though they did have a really tasty surprise waiting for us in the room). 

Cocktail Hour and Drinks: We were so glad we kept the cocktail hour simple offering only drinks and some fruit and cheese. Initially we had planned on also passing three chilled hors d’oeuvres and had considered the crab claw display. At that time we had no idea how generous the buffet would be. We had scaled back purely for budget reasons. We also limited the cocktail hour bar to two ’signature cocktails’, beer, wine and non-alcoholic beverages to control cost and to help keep the party from getting too ‘colorful’ too early. I also hadn’t gotten around to picking out those signature cocktails so the Marriott improvised choosing one orange signature cocktail and one pink – our wedding colors.

The bar at the poolside for dinner and dancing was a full premium bar. And by the way – I’ve also received great comments from the guests about the staff – they loved the bartender and said the servers did a fantastic job, even cheering the the guests on when they were on the dance floor.

Reception Menu: Below is our menu. I’ve put an * by and bolded our favorite items, though hate to say that there are so many courses we didn’t even get to try (like the Mexican food) and most of the salads! I had printed menus which I mounted to bright pink card stock and had given these to the wedding planner. They coordinated with the rest of our materials, featuring the same pink and orange paisley border. The were placed at each guest seat and would help get the guests’ appetites going while they waited for us to make it to the reception (and do our dance, and cut the cake). 

There is only one thing we would change knowing what we know now. We had the dancing poolside, the buffet set-up on the lawn and the dinner tent in between. Two hours into dancing we wanted to surprise our guests with an ice cream sundae station which would have been perfect because it was so hot! Only thing is they set it up over where the rest of the buffet set-up was. We discussed this in the meeting and all thought that was the most logical place for it. Well, DJ Randolph was just doing too good a job rockin’ the party that people didn’t want to leave the dance floor, my husband and I included! At that point I would have loved an ice cream sundae but couldn’t tear myself away. So, if we were to do it again, the surprise ice cream sundae station would still come out at 9:30pm but it would be placed next to the bar! There, I know it would have been ravaged!

Buffet Menu: Below is our menu. I’ve put an * by and bolded our favorite items, though hate to say that there are so many courses we didn’t even get to try (like the Mexican food) and most of the salads! I had printed menus which I mounted to bright pink card stock and had given these to the wedding planner. They coordinated with the rest of our materials, featuring the same pink and orange paisley border. The were placed at each guest seat and would help get the guests’ appetites going while they waited for us to make it to the reception (and do our dance, and cut the cake).

International Four Corners Buffet

A taste of around the World

The American Corner
Potato Salad, Pineapple Cole Slaw Pasta Salad tossed with ranch dressing
USDA Beef Tenderloin* with chimichurri & sauce bernaice
Fried Chicken with Mashed Potato
Chocolate cake bites
Apple pie bites

Caribbean Warmth
Sweet potato & plantain salad with local basil & chili* (this was so good!)
Seafood ceviche marinated in fresh lime with sweet potato & crisp corn
Grilled fresh red snapper* served mango & papaya relish on fragrant couscous & salsa verde Caribbean fried plantains*
Avocado crème Brule with a Key lime & apple salsa
Freshly brewed coffee & specialty teas

Mexican Fiesta
Marinated Jicamica salad with cilantro & roast corn 
Avocado & shrimp ancho chili dressing
Sliced marinated chicken fajitas with sautéed peppers & onions
Soft flour tortillas
Traditional Mexican Toppings Bar Including Shredded Lettuce, Diced Tomatoes, Black Olives, Sour Cream, Shredded Cheese, Fresh Homemade Salsa, & Guacamole
Chocolate jalapeño tort with caramelized banana crisp

Indian Buffet
Appetizer: Pakoras*
Dal Makhani* (Lentil made in rich butter sauce)
Mattar Paneer (Peas and Cottage cheese curry)
Accompanied by Nans (plain and garlic) & Pulao Rice
Gulab Jamun
Freshly brewed coffee & specialty teas

I’m glad to say I’m still hearing about how much people loved our ceremony! In fact, last night I was hanging out with one of my guests. On his return flight he happened to sit next to a young couple that had just honeymooned in Aruba. They were staying at the Marriott Ocean club next door and lounging on the beach when our ceremony started. They were drawn by the steel pan music and wandered over to see what was going on. They ended up staying for the whole ceremony and were telling our friend how beautiful they thought it was! We had people coming up to us throughout the rest of our stay saying similar things and much of that was due to Reverend Gibson. One vacationer even told us the ceremony brought tears to her eyes.

I had exchanged several emails with Reverend Robert Gibson, contacting him after I read rave reviews on the Aruba.com forum. He saved our date for us, taking us at our word – never asking for a deposit. He said he’d be glad to personalize the ceremony as much as we would like, however we never got around to thinking much about the ceremony. Instead we trusted the forum reviews and decided to let him ‘do what he does’. 

Reverend Gibson was glad to meet with us when we arrived in Aruba to discuss ceremony details and take care of payment (cash only). For some reason we were a little ‘put off’ in that meeting even though he seemed very nice. It kind of seemed like he was more interested in telling us about how beautiful his ceremony and words are, than in getting to know us, though he did ask us if there was anything specific we wanted. We didn’t really feel a connection with him the way we did with almost everyone else we worked with. (Maybe we had just been spoiled by Chela, Edwina, Desireé, Eveline… They were all so warm, always greeting us with hugs as if we were part of their families.)

The ceremony itself was a little different than we were used to. My father walked me down the aisle and was asked to ‘present me’ to my groom (no ‘who gives this woman…’). I was ok with that. Then, immediately he invited us to share a kiss. That was unexpected and I don’t know if it was good or bad. Did it help ease the nerves or were we robbed of that ‘anticipation’?

He then spoke on his thoughts of marriage. You can tell he is well rehearsed and very comfortable in front of a crowd. Our guests were really impressed and told us what a beautiful job they thought he did. The ceremony was non-denominational and he did a great job of making everyone comfortable (neither of us is especially religious but I have Christian family members and his are Hindu). We exchanged traditional vows and then he asked us to share some ‘vows’ of our own. He had warned us the day before that he would ask us to say a few words. He insisted that we should not give it any thought or preparation – that we should relax and say what comes from the heart in that moment. He said he’s ‘never seen it go wrong – something beautiful always comes out’. We trusted him and went with it.

Unfortunately I hate to say I may be the exception where ’something beautiful’ didn’t come out. Not that anything bad did, but I remember feeling really uncomfortable and kind of floundered for words and ended up embarrassed. My husband always likes to lighten the mood and say things that are fun and likes to think of us as ’sugar and spice’ (I’m white, he’s Indian). I’m afraid to watch the video because I have a feeling he actually said that in the ceremony! (It was all a blur so I can’t remember for sure…)

He then shared his ‘Aruba Blessing,’ pronounced us husband and wife, and invited us to move to the table for the signing of the certificate and Sand Ceremony. This ‘blending of sands’ is kind of Aruba’s version of a unity candle. You take sands from separate containers and pour them into one which you can then keep as a keepsake. He invited my husbands children to also join in that ceremony and they also signed the certificate. (Its not a real marriage certificate since no legal weddings can be done on the beach in Aruba – the certificate is just a keepsake and the signing is for show.)

We were disappointed that Reverend Gibson never mentioned we would need to provide a vase for the ceremony, as well as colored sands if we wanted sand other than plain beach sand. Maybe this should have been obvious, but we had no idea. So, 24 hours before the wedding our wedding planner went looking for this vase and happened to have some colored sands available. The vase she found was very nice, however it was $150 AWG (nearly $85 USD). We could have found something comparable in the states for probably $25 and brought it with us. Of course this is a downfall of working with a vendor directly. Often you would arrange the services of the Reverend through the wedding planner who would know about the vase that would be needed. However we had selected Reverend Gibson well before we met with any wedding planners.

At the end of the ceremony, he invited our guests to come up and congratulate us. We had 43 guests so this took some time. While I loved receiving the hugs and wishes I felt bad for the guests waiting in line to congratulate us as it was 90º+ and almost no wind. We were also eager to get on with our photos and keep the rest of the evening’s activities on schedule. I can’t say we had time to visit with every person at the reception though, so maybe this was best. 

So what would we have done differently? I will tell you that we did hear some grumbling from some of our local contacts that would have preferred we choose a different minister. I heard stories of him scheduling weddings too close together and arriving late or rushing off too quick. He assured us he had blocked 4:00-6:00pm for us so the timing would not be an issue. (At one time I wondered if we might move the ceremony from 4:30 to 5:00 and had asked him if it would be a problem if that decision was made last minute – he said it wouldn’t be a problem.) Also, more than one person warned us they feel like his ego is getting a little too big and we admit we did feel a little put off. That said, he is popular for a reason. He did a beautiful job and like in the other reviews, the guests absolutely loved him. And really, this is more a show for the guests, isn’t it? The ‘free form vows’ I would have either prepared or left that out and I would have brought the vase for the sand ceremony from home. While we didn’t have a videographer for the ceremony, we may have a couple of guests that took some home video I might be willing to share.

I just received an email from another Aruba bride-to-be asking when did we arrive in Aruba? How early do you need to be down there?

Really, the answer depends on you — are you someone who is laid back, trusting in your wedding planner to handle everything for you? Or do you need to review every detail and meet with each vendor in person? Is your wedding pretty standard or are you asking them to do things they don’t normally do? As you can imagine, the more input and control you want, the earlier you need to be down there.

Since we were wanting many things that are a little different than what they typically do, we needed to be down there before our guests, most of whom would be arriving two days before the wedding. Unfortunately though, Delta doesn’t fly into Aruba on Tuesdays, so our choices were either get there on Monday or Wednesday (guests were arriving Thursday). We chose to take our chances and arrive on Wednesday so we could stay a couple of extra days after the wedding. I do think it was the right choice but it was hectic!

Our schedule was something like:
Wednesday

• Land in Aruba around 2:00pm, arrive at the hotel around 3:30pm
• Run to the grocery store for some bottled water
• 5:00pm: Meetings with Marriott Wedding planner and La Vista Restaurant Manager where we would have the welcome party. Food and drink tasting with La Vista at 5:00pm followed by  planning session with Desiree
• 7:30pm: Meeting with Mark Benson & DJ Randolph about entertainment
• 8:15pm: Meeting with Mark about lighting
• 10:00pm: Finally ordered some room service and had dinner on the balcony
• 10:30pm: Henna artist came to the room to do my bridal Mehndi which would take 2.5 hours

Thursday

• 9:30am – breakfast
• 10:00: errands including a trip to Ling & Sons and Oduber Agencies
• 12:00pm – Meeting with Edwina (independent wedding planner), florist, Marriott Wedding planner. Should have been a simple meeting, maybe 1-1.5 hours, however I had a melt-down with something that wasn’t going as expected and meeting too closer to 3 hours
• 3:15-5:30 – hair / make-up trial - went badly – didn’t get to make-up so had to make another appt. for following day
• 3:30 – guests start arriving creating lots of distraction and leaving me to assemble bags on my own as my fiance was dealing with little emergencies…
• 5:30 – assemble welcome bags (took 3 hours!) – we wanted the bags waiting in the guests rooms when they returned from the party
• 8:00-10:00pm – Welcome Party (arrived an hour late since my fiance wasn’t able to help me assemble welcome bags – guests were also arriving after little sleep so I didn’t want to ask anyone else for help.)

Friday

• 9:00am – breakfast
• 10:00am – rescheduled make-up trial since Thursday appt. went so bad
• 12:00 – meeting with Reverend Gibson
• Had something here that I can’t remember right now…
• 2:45 – meet guests in lobby before sailing excursion
• 3:30 – arrive at pier for excursion – finally we get 3 hours where we cannot work on anything!
• 7:30 – back to the hotel and finally have a couple of hours to relax!

Saturday

• 11:00am – hair and make-up
• 2:30 – photography starts – ‘getting ready photos’
• 3:00 – photos – our ‘first meeting’ followed by wedding party photos
• 4:30 – ceremony
• 5:30 – cocktail reception for guests while we take more photos
• 6:30 – Guests move to reception while we change clothes, take a few more photos and have a much needed cocktail!
• 6:45 – Back down to reception, first dance, cut cake
• 7:00 – Dinner!
• 7:30-10:30 – Party!

So, this list should just give you an idea. There will be things here you don’t have to worry about, but you may also have things like a civil ceremony that we didn’t have to worry about.

We had our ceremony on the beach at the Aruba Marriott. Sunset was at 6:14 that night so we chose to have our ceremony start at 4:30. We did not want a ’sunset ceremony’. Our idea was we would have the ceremony, then guests would move on to the cocktail hour to enjoy steel pan music and the sunset while we were taking photos. Also, the photographers told us the best light is the hour just before sunset, so we wanted most of our photos taken between 5:00-6:00. (Believe it or not, we don’t care about ’sunset photos’. Instead of capturing sunset photos, a little after 6:00 we were on our way inside to enjoy an orange mojito in the lobby bar before going upstairs to change clothes.)

The day of the ceremony, guests were asked to gather in the lobby around 4:15pm. Desireé, the Marriott’s wedding planner, would be walking the guests in groups to the ceremony location, when she confirmed everything was on schedule. She didn’t want our guests to spend more time than necessary waiting in the heat if we were for some reason delayed. Good thing too, because it was HOT! And Aruba’s characteristic ‘wind’ seemed to have left us that afternoon, so the ceremony was probably 90º with very little breeze! (Desireé had recommended we instead had the ceremony start at 5:00 because of the heat, but we stuck with 4:30 since we didn’t want to miss out on the hour of primo light.)

My groom joined his two groomsmen up at the arch while the guests were being seated. (We did not have the groomsmen ‘walk the aisle’ with the bridesmaid and maid of honor.) His eldest son seated both of our mothers and then it was time to begin!

Steel pan music played as my bridesmaid and maid of honor walked down the aisle up to the bamboo and white fabric arch. Our flower girl (daughter of the maid of honor) started off great, but then decided to walk off and do her own thing which was fine. For us it was something to laugh about – after all, she had just turned 3 so we knew something like that might happen. Then my dad walked me down the aisle to the steel pan ‘here comes the bride’. Somehow I thought it would be cheesy to have that song played by the steel drum, but it was actually quite nice. That tune tugs at the emotion but the steel pan playing it made it seem so cheerful and fun – perfect for the beach!

I wore a gorgeous Romona Keveza Collection silk gown, Nadri chandelier earrings and bangles, and high heeled wedge flip flops. Luckily Romona’s dresses have the most amazing construction so I didn’t need any ’support undergarments’. A simple pair of lace undies is all was needed under that dress! And I heeded the advice from bridal consultants that said limit the veil to simple single tier of fingertip length, though I also brought a cathedral length veil which I used for other photos. (I purchased both veils on eBay for only $20 each!) Had there been a lot of wind, I would have just tucked a little bit of the veil in the back of the dress to hold it in place. (My ‘reception’ dress which I’ll show in the reception review was a gorgeous Nicole Miller gown purchased on RueLaLa.com. RueLaLa has short ‘private sales’ of designer clothes and accessories, during one of which I purchased the $2600 gown for only $650! They emailed me a teaser two days before and I was lucky enough to snag that dress before it sold out.) My bouquet was white cymbidium orchids and white freesia and the bridesmaids carried orange calla lilies. (I loved my bouquet even though it was really expensive but wasn’t impressed with the bridesmaid bouquets. I’ll elaborate more on flowers in another post.)

The Ceremony:

For the ceremony, we chose Reverend Gibson, whom I had communicated via email for a few months and we met in person the day before. He’s definitely a pro and very comfortable in front of the group. There was something that put me off a little bit, but I can’t put my finger on what is was (maybe I’ll figure it out by the time I write a more detailed review for him).

We exchange traditional vows and were then asked to say some words of our own. He had warned us the day before that he would ask us to do this. He insisted ‘Don’t worry about it – don’t even give it a thought’. He said he had never seen it go wrong. He said relax and something beautiful will come out, ‘it always does’. We decided to go ahead and leave that part in and trust him. When the time came though, I hate to say that I felt a little lost (luckily the groom had to go first!). Did some beautiful words come to me when it was my turn? I’m afraid not. I thought it was really awkward and I remember feeling embarrassed. I haven’t seen the video yet – when I do maybe I’ll decide he was right. My hunch though? Probably not.

After we are pronounced husband and wife we were invited to participate in the ‘sand ceremony‘, kind of Aruba’s version of a unity candle. We invited my husbands children to participate with us and filled the sand vase as a family. (By the way, we hired Rev. Gibson directly and in our email communications he never mentioned we’d need to provide the vase for the ceremony. We found out about that the day before. Luckily, Edwina came to the rescue and found us a beautiful vase and some colored sands.) The vase gets filled, the ‘keepsake certificate’ signed and then he invites guests to come up and congratulate us. It was nice to get that hug from each person right after the ceremony, however it took a while and I kind of feel like our guests were wanting some shade and a drink and not so excited about waiting in line to say their congratulations at that moment. (And we wanted to move on to our photos so we could stay on schedule.)

Decorating:

We chose to simply line the aisle with palm leaves. (The pink / orange ombre rose petal pattern I had in mind would have likely been disrupted by the wind and sand. I had instead chosen a white carpet runner which I decided against at the last minute. I had been considering the runner so that it would be easier for me to walk in my high heeled wedge flip, but then a carpet on the sand just didn’t seem right.)

We chose to do almost no decorating of the ceremony – no flowers at all and no sashes. We rented the folding chairs (which I think are more sophisticated than the plastic slip covered / sashed chairs) and bamboo and fabric arch from Edwina / E2. I had briefly wondered if I should have at least decorated the chairs at the ends by the aisle, but was glad we chose to leave them plain. We just didn’t want to spend more money than necessary on the ceremony – we wanted to save our budget for the party! I never felt like anything was missing.

The Beach:

If you’re planning an Aruba wedding you probably already know that there are no private beaches in Aruba! Many couples are bothered by this and its probably one of the biggest reasons some choose Renaissance Island, where you get to rent out the whole Island and you have ultimate privacy. Edwina warned us that Palm Beach is much busier than Eagle Beach which is why she prefers Eagle Beach for weddings. We had read posts from couples that were concerned about having tourists and water sports activities in their photos. The fact that Marriott is the Palm Beach hotel furthest to the north, we hoped these things would be less of a problem.

So, were there sunbathers laying around watching the wedding? Was there water sports activity going on in the background? Was there anyone in a speedo walking the beach? Yes, Yes and Yes! Were we bothered by these things, like the fact that some of our ceremony photos show a person in the water in the middle of the arch (shown here)? Surprisingly, no! Aside from one group of skimpily clad people that we politely asked to move during family photos after the wedding, we weren’t bothered. We really didn’t even notice the extra audience to the sides and were able to laugh off the occasional person strolling the beach. You may notice two of the photos in this post are almost identical with the exception that in one the swimmer is easily Photoshop-ed out of the arch. With as much as I get hung up on so many other things, I’m surprised that this didn’t bother me. I will try to post more photos later and let you judge for yourself how big of a deal it is. If you do want to be assured more privacy though, I’d consider Ren Island or Eagle Beach.

Things I am glad we did:

• Kept the ceremony decoration simple! I did not want to spend a lot of money decorating a short ceremony and wondered if I would regret that later. In the end, that simplicity was something I loved.
• Steel pan player: I believe Tico was the steel pan player and he did a fantastic job. Marriott positioned him perfectly between the cocktails and ceremony and the volume was perfect. I had wondered if a single steep pan would be enough and I totally think it was. (Other options were a steel pan trio or a steel pan and guitar duo.)
• Timing: I’m glad we kept the 4:30 timing (vs. moving back to 5:00), even though it was hot.
• Cocktail hour: Arranged for a cocktail hour to follow. (We limited it to 2 signature cocktails, beer and wine and fruit and cheese displays to help keep the cost down.)

Things I might have done differently:

• Sand Ceremony: I would have brought a vase from home for the sand ceremony. I think we paid $80 for a simple glass vase that I could have purchase for a fraction of that here at home. I also might have liked to pick out this keepsake myself. For the sand, you can keep it as simple as using some beach sand, or you can use some colored sands. Luckily we loved the combination of natural sand and earthy colored sands Edwina found for us.
• Vows: Put some thought into the words Reverend Gibson would ask us to exchange

So, the final verdict – should we have done our ceremony elsewhere? No way! We found the Marriott’s beach to be much less crowded than other hotels on Palm Beach and really wanted the convenience of having everything in one place. We didn’t have to worry about transporting guests between the ceremony and reception site. We wanted everything to be as easy as possible for our guests who had come so far. Also, some guests like being able to sneak up to their room to change into something more comfortable for the reception. Having spotless facilities nearby (bar and restrooms) was a plus as well. And we actually enjoyed having total strangers come up to us the rest of the weekend telling us they had watched our ceremony on the beach. Some said that it was the most beautiful ceremony they had ever seen. Every “Congratulations” was well received and we even had one lady say our ceremony brought tears to her eyes. Awww…. !

After several glowing reviews, its finally time for me to get back to a not so great review… If you’ve followed along you know I’ve had a hard time figuring out my flowers. I finally found my inspiration and sent the photos and explanations of what I was looking for 20 days before the wedding. I’m told its imperative we get the order placed as soon as possible and am told I will get the quotes the next day, which would leave us a few days to look at the numbers and make final decisions. (Final orders need to be placed 7-10 days before the wedding.) Unfortunately the quote I was told would come the next day, came 7 days later and the wedding is then 13 days away. (First two photos in the post are my ‘inspiration photos’.)

Individual Quotes:

The quote contains prices and substitution suggestions for each individual arrangement shown in the photos which is good. There is also a note that all vases are ‘rental’ – they get returned to the florist after the event. At least this is a good start – now how many of each do they suggest I need to recreate the look / feel shown in the photos. I want a total flower proposal based on the size of our tables which is actually now 1 long table for 40.

Full Flower Proposal:

Well I wasn’t receiving a bottom line proposal suggestion how many of each I need to recreate the look and feel of my photos. My fiancé pushes me into just making some selections and hoping for the best even though I do not yet even know the length of the dinner tables. We finally make our selections and its around 10 days before the wedding. Whew, right? Oh no… The ‘fun’ is just getting started.

Sprayed Spider Mums vs Spider Gerberas vs Hydrangeas vs Freesia

As were trying to place the order I’m told pink and / or orange spider mums are not available. (Spider mums are available in white, green, lavendar and I think yellow.) They can ’spray’ white mums whatever color I want or I can pick an alternate flower. What I had actually wanted was pink spider gerberas which I didn’t think would be a big deal since the regular gerberas are one most common flowers for Aruba wedding setups. Well I’m told the fluffy spider gerberas are not available. I’m not comfortable with the idea of sprayed flowers and ask for a picture. No one can provide a picture so I ask about alternates – I want to know about pink hydrangeas and / or pink freesia. I’m then told the hydrangeas won’t hold up well in the heat. (Then why were they on the list when I asked for a list of available flowers?) That brings me back to freesia – in my original quote I was told a ‘medium square vase’ of spider mums would be $55, and medium square vases of 10 freesia stems would be $70. So, I decide I’d rather pay the extra $15 per arrangement and have freesia instead of sprayed mums. THEN the florist comes back and says the freesia are really small and that for a medium vase of freesia to look right I’ll really need 2 bunches in each bringing the cost to $125 per freesia arrangement. I was pissed and thought this seemed a bit shady. I’m ready to place and order and they’re saying ‘forget about the original quote, you really need to spend 60% more per arrangement for it to look decent’. Why would they quote something they thought would look bad? Or why wouldn’t they have, at the time of the quote, said that they thought it wouldn’t look good? Or why didn’t they just plain give the original quote at $125? And I’m told this when the wedding is a week away and these decisions are urgently needed. So, I finally gave in and agreed to go with the sprayed spider mums even though no one was able to send me a photo.  (Oh and that spider mum quote – originally was $35 for 3 mums… when I said I’d like to add two mums the price went up $25 for a total of $60! So $35 for three mums AND the vase rental, but then $25 for two mums? That math doesn’t work – again I feel like I’m being taken advantage of. I insisted they give me a more reasonable price.)

Submerged Orchids and Orchid Cake Flowers:

My quote of $105 per ’submerged orchid’ arrangement went to $150 per arrangement when I said I really wanted the submerged orchids to be the Phalaenopsis like in my photo (shown left), not Cymbidium. I’m not surprised and tell them to go ahead, though I want Phalaenopsis with pink centers (which I learned are called ‘red lips’).

At least my quote for cake flowers (6 regular Phalaenopsis) was only $95. Or was it? Next thing I know I get an email that the cake flowers will really be $185 (not $95)! Now I’m really pissed. After I express my frustration there is an explanation that this is because the smaller Phalaenopsis they were going to order from Columbia are not available so instead they are ordering larger ones from Holland. Still seems shady and seems like the florist should have confirmed availability before giving the quote. It also didn’t seem right when I could get a whole Phalaenopsis stem for $150 which included the vase rental. Then they ’suddenly realized’ they can just use loose flowers for the cake and restored the price to $95.

Vases:

After I’ve gotten the quotes and order together I’m told two of the vases I want aren’t available. The long horizonal vase for the horizontal calla display and the rectangular vase for the submerged orchids. Wouldn’t have been a big deal if I had been told this when I was first promised the quote which was still nearly 3 weeks before the wedding because these are easily available online. Instead I’m finding this out a week before I leave and am unable to find them locally. (I spent hours looking for the long horizontal vases, then days later I’m told the rectangular vases for the submerged orchids aren’t available either and hit all the same stores again.) I found the rectangular vases for the submerged arrangements, but didn’t have time to pack them properly and two broke. Oh well – I knew that was a risk and they weren’t expensive. I was able to provide two of the vases.

OTHER FLOWERS and OUTCOME

Bridal & Bridesmaid Bouquets:

I chose a combination of Cymdibium Orchids and Freesias for my bridal bouquet, Cymbidium Orchid corsages for the mothers and had orange callas for the bridesmaids. The bridal bouquet was expensive ($225) but beautiful and held up pretty well. I didn’t put it in water when I got back to the room but the next day it was still in good enough shape to take to the Trash the Dress Shoot. The moms corsages were nice and only $30 each which I thought was a good price.

I’m afraid I was disappointed in the bridemaid bouquets though – I was first quoted $50 each for bouquets of 5 mini orange callas. That sounded too small, so I asked to make it 7 each for which I was charged $70. They ended up looking skimpy and I was kind of embarrassed to ask the girls to carry them. Since calla lily bouquets are one of their most common bouquets I never thought to send them a picture of what I expected to see. The first picture below is kind of what I was expecting and the second is what I got. Guess I was supposed to order full size callas? I didn’t think mini callas were THAT mini. Would you be disappointed if you paid $70 for the bouquet on the right?

Centerpieces:

The roses and single cymbidiums were nice and turned out nice with the exception that the vases for the single Cymbidiums were a little large. The sprayed mums exceeded my expectations – they were really pretty and we all could have been saved a lot of grief on that if someone could have sent me a picture. The orchids were gorgeous but weren’t submerged – instead the vases had an inch or two of water and the orchid was slumped against the side. It wasn’t the polished look I was going for and didn’t look as good as the picture I gave them. Ideally they would have been filled with water – actually I wonder if they use gel to get that ‘floating’ look like the photo above? There also should have been candles close by to create a bit of a glow (I guess it wouldn’t have ‘glowed’ if the vase wasn’t filled with water or gel though). I thought these things were obvious but looks like I’m wrong. I was disappointed but still had those orchids sent up to our room for the rest of our stay.

Here an example of what I got (sorry – its not a good photo) – not the cool, ‘designed’ clusters I was hoping for…

Luckly we sat at the end of the table and couldn’t really see much of the centerpieces or it would have driven me crazy. I don’t feel like we got close to the look I wanted.

I hate to say that flowers was the most disappointing part of the planning process and the biggest disappointment the day of the wedding, but I know part of that is my fault. I waited too long to make my selections and wanted ’something different’ – a kind of design they don’t have experience with. People loved and commented on a lot of things about the wedding and one reception, yet not one flower comment. Somehow I just expected more for $2400+… Hopefully someone will send me a photo that will show me it was a lot better than I remember…

Flower Advice:

My advice is just to let them ‘do what they do’… you’re probably better off with their basic mixed flower arrangements that are repeated throughout the decor. OR – if you want something different, start early. Confirm how many stems are in each quote you get, that the vase you want is available and that your colors are available. Would I make the same choices again? Maybe, but I would bring my own vases and would have drawn out exactly where I wanted everything placed. And I would work with a different florist. Unfortunately I can’t tell you who the florist was – I chose to work with the independent wedding planner’s florist so I didn’t have to add Marriott’s 19% service fee to the bill. She insists this florist is one of the best and very trustworthy. She did meet with us and wasn’t as personable as so many of the other people we had been meeting but she did bring the orchid stem to show me which finally brought a smile to my face during a really difficult planning meeting.

Edwina Werleman is the owner of E2 Events and Celebrations where she not only offers planning services but also owns wedding and party rentals. We adored Edwina from the moment we met Edwina during our site visit in May. She helped us explore our options, in particular, high-rise vs low-rise – Palm Beach vs Eagle Beach. (Eagle Beach weddings are a specialty of hers.) Even though we ended up choosing to keep things simple with a high-rise / Palm Beach venue with the Aruba Marriott, Edwina was a huge resource to us! She’ll be kind of like your ‘Aruban mom’, taking you under her wing and looking out for you.

We were really happy with the Marriott but were glad Edwina was there to help us where the Marriott left off. Most importantly, there was a look and feel that we wanted for our event that we were finding very difficult to find. The setting is gorgeous and will be more than enough for many people, but we wanted a little bit of what I think of as a ‘Miami Beach’ vibe.

First, I have a real aversion to the plastic slip-covered, sashed chairs I’ve seen in most set-ups at most hotels (from Eagle Beach set-ups to the Hyatt, you see this everywhere – maybe you’re lucky enough to find it charming). Luckily for us though, Edwina has recently invested in some simple clean white folding chairs that worked out perfectly! (We used them for the ceremony and then they were moved to the dinner.) We received so many of compliments on the bamboo and fabric arch we rented from her – it was just perfect and she can drape it however you would like, even with colors. So, if you have something you’d like to see, send her the photo – she can probably do it.

We also wanted the dinner space on the lawn to be more intimate and fell in love with the idea of a fabric canopy that would mimic our arch. We didn’t want to feel like we were having an ‘expensive picnic’. We wanted to create a little drama with one or two long tables and the lawn was a great space for it, however I didn’t want to feel ’so exposed’. (We knew we wanted dancing poolside.) When we had just about given up on the idea of a canopy, Edwina decided she could invest in this for us. We are so glad she did. It turned out beautiful! It made the space so much more special and I loved the softly flowing sheer drapes. She had crew there the night before waiting for its delivery and had set-up ready to begin at 5am on the wedding day! It was decorated with hanging silk organza lanterns suspended by ropes of crystals (hopefully I’ll get a better picture soon).

Next, I wanted candelight but was not liking the ‘rustic’ lanterns that were available. I fell in love with some contemporary nickel lanterns I had seen at Restoration Hardware. After careful consideration, she decided she could invest in those for us as well – from 7″ tall to 24″ there must be at least 40 of them. In addition to using some of these lanterns on the tables, we used them throughout the ‘lounge’. Desiree and Edwina worked together to create a really chic lounge space for us that was perfect! Our guests loved having a comfortable place to sit, where they could watch the activity on the dance floor and still feel like part of the activity. The folding chairs are great, but toward the end of the night they so appreciated the Marriott’s comfy seating and the lanterns helped give the space some of that ‘Miami Beach’ feel.

Edwina worked with the florist as well. We were really frustrated by the 19% ’service fee’ Marriott adds to everything, however they were cool with letting us hire these services through Edwina. (The service fee is a corporate policy they can’t do anything about, however it was a big point of contention for us since Westin and Hyatt add the service fee to food and beverage only. Hopefully that policy will change someday.) Flowers ended up being a struggle for us, as you may have read, but much of the blame falls on me for waiting til the end to figure out what I wanted. And of course I wanted something they don’t have! Everyone worked really hard and we did get some beautiful flowers. (And by the way — the ’sprayed mums’ I was so opposed to turned out beautiful!)

Edwina also helped us with other things like having these yummy dutch butter cookies made fresh for our welcome bags and arranged to have hair and make-up done at the hotel for our mothers and maid of honor. (Marriott graciously let us use an available meeting room that worked out perfectly!) We also hired our videographer through Edwina and are looking forward to seeing the video!

It was nice to work with someone that had the flexibility to do things Marriott could not. Everyone seemed to work together so well and we were grateful that the Marriott did not give us a hard time about using some of our own vendors (some of the other hotels aren’t as accommodating). Marriott knows what they do well, and are good sports about letting you bring in what they cannot give you.

Edwina is wonderfully receptive to new ideas. If you can give her a picture, she can probably figure out how to make it happen! (Though keep in mind importing anything to Aruba is very expensive – duty and shipping on our lanterns cost as much as the lanterns themselves!) Edwina is very honest and will tell you what things she can and cannot do well. And she usually replies to emails surprisingly quick! She’s a little crazy though, often replying at 1-2am – we don’t know how she does that and then get up in the wee hours to supervise her crew.

Not only would work with Edwina if we could do it all again, but I now also consider her a friend!