Megan & Nick, March 2018, WP & BWI Ballrooms (Update 9/26 - Random Updates)

[UpstartCrow]

Hi, folks! I’ve been dreaming of having a Walt Disney World Wedding since I learned they were a thing. (I was in high school, there was a tv special I watched with my friends, and they all just sort of turned to me, the resident Disney geek, and went, “oh my god, you HAVE to do that.”)

So, the wedding’s been set since I was 16, and I’m very fortunate to have a groom to go with it now.

A lot of this is going to be retrospective, as we’re now less than 8 months out from our date. But here’s how things have been going/are going with what I'm hoping will not be a complete disaster of a wedding. If I know myself, these posts will be EXTREMELY verbose, so... sorry. But hey, when I was in the earlier stages of planning, the lack of information drove me absolutely bananas, so maybe someone somewhere will find things like lengthy descriptions of the wainscoting at a venue we didn't use helpful. I can always hope.

1. The Proposal
2. The Big Picture (Guest Count/Venue Selection)
3. The Site Visit (VERY IMAGE-HEAVY)
4. The Room Block (Basically just a rant)
5. The Photographers and the Save-the-Dates
6. The Dress!
7. Random, Pre-Planning Session Stuff (inc. shoes, floral ideas, music)

 

[lpizzuro123]

We were married at Disney over 8 years ago and these boards were my lifeline. We found out so much from all the wonderful people on these boards we pretty much knew what we wanted and what to expect when we went down for our planning session. Looking forward to reading all your wedding planning.

 

[UpstartCrow]

The Proposal (A Play-by-Play of a Comedy of Errors)

I'm starting out on a self-indulgent note here before I get to actual wedding planning, but I think it's a somewhat interesting story.

Nick and I have been to WDW together five times now- most recently for our site visit. On the trip before that, he proposed to me in front of Cinderella’s Castle (and what felt like about a hundred confused tourists).

The way it worked out: I’d been in Florida for a cruise with my family and was going to meet him in Disney “for my birthday.” At this point, we’d been together for close to five years, he knew I wanted to get engaged in Disney World, and that I’d sort of been hoping he was going to propose on our Disney trip a year before. So, it was not really a surprise that he was going to propose on this visit (especially since I'd been helping him pick out a ring).

Anyway. I got to our hotel room at the Polynesian and he texted me that he was on Magical Express, heading over. So, I started to unpack, and was taking some room pictures when there was a knock on the door. A bellhop handed me an envelope with a teal ribbon tied around it. We had said we were celebrating my birthday when we made the reservation, so I thought “oh, cute! They sent me a little card. I’ll wait until Nick gets here to open it.” I resumed unpacking.

I kept getting texts from Nick that he was on his way. It was starting to get to the point where he should have been there by then, but he somehow wasn’t. Finished with my unpacking, maybe twenty minutes after receiving the envelope, I mentioned to him that oh, Disney sent me a birthday card, isn’t that cute?

“Did you open it?”

“No, I thought I’d wait for you.”

“Megan, open the envelope.”

Oh.

Whoops.

My heart started racing, which it continued to do until I arrived at my destination (and for some time after). I did take a very fast shower because I’d been up since 6 and was kind of a mess at this point. Vibrating, I finally set out in a nice dress and sandals, presumably looking like an absolute fool to all the families on the Magic Kingdom monorail wearing much more practical Mickey t-shirts and Crocs and not looking vaguely dazed and shaking.

Nick met me at the end of Main Street, smiled, and brought me up to a PhotoPass photographer in front of the castle, who was just taking a picture of a group. We were both so jittery I don't even remember what we said to each other beyond "how was your flight?" Then the group took another shot. Then another. Then another. Then another. They decided they wanted shots with every single possible permutation of the 15 people in their party. Nick’s anxiety spikes. My anxiety spikes. Neither of us can speak. FINALLY, it’s our turn for a picture. Nick hands his phone to a woman waiting in line after us and asks if she can take a video. Confused but obliging, she agrees. We go up, and I somehow manage to stay upright as Nick declares his wish for his princess to become his queen (Nick is a breathtakingly cheesy man sometimes) and drops to one knee.

Unfortunately, because of the noise and the nerves, I didn’t actually hear Nick ask me to marry him. So, he was kneeling there with the ring (nestled in Cinderella’s glass slipper) out, and I was standing there grinning and we were both just staring each at other wondering why the other one wasn't doing anything. In my head, I started panicking. “He realizes I don’t put the ring on myself, right??? Does he actually know the fundamentals about how this goes???” Finally I just kind of went “… so are you going to ask me?!” and, very confused, he’s like “I did!!” But he asked again, I said yes, and the important thing is that the pictures don’t show ANY of the awkwardness (though they do show quite a few mildly-interested tourists milling around in the background- made it a little difficult to get a photo we were happy framing and displaying, but I'm not complaining).

Afterward, I found out that Nick had been at the hotel since before I got there, and was actually crouched around the corner while the (deeply confused) cast member gave me the invitation, so he knew I had it. He immediately set off for Main Street in his dark button-down shirt and khakis, while I was trying to kill time. So, he stood there broiling in the heat for over an hour before I actually arrived. I cannot believe he still wanted to marry me after that.

Of course, we immediately went to City Hall to get our buttons. Big shoutout to the absolutely lovely cast members at the Christmas shop in Liberty Square, who were the first to notice and made SUCH a huge fuss over me, the ring, etc. (“When did you get engaged???” “About an hour ago. Right over there!” “[WORDLESS SHRIEKING]”) They really made us feel special.

 

[UpstartCrow]

The Big Picture (Guest Count and Venue Selections)

So, for us, an “Escape” wedding was never going to be an option (though oh, how we have come to wish it were). Nick would actually have been fine with it but stupid me had substantially more than 8 people I wanted to have at my wedding. (Why, past Megan, WHY?)

Our final invite list is sitting at 103 (so, 105, including us). “I mean, you have 100 people, so… that’s a lot… like, that’s a LOT,” said our sales coordinator from Disney. “Oh wow, 100? You’re really keeping it small!” said our family and friends in New York.

I’ve known I wanted the Wedding Pavilion as my ceremony location since I was sixteen, but it was really the only place we could have considered anyway (unless we wanted to have the ceremony in one of the ballrooms). Our guest count effectively ruled out most of the other locations, and while I loooooove the Yacht Club Gazebo (that whole area, really), I am way too Type-A to have ever planned an outdoor wedding.

For the reception, I really, really wanted the Grand Floridian ballrooms for the proximity to the Wedding Pavilion, plus the whole ambiance around the resort/grounds and everything, but we offered the BoardWalk ballrooms as our second choice. I want kind of a Sleeping Beauty/Snow White “garden/woods”-y vibe to the wedding (our colors are [shades of] pink, green, and cream), which I think would be at odds with the Atlantic Dance Hall’s 1920s thing.

So, we gave them three dates, and two different options for reception venue (six possibilities in total), and then we waited. I know I was pretty inflexible overall, but we knew we needed to have the wedding on a Saturday if we wanted most of our guests to have a chance of making it, and we weren't really willing/able to consider ceremony venues besides the Wedding Pavilion.

We scheduled our site visit for late April- around 12 months out from our chronologically last date (which had come to be our first choice). We definitely breathed a huge sigh of relief when our March date rolled around and our coordinator announced that we were able to get everything we wanted except the Grand Floridian ballrooms. Got a little nervous when the second date came by and they told us they couldn’t make it work for us that weekend. Meanwhile, everyone we know marveled at this extremely bizarre lottery system we’d been thrown into. My best friend is getting married up here in June next year and they had everything locked down while we were still waiting to be told if we could get ANY of our dates. I have to say, it was pretty aggravating. The lack of control over your fate, having to wait before you can really start doing anything (can't even count how many times someone asked if we booked x yet and I had to remind them that we had to wait to find out what our date would be), etc… Definitely caused a lot of sleepless nights. Given how quickly things like hotel and dining reservations fill up at Disney, it doesn’t necessarily not make sense, but it was very frustrating for this control freak.

In the end, on the last day of the trip we went on to do the site visit, we found out we couldn’t get anything on our one remaining date option either. So, we flew back to New York happy to finally have a confirmed wedding date and venue, but also in a little bit of a panic because we went from thinking of ourselves as twelve months out to suddenly finding ourselves ten months out.

 

[UpstartCrow]

The Site Visit (ft. a ton of very blurry, hastily-taken venue photos)

When we made the trip for our site visit, it was nearly two months after they told us at least a date/venue we could have, so we were going just to check things out more than to make decisions. So, we saw the Wedding Pavilion (we really lucked out that it wasn’t in use), the Grand Floridian ballrooms, and the BoardWalk ballrooms.

We met our sales coordinator at Franck’s, and she took down some general information about the wedding (estimated guest count, colors, size of bridal party, buffet or plated service) and fielded our questions (of which we didn’t have too many at that point). She also showed us some photographs of the ballrooms decorated for weddings, since you see them in “business” mode when you’re actually touring.

After that, it was off to the Wedding Pavilion, where I got slightly choked up walking around with my fiancé. It was absolutely everything I wanted. It actually has kind of a “chapel”-y vibe that I wasn’t really getting through the pictures, but which I love. I had been worried that the new chandelier was going to look a bit grander than I’d wanted, but it’s perfect. (The darkness in the pictures is because they're lousy phone pics- it was VERY bright and airy inside.)

Then I whipped some paint samples out of my purse and started trying to match the carpet. I was still trying to decide my colors and I was worried if I had certain shades of pink with that sky blue, it was going to look like a baby shower. I’m sure our coordinator thought I was insane.

Next stop was the Grand Floridian ballrooms, where I think the lobby area that leads into all the different conference rooms impressed me more than the actual rooms.

In the ballroom itself, I absolutely LOVED the fake balconies and the paintings on the walls. The paintings were just one of those little things that just gave me that “Disney” feeling. Possibly because I stayed at the GF with my parents once when I was little, and I consequently have Grand Floridian nostalgia. Possibly because I have two degrees in American history. At any rate, our coordinator told us that not all the rooms have the balconies, so that wouldn't be guaranteed even if we could get the Grand Floridian ballrooms (which, in the end, we couldn't, since they were booked solid for conferences before our first date even came around ).

My main reservation about the ballrooms had been the carpets (because, just, wow, those are a lot of colors), but seeing them in person put my mind at ease. I think once you have a dance floor, and buffet tables, and dining tables on them, they’re not going to look so loud (right? ).

Last stop was the BoardWalk ballrooms, which our planner had really been pushing— she had her own wedding reception there, which she admitted may have biased her. I really had nothing against the rooms themselves- honestly, I always thought they looked similar to the Grand Floridian, only darker and with different wainscoting (and without the balconies and the paintings). I just wanted to be able to have the whole wedding at the Grand Floridian. The atmosphere there seemed more elegant, and I thought it might be less of a hassle getting everyone from the ceremony to the reception.

That said, I loved the lobby at the BoardWalk convention center too (honestly, more than the one at the GF- not that that's a huge deal, but still ). I was also a little surprised to find I liked the lighting fixtures there much better than the ones at the GF. The rooms weren’t as dark as I was worried, and as our coordinator pointed out, the lower ceilings there make the rooms feel a little less “convention”-y. No paintings in the ballrooms, but at least they have the ones outside.

When we left, I decided I’d be perfectly happy to have the reception here. Which is good, since, as it turns out, that’s where our reception is going to be!

 

[Gondingl]

Congrats on your Disney engagement and Disney wedding! Your proposal story is completely adorable! You guys are getting married right around us! Our date is Feb. 17th and the lottery system is crazy! I gave them 3 months and there was only two dates in all of 3 months that matched what we wanted - Sea Breeze Point and Atlantic Dance Hall!

Can't wait to follow along with your wedding planning!

 

[UpstartCrow]

Thank you, and you too! OMG, two dates in three months?? That is COMPLETELY bananas. And February's supposed to be something of a "low" season for weddings, isn't it? Not that there's much of a "low" season for anything at Disney these days, but still. What the heck does it look like if you're aiming for, say, June, I wonder.

 

[UpstartCrow]

4. The Room Block

AAAAAAAAAARGHHHHHHHHHH

Ahem.

Our contract process was, overall, pretty fine. There were a few items we went back and forth on, and we wound up lowering our “estimated guest count,” but that was well and good (protip: when they ask you that in their initial email before you even get the contract, it is not so they have a ballpark estimate of how much space you’ll need- that is the number on which your F&B charges will be based. Oops). As far as which hotels to block out, we’d decided months ago to do a value, a moderate, and a deluxe, and my family was very adamant about the Beach Club (which is like “their” resort that they stay at every time, and we love it too). We’ve never stayed at any of the Disney values or moderates, but we did some research, looked at maps, and wound up with Port Orleans – French Quarter and Pop Century.

If you’ve read my posts on the main board, you may recall that we were SUPER STRESSED OUT about the room block. (And still are, though fortunately not to the same extent.)

We invited 107 people (there have been some additions since my last post ). The vast majority do not live anywhere near WDW. A good number are rather distant relatives who may or may not even want to attend the wedding. Or, alternately, they could jump on an excuse to go to WDW and surprise us. So, we could wind up with 100 people, or we could wind up with 40. We could have 40 people flying down for the weekend, or we could have 40 who turn it into a weeklong vacation.

Our coordinator warned us that the “allure” of Disney World will bring in more guests than you’d expect for a typical destination wedding. And also that Disney fills its hotels quickly--which, of course, we know from experiences of trying to book a trip, say, six months out, only to find no availability at the hotels we want. On the flip side, we obviously didn’t want to assume the highest possible volume of guests, staying for a week, at every hotel, simultaneously.

In the end, we decided to lowball our initial estimate, mostly putting rooms on hold for the night before the wedding and the night of, and then we thought we’d add rooms as we had a better idea of people’s plans (so we could at least take care of the guests we’re closest to). We thought that would be okay, since Disney hadn’t even opened up reservations to the general public yet.

That was what we thought.

A few weeks later, my mom corralled a good number of the family/family friends we’re closest to and told me of their plans. I said okay, that should be fine, since we had the rooms blocked out on the dates they wanted, but noted that we should probably add, in case other people wanted similar things. (Which, I came to learn, a couple of parties did.)

When we tried to do that, Disney told me to wait until they’d processed the contract. So, I waited. And waited. For weeks. Anxiety mounting all the while, knowing people had plans that extended beyond what we had blocked. When the block FINALLY went live, I got a message from my mom saying they couldn’t book the full week they wanted at the Beach Club because it said there was no availability.

This was on, like, the day Disney opened up reservations for next year. I said that was impossible. I checked the website. It did indeed say there was no availability. We emailed our planner/room block coordinator in a panic.

Apparently, the room block website will sometimes show no availability on dates the couple didn’t specifically block out, even if there is. So, if someone wants Thursday-Saturday instead of Friday-Saturday, when the couple only has rooms blocked out for Friday-Saturday, it may tell them there’s nothing available. They told us that sometimes happens randomly. (And it’s since started happening with Port Orleans too, not just the Beach Club.) So, wonderful. Unless people are lucky enough to only be looking at the specific dates we blocked out, or unless they contact us (which, on our website, we urge them to do if they have problems), Disney may or may not erroneously tell them the hotel is booked up. So, that's something we're dealing with.

At least, at this point, we could finally add to the block, so we were able to get everyone set up (and add some more nights for other people), despite being terrified that they were going to tell us there were no rooms we could add. Fortunately, it worked out, so at least our parents and a number of close family members/friends were able to book at the hotel they wanted, for the amount of time they wanted.

I’m thinking if I made it through this stage of the planning process without throwing the whole thing out the window and getting married in New York somewhere, I’m probably good now. But for quite a few weeks there, every email I received from Disney (and Facebook message from my mom) seemed to trigger a panic attack. By far, the worst part of the wedding planning so far.

Of course, flash-forward to now, six months out, and pretty much nobody has booked an on-property stay since that initial wave. So, now we get to worry about not meeting our guarantee instead. (We're up to 32 people, including us, who have flights and/or hotels booked, which we're sort of counting as unofficial RSVPs.)

 

[UpstartCrow]

5. The Photographers and the Save-the-Dates

By far, the best part of getting our third-choice date was that, of the three dates we offered, that was the only one where the Roots were available. (They say on their website to contact them even if you don’t have a date yet, which I’d taken advantage of once we sent our options to Disney.) So, I’m very excited to be using them for our photography! That’s definitely one of the elements of the wedding we both put a very high priority on, so being able to cross that off the list immediately and feel very confident in our choice was just the biggest relief.

Save-the-dates, on the other hand, were one of those things where I started out thinking “eh, it’s just the save-the-date—everyone except our parents is going to throw them out immediately anyway, let’s not go crazy.”

Uncounted stationery samples, mockups, and straw polls of my friends and family later, I FINALLY settled on this card from Minted, with the colors tweaked to be a lighter green and pink (which I think are going to be the dominant colors in our floral).

I’ll admit, I was drawn in by their promise of free recipient addressing. Turns out you do have to pay for return addressing, and also that their interface for typing in the addresses only gives you one line for the recipient’s name. So if you have unmarried couples, families, etc., you either have to squeeze them all onto the first line, or hand-write them (I opted for the latter). It seems we’re bucking the trend a bit by not having our save-the-date be a postcard using pictures from our engagement shoot, but we decided to do a parks shoot (Magic Kingdom & Epcot) a few days after the wedding instead of an engagement session. (Our wedding website is full of, just, the absolute goofiest pictures of us in Disney I could find. Figured the "nice" photos I have aren't THAT nice, so might as well just go in the total opposite direction. )

 

[lpizzuro123]

Just as an FYI - we had some DVC members attend our wedding and while this was over 8 years ago, I believe even though they did not use our room block as they were staying DVC, I am almost positive their DVC nights went to our minimum.

 

[Gondingl]

Hi on your Wedding PJ!!

Girl, I understand your pain about the wedding count number and the wedding blocks! We also low-balled our wedding block estimate; had to do the run around of adding rooms (we got an addendum to the contract we added so many rooms to our low-ball count) and now have hit that dead spot of where no one is booking. I'm not sure if it is because people aren't seeing things available or if people are waiting for the invites to come out... But SO stressful!

Your Save the Dates are super cute!!! And consider me jealous that you were able to get the Roots for your photographers! Their work is swoon worthy! Can't wait to hear more as you plan!

 

[ALegrande]

Loved reading your PJ! I'm a March bride too so we're wedding sisters I'm Escape though, March 18th at the YCG! Excited to follow along on the rest of your journey!

 

[AllThingsMickey4]

You sound like me with my room block

I stressed for WEEKS over that stupid thing. We've invited around 65 people (hoping that maybe 55 people MAX will come). I low balled my room block during the LOA process because I didn't even know how many people I was going to invite. Well I've added about 30 more room nights (I have like 53 blocked I think). A lot more people are turning our wedding into a vacation than I thought.. my parents are staying a week, my sister is staying a week, my friend is getting married about 10 days before me and is going to Disney (and our wedding) on her honeymoon, and my cousin is staying a week.

I emailed my room block coordinator so many times that she told me to call her, so I did and the first thing she told me to do was breathe and go find something fun to do like pick out flowers LOL. Basically she said if I give my guests her number, she will add to my room block as needed, which is a HUGE relief because I have NO idea how long everyone is planning on staying.

Now I just hope that if some people book outside of my block that I can get their reservation numbers.. I'm sure that will be a struggle on its own.

I invited 65 when my max for the dessert party is 50 and I've only heard from one family that they might not be able to make it. All of my guests are at least 570 miles away so I thought for sure we could count on 15 not coming. We still have a while to go until April, but so far everyone's response has been "Oh I've always wanted to go to Disney World!"

 

[UpstartCrow]

Just as an FYI - we had some DVC members attend our wedding and while this was over 8 years ago, I believe even though they did not use our room block as they were staying DVC, I am almost positive their DVC nights went to our minimum.

Yeah, I think as long as they stay at Disney-owned-and-operated resorts, it counts- you just have to sync up their reservation numbers. So far, I don’t think we have anyone who falls into that camp- they’re just staying at off-site vacation rentals and things. Can’t say I blame them, with Disney’s hotel pricing being what it is.

 

[UpstartCrow]

Hi on your Wedding PJ!!

Girl, I understand your pain about the wedding count number and the wedding blocks! We also low-balled our wedding block estimate; had to do the run around of adding rooms (we got an addendum to the contract we added so many rooms to our low-ball count) and now have hit that dead spot of where no one is booking. I'm not sure if it is because people aren't seeing things available or if people are waiting for the invites to come out... But SO stressful!

Your Save the Dates are super cute!!! And consider me jealous that you were able to get the Roots for your photographers! Their work is swoon worthy! Can't wait to hear more as you plan!

Yup, we had to re-submit the contract too. Glad it’s not just us who didn’t have the psychic powers Disney seems to think we should. I’m pretty confident the majority of our guest list hasn’t even looked into flights/hotels yet- if they’re even attending. The amount of people we talked to who got our save-the-dates and either didn’t go to the wedding website at all, or went to the website just to look at the pictures and didn’t realize there was actual information there is staggering. And those are the people we’re close to! So, yeah, maybe waiting for the invitations.

Thanks!! Oh, I’ve loved the Roots pretty much since I found out Disney weddings were a thing. So, I was/am SUPER excited about that.

 

[UpstartCrow]

Loved reading your PJ! I'm a March bride too so we're wedding sisters I'm Escape though, March 18th at the YCG! Excited to follow along on the rest of your journey!

Hooray, March weddings! The YCB is so gorgeous. Every time I’m in the area, I’m always grabbing whoever I’m with to be like, “LOOK, THEY DO WEDDINGS THERE, LOOK, LOOK HOW PRETTY.”

 

[UpstartCrow]

You sound like me with my room block

I stressed for WEEKS over that stupid thing. We've invited around 65 people (hoping that maybe 55 people MAX will come). I low balled my room block during the LOA process because I didn't even know how many people I was going to invite. Well I've added about 30 more room nights (I have like 53 blocked I think). A lot more people are turning our wedding into a vacation than I thought.. my parents are staying a week, my sister is staying a week, my friend is getting married about 10 days before me and is going to Disney (and our wedding) on her honeymoon, and my cousin is staying a week..."

Yeah, it is really freaking difficult to accurately predict the specific travel plans of an unknown quantity of people almost a year in advance. (Surprise, surprise.) Not that I can think of a better alternative, given how quickly Disney sells rooms. Such a headache, though.

Lol! Awww, no joke, I always used to go back to the “cake flavors” pdf when I got too stressed. Still felt “productive” enough that I wouldn’t freak out about not doing anything, but calmed me down from the room block craziness.

Eek! That’s so stressful! We’re in the opposite boat- we kept saying we couldn’t guarantee fewer people showing up, so we consistently gave estimates of like 80-100 people, but we are… very much not going to achieve that, I don’t think. If we wind up with 35 people at this wedding, they are going to be VERY well-fed, since our F&B minimum is based on 75. I'm EXTREMELY worried they're going to kick us out of our "Viennese hour" (shhhh, it's a secret, and I'm paranoid about my DISboards-savvy family tripping over this) location for not being able to meet the minimum guest count for the space.

 

[AllThingsMickey4]

Yeah, it is really freaking difficult to accurately predict the specific travel plans of an unknown quantity of people almost a year in advance. (Surprise, surprise.) Not that I can think of a better alternative, given how quickly Disney sells rooms. Such a headache, though.

Lol! Awww, no joke, I always used to go back to the “cake flavors” pdf when I got too stressed. Still felt “productive” enough that I wouldn’t freak out about not doing anything, but calmed me down from the room block craziness.

Eek! That’s so stressful! We’re in the opposite boat- we kept saying we couldn’t guarantee fewer people showing up, so we consistently gave estimates of like 80-100 people, but we are… very much not going to achieve that, I don’t think. If we wind up with 35 people at this wedding, they are going to be VERY well-fed, since our F&B minimum is based on 75. I'm EXTREMELY worried they're going to kick us out of our "Viennese hour" (shhhh, it's a secret, and I'm paranoid about my DISboards-savvy family tripping over this) location for not being able to meet the minimum guest count for the space.

I was one of those people that didn't know they actually used the number you give them for the estimated guest count during the LOA process. When I first started talking to my consultant in February I hadn't even made a list of people we were going to invite (my fiancé and I have been together for 7 years, but we weren't officially engaged yet). I just kind of added up our family members and subtracted the ones I didn't think would come and came up with around 35 people. When it got closer to our one year mark I told my consultant that it would be closer to 50.. but he still booked our DP at U.K. Lochside when my first choice was Italy Isola West

My consultant was dead set on putting us at the venues he wanted us at (LSS had too many couples requesting it, ADH was "too small" for our guest list, my request for the GM Lounge was denied, the YC ballrooms were all blocked for a convention, none of the GF ballrooms were available).. eventually I ended up at a ballroom in the Contemporary. I filled out a survey about my consultant experience expressing my disappointment in my consultant's ability to find me a unique reception space and what do you know.. my planner emailed me a couple of weeks later that I got the GM Lounge.

I'll never know if it was my survey or
pixie dust but my planner is awesome!!

Anyway.. I hope you get to keep your space for your Viennese hour!! Maybe since your F&B minimum is based on 75 you'll be okay? I know Disney tries to maximize space, but I think if you are willing to pay for the minimum number of guests you should be able to use the venue. Doesn't Disneyland book their weddings on a first come, first served basis (i.e no dreaded lottery system)? I wished for that kind of system so many times during the months leading up to our one year mark!!

 

[UpstartCrow]

I was one of those people that didn't know they actually used the number you give them for the estimated guest count during the LOA process. When I first started talking to my consultant in February I hadn't even made a list of people we were going to invite (my fiancé and I have been together for 7 years, but we weren't officially engaged yet). I just kind of added up our family members and subtracted the ones I didn't think would come and came up with around 35 people. When it got closer to our one year mark I told my consultant that it would be closer to 50.. but he still booked our DP at U.K. Lochside when my first choice was Italy Isola West

My consultant was dead set on putting us at the venues he wanted us at (LSS had too many couples requesting it, ADH was "too small" for our guest list, my request for the GM Lounge was denied, the YC ballrooms were all blocked for a convention, none of the GF ballrooms were available).. eventually I ended up at a ballroom in the Contemporary. I filled out a survey about my consultant experience expressing my disappointment in my consultant's ability to find me a unique reception space and what do you know.. my planner emailed me a couple of weeks later that I got the GM Lounge.

I'll never know if it was my survey or
pixie dust but my planner is awesome!!

Anyway.. I hope you get to keep your space for your Viennese hour!! Maybe since your F&B minimum is based on 75 you'll be okay? I know Disney tries to maximize space, but I think if you are willing to pay for the minimum number of guests you should be able to use the venue. Doesn't Disneyland book their weddings on a first come, first served basis (i.e no dreaded lottery system)? I wished for that kind of system so many times during the months leading up to our one year mark!!

Yikes, sorry you had such a lousy experience with the consultant! I wish they were a little more transparent with what your options are. It might have been less stressful if instead of us going, "here are six date/time/venue combinations and a wildly inaccurate estimation of how many great-aunts and family friends are going to fly in for this. Please let us know, over a period of months, if we can get married here or not," it was them saying, "here's what's available this day at this time, here's when this venue is available..." I had no idea Disneyland was first-come-first-serve. Doesn't that sound wonderful?

Glad it worked out for you in the end! I didn't even know about the GM Lounge- what a neat space!

Yeah, for the Viennese hour, our minimum is actually for 80 (they were able to lower it from 100 for us). The whole way through, I'd been concerned about having more guests show up than a venue could accommodate, so we'd been putting our estimates very high. But then when we got the contract that said they could change the venue if we didn't meet the minimum number of guests (which was 100 at the time), we were like, "uh... wait, what? Move us where?" Turns out the only other location that would be a possibility is "Mexico Vista," which I had never even heard of. But I looked it up, and... it would definitely be a downgrade. Took a couple of weeks to get sorted out, but in the end they told us it was fine, and reduced the minimum to 80 for us, which is more achievable. But we pretty much just have our consultant's word that they won't change it on us if we only end up with, say, 60. So. I'm mostly trying not to think about it.

Edit: WHOOPS, you said GM, not GF. I should not post late at night.

 

[UpstartCrow]

6. The Dreeeeeess!!!

Oh, man. I wish I were cool about this, but I am not. I am not cool at all. I’m not chic. I’m not glamorous. And I’ve wanted the big, poofy, princess, fairytale wedding dress for as long as I can remember. My dream gown had always been the very first Snow White gown from Alfred Angelo (RIP).

Princessy, but with very floaty, floral elements. I always said (and still say) on my wedding day, I wanted it to look like all the birds and chipmunks of the forest had tied my sash and dressed my hair. (Snow White was a very formative influence on me, okay? ) That’s the “princess look” I wanted, not the Cinderella/Belle big, satin ballgown. This distinction probably makes sense to nobody in the world but me, but oh well.

As it happens, I’m a little worried that the gown I ended up with is actually too close to the “Cinderella/Belle ballgown” side of the spectrum, but I digress. First, the journey.

My first shopping experience was wonderful. My mom and my maid of honor came with me and the sales consultant could not have been any sweeter. The store was gorgeous, and out of the maybe seven or eight gowns I tried on, I wound up with two front-runners (with my mom/MOH preferring one and me preferring the other one, naturally). So, a good start, but nothing definitive. (If anyone’s interested, the gown my mom and MOH liked was this one by Justin Alexander, and I liked this Allure one.)

In all my months of searching online, I kept finding that I really liked a lot of the Mori Lee gowns, and there’s pretty much only one salon anywhere near me that carries them. Fortunately, it’s actually very close to where I live. Unfortunately, I knew the area and the storefront well enough to be a little trepidatious about what it would be like inside. But it had good reviews, so I went with my mom.

Oy. Don’t get me wrong, it was FAR from some of the horror stories I’ve read about consultants being nasty or unhelpful- I think the woman who helped us was genuinely trying her best. But it became clear early on that I was not going to find anything there. I’d said right off the bat I didn’t want an illusion neck, or anything with a lot of “bling." Which... apparently was the entire stock of this salon. Long Island, man.

I could hardly even find things to agree to try on. By the end, I was saying “yes” to gowns just because I felt like a snob rejecting everything in the store. At one point, the consultant had me try on a "wild card" dress that was just... so far removed from anything I would ever wear, in my life, ever, clearly expecting the Say Yes to the Dress moment where the bride realizes that her perfect gown was one she never would have picked out... Yeah, nope, sometimes a bride who says she doesn't want anything too flashy really doesn't like the head-to-toe jewel-encrusted satin gown with the absolutely enormous handkerchief skirt any more than she said she did. In the end, I didn’t even finish trying the gowns on- I was exhausted, my mom was exhausted, and I’d had it with trying to be “polite” about things that were emphatically not my taste.

Looking back, it was actually kind of hysterical, but that was about the point where I started panicking that I was never going to find a gown, and obsessively cataloging ones I liked online and tracking which stores might carry them. Because of course I did. I was all set to drag myself into Manhattan, but in the meantime, I made an appointment at (what I thought was) a teeny-tiny shop in my hometown (where I no longer live), owned by a friend of a friend, because what the heck. They carry Stella York gowns, a lot of which I like, and nobody else around here seems to, so I thought I might as well give it a shot.

When I walked in to what turned out to be an absolutely beautiful store with my mom, I immediately noticed they had a stuffed “bride and groom” Mickey & Minnie on display. My mom and I just looked at each other and I think had the same simultaneous thought that yeah, this is going to be the place.

The owner/consultant could not have been more helpful or personable, and, it turns out, she's a bit of a Disney fanatic herself. It definitely felt like fate! In the end, I actually fell in love with two gowns:

And

It was the first time I really had that “bride” feeling. Unfortunately, I got it from both of them. I was so torn between them, I couldn’t make a decision there and then, but joined DF on a business trip and thought about it for about two weeks. Finally, I decided, but kept it a secret from my mom and maid of honor- both of whom came with me on the “final” trip to the salon. They both liked the same one- the second, with the lace panels. Which was the one I had gone into the store thinking I was going to buy (and is, in the end, the one I got)! Unfortunately, when I put the other one on, I’d kind of fallen in love with it again (and omg it was SO much more comfortable/lightweight), and I had a small panic attack about it when I got home. But, in the end, I love that my gown has a more dramatic train (been dreaming of taking bridal portraits on that staircase in the Grand Floridian lobby since I was a kid ), and, as my MOH pointed out, it creates a very “floaty” effect when I’m walking, which was exactly what I’d dreamed of. So, I do think I made the right call. I’m probably going to have them add cap sleeves, which I think might help tone it down, in a way I can’t really articulate. Got the veil to go with it in the same trip and am currently on the hunt for shoes.