TR: Miranda and Shaun's Wedding - WP/Cali Grill/Illuminations DP

[shaun&miranda]

Well, it’s taken a mere 6 months for our lives to settle down to something like normal! I feel quite embarrassed to start a trip report this long after the wedding, but life has been too hectic!

We got married May 24th in the Wedding Pavillion at noon, had lunch in the Napa Room of the California Grill, and then had an Illuminations Dessert Party on the UK Lower Terrace at Epcot.

I’ll start by introducing the main cast:
Me – Miranda – the Bride
Shaun – the Groom
Richard – the Best Man (British, but living in Texas)
Vicki – Maid of Honour
Colin – Bride’s Attendant (yup – I had a male bridesmaid)
Chris – Friend attending wedding

It’s fair to say that all the preparations for the wedding had been fairly complicated! We were having 21 guests in total, so had what was then called a Custom Wedding – now I believe they’re called Wishes Weddings?

The main problem was that I am not a very girly-girl. I have not grown up thinking and dreaming of my wedding day – in fact when I was small, I insisted I would never get married! Then of course, I met Shaun and it all changed

But I had no idea what I wanted to wear, who I wanted with us, what I wanted to do. Since Shaun proposed to me at Disney (at midnight on Dec 15th 2005 outside Cinderella Castle, on one knee) it seemed appropriate we should get married there. All our families were really supportive, although we had to pay for one of Shaun’s sisters and her husband to come – they were just too poor to afford the trip.

I went through all the normal dress trauma, but in the end, I stuck with the first dress I bought – which was off the rack from a UK shop called Monsoon. My outift worked out really well – I have 4 really good friends who are girls, and I ended up buying one piece of my outfit with each of them, so each piece meant something to me. The one thing I did change was my tiara – I loved it at first, then decided it didn’t go at all, so bought a new one! I didn’t mind too much since my dress only cost £135 – which is about $270. I think I would have had less worries about my dress if it had cost more – in a weird way I worried it was too cheap.

The first people to go out to Florida were Colin, Chris, Vicki and her boyfriend Dave. They were going camping around Florida for 2 weeks, then joining us in Orlando for the wedding week.

Shaun and I flew out on Virgin Atlantic from Gatwick on 14th May. The flight was fine, and we caught the Magic Express to Caribbean Beach Resort. Getting the Magic Express was a bit stressful, since our booking had been lost, was then retrieved and was wrong, but we got there eventually, and the lady helping us was really nice.

We got to CBR and as others have said, it is a really pretty resort. I was too tired from the flight when we arrived to really appreciate it – it is also HUGE!

The check in for our room was less than great. We had booked through our Disney Wedding Website, so that we could be sure it would count toward our room block. This was a terrible idea.

We were staying 14 nights, but the computer couldn’t handle a booking that long – so it had split our stay into two separate reservations. We were told we could keep the same room, but had to come back and renew our keys mid-way through. Like fools we agreed, not realising what day we had to do this – our wedding day!

The computer had also lost our payment for a preferred location, and our request for a King Bed. The woman on check in basically wouldn’t help and didn’t seem to care, which upset me a lot. Eventually she called her manager over and we got a preferred location (by paying for it), but the standard 2 bed set up. She did give us Just Married badges, but it was a really awful start.

Our room was in building 31, Trinidad North, on the second floor. This was a great room, really close to the food court. Although when we arrived it had someone else’s luggage in it! I called Bell Services and got them to come and collect it and give it to the rightful owner.

We changed into some clothes we had packed in our hand luggage, called a taxi and went to dinner at Narcoossee’s (which we had reserved). The meal there was great, as always, the atmosphere was lovely, and they had printed us special menus saying Congratulations Mr and Mrs Roberts, which I thought was really lovely. We got to watch Wishes from across the lake, and after a bottle of wine, it all felt a lot better!

 

[caryndisneydiva]

can't wait to see pics!!!

 

[mla1977]

I'm so sorry that it sounds so stressful for you. When I was there in May, I had the room booked for 2 adults and one child and they tried to give us a king sized bed. I would have loved that if it was just the two of us. I hope that things got easier for you after this!

 

[B2B-2008]

How funny I am also going to be a Mrs Roberts!

Looking forward to more

 

[shaun&miranda]

I haven’t mastered posting pics yet – will have a go over the weekend!

I won’t give you a day-by-day breakdown of what we did and where we went, but I will cover some points about the days leading up to the wedding that I think other people can learn from and hopefully avoid the mistakes we made! (and the bits that went well)

We had a couple of days on our own first, which were great. We went and did our favourite rides, saw our favourite shows. We got our marriage licence, and Shaun’s wedding ring.

We also had a couple of really big arguments, since Shaun was just now getting interested in organising the wedding (we were having a party in the UK when we got back) and was now objecting to things I organised months ago. (I did try to involve him back then, but he was busy!)

One evening stands out – we were at MGM waiting to see Fantasmic. It’s really crowded and we’re sitting down like 30 mins before the show starts, and Shaun asked if we were having a seating plan at the UK party.

I had originally wanted a seating plan, back in January when we discussed all this, and he had objected and talked me out of it! Now that we were away, he wanted to do this! So we had a big row, right in the middle of all these people sitting around us waiting to see Fantasmic

In hindsight, this is all very funny to us now. We hardly ever row – apart from the 2 weeks leading up to the wedding! The looks on the faces of people around us as they tried not to listen to us was really funny.

We watched Fantasmic in silence, ignoring each other, but you can’t watch that show and not feel uplifted and full of cheer, so we made up as soon as it was over.

The problems continued for the next few days as our friends and family arrived. This actually made it all worse – since the four that had been camping together were now totally sick of each other and squabbling all the time.

Our friend Chris had literally hundreds – possibly more than a thousand mosquito bites from camping in the Everglades (idiot slept outside the tent). We counted more than 70 bites on his right leg up to the knee! Chris became a big fan of “backscratcher” cocktails that he discovered at the Polynesian when we went to the Kona Café. This drink is served with a wooden backscratcher, and he made good use of it!

Looking back, we should have broadly left our friends to it, and done our own thing. Instead, we all went around in small groups, with Shaun and I going with different groups of friends/family each day. It was incredibly stressful trying to keep everyone happy, and at one point I ended up in tears in Epcot, with Shaun and everyone else not even realising I was upset on the other side of the street. This was not a high-point!

I would strongly recommend spending maybe a couple of hours a day with friends or family, and then doing something alone with your fiancé. Would have been much less stressful! As it was, all my worst moments were when I was trying to organise my friends, and my best moments were when I got to be alone with Shaun. I totally lost sight of the fact it was my wedding and Shaun’s – not just another holiday for everyone.

There were some good things we did. I took my family to Ohana with my 2 bridesmaids and it was just brilliant. We had a great time, and the lady who plays the guitar misunderstood and thought I was marrying my bridesmaid Colin – she tried to get us to dance and was confused when Maid of Honour Vicki came too

We also all met in the pool bar after everyone had come back from the parks, and this was really nice. It was relaxed, cool in the evening, and there was much less stress at these times.

I realise it sounds like I had an awful time, and honestly, in the week before the wedding, I was really unhappy a lot. I can see now a lot of it was caused by me trying to make everyone follow my plan, when they had their own ideas. That was partly their fault for not seeing this week was all about me and Shaun, and partly mine for not realising this was a vacation they were all paying to be on.

I’m not telling you this to bum you all out, but I’ve spoken to quite a few brides now who said the week before was full of rows and stress, and it would have helped me a lot if I had understood it might happen.

To get the last bad bit out of the way, the wedding was on a Thursday. On Tuesday, Shaun was taken to Miami by his best man Richard, my younger brother and our friends for his bachelor party – going to a Florida Marlins Baseball game.

I won’t go into all the detail, but he came back on Wednesday, we had our biggest row ever, our rehearsal dinner was planned that night at the Crystal Palace and the Best Man decided not to come. This was all too much for me, and I went to the bathrooms in the Grand Floridian and had a cry. Later that night, Shaun and I did kind of make up but I was really upset, and was furious with the Best Man Richard (and six months later, I am still mad at Richard).

I was so upset that we were arguing on the night before our wedding, but again, hindsight is great, and I can see that with a bit of common sense from me beforehand, a lot of the stress could have been removed!

I guess the moral of the story for all you yet-to-be brides is to understand that the week before the wedding you and the groom (and everyone else) are trying to combine the really important stuff to do with the wedding along with having a good vacation. This may well mean arguments! But you still love the guy you’re there to marry.

On the good side, the rehearsal dinner was great. The Crystal Palace is just brilliant, and they had made this incredible heart of mickey confetti on the table, and gave us a certificate from all the characters wishing us well for our day. (I will try to post a pic)

When Eeyore came round he saw the confetti and that we were getting married, gave me a big noisy kiss and then tried to run off with me! It was really funny and made me laugh.

The characters were all really interactive, and if you are feeling a bit blue, then going somewhere with lovely food and Winnie the Pooh characters hugging you every 15 mins is just a great antidote! We watched Wishes over the castle and then went back to CBR.

The next instalment I promise will be a lot happier – it’s the wedding day! And I will put some pictures in that too….

 

[lurkyloo]

I don't think your TR is negative at all - you make a really valid point! It seems like there has to be a balance between making sure your guests are entertained and spending time with just your DF/DH.

When my FMIL told us they'd be staying at WDW the week AFTER our wedding - right during our honeymoon there - instead of the week before, my heart sank. She was trying to get us to meet up with his whole family for all these activities, til finally DF impressed upon her the fact that it's our *honeymoon* not a family vacation...

 

[B2B-2008]

I have my whole family staying with us for our whole time in WDW. We have decided that we will plan what we are doing for each day and if they want to come with us they can if not we won't worry. We have also decided to book ADR Dinners just for us every night so that we get at least all the evenings on our own.