Ecstasy wedding Review 4/2/11

[nessa26]

Just got married on the Ecstasy (in port) out of Galveston on April 2nd, 2011 and wanted to share my experiences with everyone!!!! - The wedding was amazing!!! Couldn't have been any better!!! Sorry for the incorrect grammar ahead of time, not my specialty....

 

Ceremony - Blue Sapphire Lounge @ 1:00pm

Reception - Stripes Disco @ 1:30pm

 

 

We had our rehearsal dinner the night before at Fishermans Wharf for the entire wedding party and a few of our out of town guest, the food was amazing and the service was great. We had reserved a private room upstairs that had a deck that we rehearsed with the wedding party on. We had 4 bridesmaids & 4 groomsmen and 2 flowergirls and a ringbearer...yikes!!! We stayed at Hotel Galvez the night before the wedding. They offered a shuttle to and from the port for the cruise and valet parking (which was pretty cool :) ) and you could park your car for 15$ for the week of the cruise. I had my hair done at their salon the morning of the wedding and so did my mother & mother in law & sister. They did amazing on my hair & makeup I loved it!! We took the hotel shuttle over to the port ( I had called months ahead of time to book the ride for 10am) and when we arrived to the port alot of our guests were already there....we had a total of 99 guests... 32 of them sailing. We were also the only wedding that day, pretty sure thats why I got away with having more than the 50 person minimum non-sailing. As soon as we got there the ladies from the wedding experience were there to meet with us! They were sooo helpful and made sure everything went smoothly. Loved them!!!!We had a few problems in the beginning with our guest list, we had people show up who didn't rsvp...so they had to wait till all the guest were checked in and if anyone no showed then they were allowed to be switched and put on the guest list. Thankfully we had just enough no shows to do this. This whole process went so quickly It didn't take long at all. We were on the boat with plenty of time to get ready! We had a ton of luggage, but luckily my MIL carried my dress onboard, and my mother carried the flowers we made for the BMs & GMs. I had a second short dress and so did all my bridesmaids! That happened within the last few weeks they all got second dresses to go with mine to change into (with our cowgirl boots!!) before dinner. Pretty sure we were the only crazies on the boat in boots lol!! But I loved it, unfortunately we didnt get any pics of this :(. The guest were given maps of the boat with our ceremony & reception time & location. I heard that they got to eat at the lido buffet too, but we didn't arrange for that....not sure how that happened but good for them!! Carnival had our room ready (V30) for the girls to get ready in and I had requested my parents room be ready for the guys to get ready in. Getting ready was crazy!!! We had me, my mother, aunt, 4 bridesmaids, one of their mothers and newborn son, and 2 flowergirls, plus one of their moms and grandma!!! lol!! I expected that though...and was very happy with my choice to upgrade to a minisuite for our cruise!!!!. We needed all the space we could get. Everything went smoothly getting ready, the girls were under instructions to be down at the lounge the ceremony was taking place in 15 minutes before the ceremony. I didnt want to be left alone for 15 minutes!!! I thought I would panic, luckily my mother got to stay :) The bouquet they gave me was beautiful, I had requested to have pink and white roses mixed and they did that at no additional cost.The wedding party did a quick rehearsal and the photographer took some great pics of them and my father in the lounge. Then he came up to my room to take some pics before the ceremony in my room with my mother. His name was Samuel and he did amazing!!! I love all the photos he did a great job!!! But back to the wedding.....I had requested that all groomsmen and bridesmaids walk down the stairs and the wonderful ladies from the wedding experience made sure they did:). I also had brought my own music. I didn't want to walk down the aisle to the traditional music, I picked Adored by Collective Soul. They had to play the whole song over again by the time it came for me and my dad to walk lol. We had brought our own officiant and I'm glad we did! If not the wedding experience does it over a microphone, not even standing in front of you....kinda strange!! The ceremony went smoothly, afterwards Samuel came and took more pics. The pics weren't so great from the ceremony because the lighting is terrible in there! All of our faces look orange. After we took pics with the family we went over to the stripes disco. They announced all the groomsmen and bridesmaids and then me and my groom. We went straight to the cake and did the cake cutting and then the toast. I hardly remember the reception at all!! It went by so quickly and everything happened so fast...I did not have time to eat any of the food but heard it was great. I did sneak a few drinks in though after all it was open bar!! We also did not reserve any of the music/microphone options but we still had access to the microphone and the MOH & BM both got to do a toast. An hour flew by so fast then it was time to say goodbye to all the non-sailing guest. Then samuel found us again and he lead us around the ship to take more pics of me and my groom. One of my friends was also there with her camera and followed us and took pics along with Samuel, he didn't seam to mind. I still haven't seen any of her pics yet....My family also followed us while we were taking photos and we got some great ones of them as well. He really captured some good moments...But I did notice that he didn't put one of my purchased photos on the cd....not sure how that happened but not too happy bout it. All in all everything was amazing, the cruise was a blast... I don't regret having everyone along on our honeymoon. We our going to plan one for just the two of us soon:). The chocolate melting cake is fantastic, although I only ordered it once on the last night because we had so many leftover wedding cake that they would bring it out every night after dinner.I'm officially sick of wedding cake lol!!! The best dod was the boombay smash!! Absolutely loved that drink, going to attempt to make it this weekend :) The boat stopped in Progresso and Cozumel. Progresso was great for shopping! We didnt do any excursions there but took the shuttle into town and got my souvenirs there. We did the Snorkel, Sail, and Beach party excursion in Cozumel. Snorkeling was ok but we didn't really see any fish...the boat ride there and back were the funnest! Dancing with a margarita in hand to the macarena? and cupid shuffle on a boat was tricky but made for some good pics and fun times!!!! We also had time after our excursion to go jimmy buffetts margaritaville!!! That was a blast!! Loved it !!!!The weather was beautiful the whole trip, defanetly looking forward to cruising again and highly recommend the cruise ship wedding!! Everything was perfect !!!!! I'm going to include a link to my pics, if it works....not too sure how to do it but im going to try! If you have any questions just let me no!! Thanks for reading, I have read so many reviews on here and found them so helpful I hope mine is too!!!!!

 

Photo link - //www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=68094&id=100000224915103

[mrsgomez2011]

I loved your photos! Thanks for the review and Congrats!!!!

[nessa26]

Thankyou!!! Oh and I forgot one little detail.....we seriously watched titanic while we were on the boat! Im not even kidding!!! It was on TNT....ohhh the irony!!!! LMAO!!

[Denise2000]

Loved the pictures and thank you so much for the review!

[Denise2000]

Thankyou!!! Oh and I forgot one little detail.....we seriously watched titanic while we were on the boat! Im not even kidding!!! It was on TNT....ohhh the irony!!!! LMAO!!

 

Nessa I'm not doing the DJ either and my reception is also 1 hour. What did you use for the music(Ipod or CD player)?

[nessa26]

Nessa I'm not doing the DJ either and my reception is also 1 hour. What did you use for the music(Ipod or CD player)?

 

 

We didn't book any music, there might have been some soft background music that played, I don't really know everything happened so quick I didn't even notice but in the beginning when we first got to the terminal one of the ladies from the wedding experience said they would try to play something for us. She might have, I honestly do not remember I was so busy visiting with guest and doing the cake/bouquet toss/ & toast....Really wishing I would have spent the 500$ on the video.....totaly would have been worth it to be able to watch everything again!!!

[Meyer2]

Great review & pictures too!! Congrats!

[Artemis908]

your dress is awesome and I love the photo of you tugging on his tie haha and looks like you had some red guests! ;) too much fun in the sun? hehe

[underthemoon53]

Your photos are soo gorgeous and I love the style of them!!! Congrats :]

[mountainbreeze]

It looks like you guys had a great time! You looked just beautiful, and your pictures came out great!

Thanks for writing a review for us!

Congratulations! :)

[Lipz]

Ye ha!!

Thanks for sharing and congratulations!

[msg102711]

nessa26

I am getting married on the Ecstasy in October... 56 days and counting!! Thank you so much for your review. We are so excited! I tried to view your pictures, but I am told that the link has expired. Is there any way you can repost the link? Thanks so much!