If you’d have told me, at any point in my 20s, that I’d be married before I was 30, I’d have laughed in stubborn and sour disbelief. In the ‘olden days’ when my parents were my age, if a woman wasn’t married or have plans to marry by the time she was 30, other women would assume there’s ‘something wrong with her’. To be quite honest, I was leaning more towards accepting a life as a lonely spinster, until I met my other half, Brendan.

After only a year of dating Brendan, because of all we’ve been through, I knew he was ‘the one’. The idea of marriage had been brought up as a possibility, however, because of complicated situations, I assumed it would come with many challenges and a lot of stress. Planning a ‘big wedding’ was something I had no interest in, and neither did Brendan.

Five months ago, on March 11th 2020, I married the person I love, have been through the most with, and am confident is my other half. On the beach of the RIU Republica in Punta Cana, Brendan and I had a beautiful ceremony, and spent the entire day, just the two of us. With only one month to plan, we decided to elope on our trip which we booked on February 8th, 2020.

This is Part 3 of what I plan to be a series of blogs describing the different parts of the planning, lead up, ceremony and celebrations, and returning home to a world which COVID-19 changed forever. Very few couples can say they spent the first three months following their wedding spending all day, every day together, during the time of frustrating social distancing and quarantine.

Celebrations with our friends and family will have to come, I guess now, next summer. Then, my Mum can do her part in planning what she chooses. For me, I had everything I could ask for from a perfect wedding day. You can read the first post here.

This blog is about what many couples spend over 15 months doing: Planning the Wedding.

I’d like to mention, we decided to elope with only a month to plan, before ‘eloping’ became a trend in 2020, due to COVID-19. Back in the start of 2020, eloping was still considered pretty taboo. #weddingtrendsetters2020

Here are some interesting facts from Wedding Wire (Canada and USA):

• $29,450 is the average cost for a wedding in Canada
• Nearly 60% of couples increase their initial budget, primarily due to finding things along the way that they felt they “needed to have” and realizing they may have underestimated at first pass.
• 79% of couples create a ‘Wedding Website’ to share details with their guests – I didn’t know this was a thing…who the h*ll has the time for this?
• 81% of parents are involved in the decision making for their child’s wedding- Oh god…..
• 71% of couples date 2+ years before getting engaged– Guess we’re ahead of the game
• 32 is the average age of couples at the time they are married (USA) – I feel relieved…Take that Linda (Mum)

All in all, our wedding cost just over a grand. This included the wedding itself/cost of the Minister to perform the ceremony, professional photography, my dress and accessories and Brendan’s outfit. Additionally, there was the cost of trip, which we planned anyways. The engagement ring, aka. ‘the rock’ on my ring finger, was also a separate cost from Brendan’s savings…no idea what the costs was, but I assume it was quite pricey.

I’d like to add, as someone who likes big and ‘blingy’, Brendan picked the perfect Engagement ring for me: a simple band, with one big a$$, Round-Cut Diamond.

The RIU hotel chain is well known for hosting events, and offers a service called Weddings by RIU. When couples decide to get married or renew their vows, they are assigned a wedding planner who helps you plan the wedding from the initial proposal to the big day. Your first step is going to weddingsbyriu.com, and submitting a request form.

Depending on your budget, there are options to suit every couple for a beautiful wedding. The ‘Classic’ aka. Free* package is a minimal package with only mandatory additional cost being a Minister to perform the ceremony.

 

It was perfect for us: a simple archway setup at the beach, sparkling wine toast, wedding cake, surprise gift, and semi-private dinner reservation. Anything extra from chairs for your guests, to a private dance with a DJ is additional. Some brides take years planning their destination wedding.

With only two guests, and a very un-picky couple (and certainly no ‘Bridezilla’) the planning was quick and simple. Once we chose from the options in the RIU Weddings brochure, Yessica sent us over the the entire ‘Wedding Resume’ for approval.

Our final selections included:

Guests: 2, the Bride & Groom
Ceremony: Beach setup with an archway
Wedding Cake: Vanilla cake with caramel filling, lilac and yellow flowers
Reception Dinner: Kulinarium Restaurant which serves ‘International Fusion’ cuisine
Walk down the aisle song: ‘Lost in the Fire’ by The Weeknd. This was ‘our song’ last winter
Walk off the aisle song: ‘Sunflower’ by Post Malone, Swae Lee remix. Brendan calls me his ‘Sunflower’ because of my voluptuous blonde hair

Yessica put us in touch with Nico, the head photographer from, WBA Studio, located on site at RIU Republica. Nico sent us over the complete list of photography packages, which included a sunset cruise, where your photographer would be present.

Unlike me, Brendan does not like his picture taken, but we agreed that professional photos were necessary for our wedding day. Since we had a limited budget, Nico offered us a ‘Minimal Photography Package’, which included 30 final prints. Our photographer would only be present for the ceremony, and for some photos after on the beach.

This was by far the best idea: We have 30 of the happiest wedding photos I’ve ever seen. Not having photographers present all day, and no forced family photoshoots, kept our pictures looking happy and natural.

With our wedding ceremony scheduled and planned, next came the ‘Bride & Groom’ stuff including finding a dress, shoes, veil and accessories for me, and Brendan a shirt, new shorts and leather flip-flops. Brendan had the task of finding an engagement ring, for the true ‘proposal’ he planned to do sometime during our trip.

Coming soon, will be a series of sub-blogs which go into detail of the planning, ceremony, and reception:

• Finding the dress
• Upon arrival
• The proposal & rings
• Our wedding day
• The ceremony
• The reception dinner
• After the wedding
• Honeymoon on quarantine

To wrap it up in as few words as possible, our wedding day went PERFECT. Despite having rain on-and-off throughout the week, our special day, Wednesday March 11th, was sunny with a few clouds, and no rain. We spent the entire day together, a beautiful wedding at 4pm on the beach, and had a reception dinner with a delicious cake.

Yessica was an amazing planner and ensured we had our dream wedding. We were the only two guests at our wedding, and we wouldn’t have done it any other way.

Love from Lala.

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