Couples getting married on November 26, 2019 in Missouri

Hey Heather! Congratulations on your engagement!!

WOW, you’re getting married in Jamaica? That sounds amazing! Have you or your FS been there before? You must be so excited!!

Are you hoping to have a lot of guests celebrate with you or are you keeping it more intimate?

Did you choose your wedding date for a special reason?

He wanted to elope in Vegas because this is his 2nd marriage and he doesn't want the big circus. I'm 44 and never been married and wanted some kind of wedding. Meanwhile, my mom wanted to take our family on one all-inclusive vacation to Jamaica at Thanksgiving time because she will have just retired, celebrate Thanksgiving and 3 birthdays. He suggested we get hitched while we are down there and it grew from there. Now we have nearly 25 people going and its growing unexpectedly. I just bought a package that includes 30 people but it's the extras that are racking up. He is really into Reggae music and his all-time favorite (King Yellowman) lives on the island so I made lots of calls and was able to book him for 5-6 songs with a meet/greet. Would love for that to have been a surprise but couldnt wait to tell him plus I needed his song preferences. Now I probably need a stage too. Ugh. I'm excited that we have important people coming. My fiance opened his big mouth and promised to pay the way for a couple of friends so that definitely adds to the budget and I wont allow him to renege on his promise. One might end up paying but I doubt it. Its tough planning a wedding remotely and my travel agent told me in the beginning that I will be frustrated by the lack of response or urgency of the coordinators but that they do weddings every day year round like robots so it will all come together at the end. I was receiving good responses in the first few months but then I couldnt get a response for weeks. Apparently their system crashed and they had to rebuild their files. Finally heard yesterday that they can start responding again. Whew! I'm just worried about the the costs of extras and knowing what extras I will need because I have to visualize with limited info. I'm going to try to only worry about the important things and go with the flow as much as possible. Its definitely bringing my control issues out. I need a "green room" (dressing room for Yellowman and his manager for 30 minutes prior to his performance with some basic food/hospitality. They told me I would need to book them a room which would give them access to all of the amenities and restaurants. Are you kidding me? Pay 500 for a room and amenities they are not going to use. I need a private spot for 30 minutes! My travel agent has a business development contact with the resort parent company so they are trying to work something out for me. I'm sure that they dont tie up entire guest rooms for all of the entertainers that they book directly. The coordinators were not making any progress so I offered to work on it myself but then I felt like they were gouging me like these are guests versus vendors. He is a bit of a celebrity (twice nominated for a grammy) so I want to make sure he is treated well. Worst case, I can ask the best man to allow him to use his room. I just dont want any guests to have to leave the reception or have an awkward situation. Hopefully I will start receiving quotes on the extras and make some decisions on what I need versus nice-to-haves. Meanwhile my fiance had been spending on non-wedding stuff like a drunken sailor but promised to cut it out. I just want to make sure we have enough to cover all of the expenses by then. Thanks for allowing me to vent.