Our Conquest Wedding

We were married at boarding in Fort Lauderdale on January 31st. I'm 58 and she's 55. This is the second marriage for both of us. We had 15 family and guests attend and sail with us.

We were supposed to be at the port by 10, but got there at 10:15 and then it was hurry up and wait. The wedding was scheduled for 12:45 and the reception at 1:30. Customs was slow clearing the ship and we didn't get on the ship until 12:15. How many of you ladies could get ready in 30 minutes? While waiting, our officiant Christine and our coordinator Christine (yes, same name) were great. The officiant went over the entire wedding with us, going so far as to draw diagrams where everyone would stand and move. While standing in line waiting, Laurie was having her makeup done. Once the doors opened, the coordinator and the girls went flying to our room and us guys made our way to another room. Needless to say the wedding started late. It was about 1 when we got going.

Our wedding was in the Gallery. The room was nice but nothing fancy. We didn't need anything fancy so it was fine for us, but there was a large bag in a corner of decorations for the next wedding that was following us. We didn't do much other than the basic ceremony which was a good thing because it speeded things up for the next group. The next wedding only had the bride and groom sailing and 15 non sailing guests. There is a cutoff time for non sailing guests to leave, so if we ran late, they wouldn't get their full time. Our wedding was beautiful with more than a few tears shed. The officiant Christine did an amazing job and made it special for us. I want to take a second and apologize now for what will be an over use of the word "amazing". It will be a common theme but I don't know how else to describe the day. Then the coordinator Christine took over and did a great job moving every one to where we needed to be.

During the wedding our photographer, Pravin, was taking a lot of pictures but was not intrusive at all. After the service we did a lot of staged group pictures and then it was on to the reception. We chose Henri's Dance club for the reception because we wanted the DJ. We aren't dancers but we wanted the music. In fact, our first dance, was our first dance. Even then it was hard to find a song we agreed on, finally going with "Just the Way You Are" by Bruno Mars (a perfect choice thanks to my daughter).

The reception was amazing. We went with the 11/2 hours and it was great. We chose Something Blue for our signature drink. We had a couple people who rarely drink but those were so good they both had a few. The bar would mix anything you wanted. One brother-in-law started at the top of the beer list and just kept working his way down. We chose the red velvet cake with vanilla frosting. You know the part when you intertwine arms and feed each other cake? I was trying to think of something romantic to say. What came out was "God this is good". The appetizers were all good, but nothing was great. They did keep them coming. There were fruit cups that were beautiful and pretty veggie cups. The apps were: Roast Beef and Brie Cheese Canape, California Sushi Roll, Stuffed Mushrooms, Chicken Nuggets, Lamb Empanadas, Spanakopita, Spring Rolls, Bacon Wrapped Sweet Plantains (one of the favorites), Chicken Balls on Fire, Batter Fried Shrimp, and for our Vegan and Gluten guests we had a Potato Pancake with Apple Wedge (this was actually my favorite). One of our bar servers was Lisa. She was fun during the reception, and she was our bar server at diner, so that was a pleasant surprise.

Throughout the reception Pravin was taking pictures. After, he brought us on deck for more poses. The only problem was that my eyes are very light sensitive and I couldn't stop squinting. He managed to pose us and got a few good ones. I had read on this board how everyone liked their pictures, but nothing prepared me for how good they were. Simply amazing. We had a time set to look over the pictures, but unknown to me, my son met with him earlier and they picked out pictures and had a book all done. Pravin brought the book to our dinner table and informed me that my son and daughter bought us the picture package. We couldn't believe it. We still met with Pravin and he showed us the rest of the pictures that weren't in the book. He said we could switch out any pictures we wanted. In the end, we left the book as it was and bought the rest of the pictures.

The rest of the week our onboard coordinator was Dragana. Every night she came to our table to see if there was anything we needed. I thought this was nice. It made you feel like they wanted to do whatever they could to please you. The entire cruise was great and everyone had an amazing time.

Congratulations!! I am glad that you had a wonderful wedding! I am getting married on the Conquest as well! Do you have any pictures?

I tried to download some, but I got an error message. Any tips on how to do it?

Sorry I don't! I'm assuming you tried adding an attachment?

This is the Gallery (if it works)

A good shot of the Gallery and the buffet.

Your dress is beautiful. I am getting married in July 2017 on the Vista, second for both of us as well. I am 47, he is 57 but looks younger than me..haha. I am not wanting a traditional wedding dress, wondering where you got your dress from. Thank you for the review.

I got my dress from David's bridal (ordered online) about 3 weeks before the wedding. I originally had a lace, knee length dress I had bought last May, but at the last minute I decided I really wanted a floor length dress. I thought I was too old, but I just loved it and decided I should get what I really wanted... it was my wedding, after all! It was a bargain, less than $170, and all I had to do was have it hemmed:)

Laurie

It seems that our wedding may be very similar to yours. This to will be a second wedding for both of us...trying to figure out my comfort level, especially with the reception. TO have a DJ or your own CD is fairly expensive if you are really just wanting a first dance or two for the reception. Not sure my dad will be able to dance so the father/daughter song..I don't know, not sure about that, plus all the music I am finding is if I were a young bride for the first time. So...tell me about your reception and music...and then there really much time between the cake and pictures and things to really worry about music.(we are doing 1 reception). Carnival did tell me that we could for go both of those packages and bring music on a phone or something and use a blue tooth type speaker, it would just have to run off of a battery..so IDK, might do that. Any suggestions that you would have I would truly appreciate.

We are not dancers. Our first dance at the reception was our first dance ever. We do like music, and it would be strangely quiet without music at the reception. We did the 90 min. Celebrate Big. The DJ cost $275, if you supplied your own music, it still cost $225. The extra $50 meant it was one less thing for us to worry about. We picked Current top 40, Classic Rock, 70's Disco, and 90's Dance and Popular. The DJ did a great job mixing the songs and it kept the mood up. The 11/2 hours seemed like just the right amount of time. There were only 17 of us and it was all close family so we didn't have to make a special effort to visit with any one, it just flowed naturally. Our photographer was fantastic, he got so many great shots without being in the way and then at the end he posed us for different group shots. If you have any questions, I would be glad to help.

Hmmm, they told me when I called that we could provide our own music by phone, CD, however but we would just have to have the means to play it, and that means would need to be battery operated (like speaker system), that we would not be allowed to plug anything in to an electric socket. They also so told me to keep in mind the size of the venue when thinking about our speaker system we were bringing.

Anyway, I will verify that when my planner calls.

I did print off all the attachments that I got by email, man alive there are a ton of things to fill out. I don't think we are going to do a lot of the traditional things that are in most weddings/receptions. My kids (21/20/18 will be standing up with me and not sure on my fiancé, because it is mostly family and he don't really have family that will be able to come. Don't think we will do the traditional dances, probably on the first dance for us and that's probably it...

Our wedding is July 2017, trying to figure out what is to soon to start looking for a dress...:confused:

Also, the whole licensing has me confused so I need to call to get clarification.

Thanks for all your input

Looking at the paperwork, I think for the $225, they provide the speaker system if you provide the music. I guess if you have your own sound system there wouldn't be a charge. The paperwork can be overwhelming. Take it one thing at a time by deadline. Some things have to be in right away, others you have a long time to get done. We kept calling to ask what we had left to do because we couldn't keep track of it all. For the license, we paid them to do it. You can save $125 if you do it yourself online, but we didn't feel comfortable doing it. Didn't want to show up for the cruise without the license.