Our wedding was at the zoo (both ceremony and reception) on July 3rd. Overall it was wonderful!!! I'm going to include restaurants and as much as I can in these reviews...hope it helps!
DRESS: ATLAS BRIDAL (& DAVIDS BRIDAL) Atlas: C (David's Bridal: 
Atlas Bridal was the only place locally I could order my dress from. The attendants were sometimes rude, did nothing to really help me, and gave me a really hard time about getting color swatches. But they had my dress!
Davids simply couldn't order my Maggie dress for me, but Jan that I worked with was amazing! Absolutely wonderful! I gave them B only because they refuse to take back the first dress I bought.
ALTERATIONS: FUTURE HEIRLOOMS (Pam Thomas): A+What can be said about Pam that hasn't already been said a million times! She's amazing, wonderful, and does fantastic work! Plus she's just a doll to chat with...a truly good person. I enjoyed every fitting and can't wait to send pictures of how lovely the dress turned out because of her! Highly recommended!
REHEARSAL DINNER: BEIRUT: CThe food was amazing (as always) but they didn't give us the private room they said we would have, they forgot our pizzas, didn't warm the grapeleaves, refused to do buffet style and mandated it had to be family style. Then when we got there, it took 20 minutes to get the appetizers and an hour to get the main course!
SALON: SERENITY (Sada): C
Sada does amazing work! Absolutely loved how all our hair and make-up turned out. I'm planning on switching to her to do my hair regularly she's that awesome!
My main problem was that to do 5 ladies hair and make-up, there was only 1 person there. We were supposed to be picked up by the limo at 1pm and by noon she had only finished me! Our FG and her mom and grandma got up early and travelled across town to get her hair done with us...only to leave and go back to the hotel and do her hair themselves because we ran out of time. Since the salon knew all of our itinerary for the day ahead of time, it was poor, poor planning on their part. We had to switch our entire itinerary for the day because of the time it took at the salon.
TRANSPORTATION: BIRMINGHAM LIMO: A+
We had a 10 passenger limo for the daytime and a 15 passenger party bus for the night. Their pricing was great! They were totally awesome with last minute changes and detours. Plus, the 15 passenger party bus was being used so they gave us the 20 passenger one for no extra cost! Very good at emailing and getting back to us when we needed! They even surprised us with champagne and orange juice...but since we flipped times with the guys, they drank it all!
DAY-OF-COORDINATOR: MY BEAUTIFUL MEMORIES (Melissa Lohr): A+Melissa was so awesome that when we were trying to figure out how to change our day timeline while we were at the salon, she went to my house to get my youngest son and take him to the HIFQ so he wouldn't have to miss out on the limo ride. She made all the changes with the limo company, made sure the venue knew about time changes, kept everything on track...and kept me from panicking! She was absolute tranquility in a sea of chaos that day! Love her!!!
CEREMONY/RECEPTION/CATERING/BAR: TOLEDO ZOO: ASo awesome to work with! Amazing packages, they handle everything, do all the set-up, just wonderful people! I would absolutely have another event with them again! Gardens are stunning, pavillion decorated perfectly, the food was great and I'm still hearing how good it was! Only reason they didn't get an "A+" is because the AV guy used the wrong CD and all of the music for my ceremony was wrong. There was still music, but not at all what we planned. (Also the bar's last call was at 10pm. ???)
DJ: DJ TOMMY RAY (Our DJ was Terry): C
We weren't necessarily
unhappy with Terry, but there were a few issues. #1: Theme song from Godfather is not really what I'd play at a wedding during dinner. #2: right before we cut the cake there was a medical emergency with my oldest son. It took up some time since EMS had to be called, and he was
still playing dinner hour music. I had to have someone go tell him to put on something upbeat for the guests. #3: Songs we had on our must-play list he didn't play. #4: He just didnt seem all that "up" on current music trends...like for a wedding DJ he had no idea about the song "Say Hey" by Michael Franti & Spearhead. ???
GUYS ATTIRE: WEDDING TROPICS (online retailer): A+
The outfits were amazing and they rushed a lot of things because of the GM procrastinating. When they knew measurements were wrong, like for our RB in particular, the kept in touch with me 3 times to re-verify the measurements. They were great!
FLOWERS: PRESCOTT FLORIST (Designer: Karen): A+
Super knowledgable, really economical, and everything turned out even better than expected! Our bouquets were stunning and we got a lot of comments on the centerpieces! She made everything better than we hoped!
PHOTOGRAPHERS: LOVE IS GREATER: A+
They showed up to photgraph us ladies at the salon, even though it wasn't part of the time I paid to have them. They worked great together...are super easy to get and stay in touch with. I don't have any of the edited photos yet to really comment on the quality, but they were really easy going about time changes. With the medical issue with my son, the one photographer is a nursing student and was right there helping before EMS arrived. Plus, since it was a pretty scary thing in the middle of the reception, they offered us an additional sitting with them at no charge...just because they felt bad for us! So sweet!
HOTELS:Holiday Inn French Quarter: AGuests were really happy staying there, but they forgot to give out some of our welcome bags to guests as they checked in. Intheir defense, there were 3 different weddings that had people staying there the smae weekend!
Holiday Inn Express, Perrysburg: A+
Guess who stayed there said it was really nice, staff was great, and everyone got their welcome bags!
Belamere Suites: A+++Holy. Cow. We had the Presidential Pool Suite. We cannot wait to go back when we have more time to enjoy it! Stayed there the evening after the wedding, so we didn't get there til almost 1am. Magnificent!!!! Amazing!!!! Loved it!!!!
DAY-AFTER BBQ CATERING: CITY Q BBQ: A+They delivered all the food right on time...including the chaffing dishes, water for the chaffing dishes, sterno, plates, plasticware, everything! Quality was great...everyone loved it!
DAY-AFTER BBQ TABLE/CHAIR RENTAL: MEREDITHS PARTY RENTAL: BWe rented 5 round tables, 2 with umbrellas, and chairs to set up in our backyard for the BBQ. They dropped everything off right to my yard, set up was really easy, and all I had to do at teh end of it was stack it all back up in my yard, and they came to pick everything up on Monday. Cost was somewhat reasonable, but the tables were rather janky looking...almost ancient. Made with cheap wood, laquered over crackes and stains, and the umbrellas looked like they had seen much better days. I expected nicer stuff...but we had some shade, so it served its purpose.
Whew...
That's all I can think of for now...if you have any questions, feel free to ask!