Reception: The Fountains at the Town of Wallkill Golf Club (Middletown) www.thefountainscatering.com
I’ll start with the negative first. They really need to hire a real professional sales manager to deal with clients before the wedding. Leading up to the wedding, I felt a bit ignored and they were seemingly quite unorganized, but mostly unresponsive. When I would email or call, it always took quite awhile for them to get back to me and when they would respond, the response was often incomplete. When we met with the owner and picked the venue, we asked whether they would be making any physical changes to the space. They said they’d be putting on a new coat of paint, but that was it. Before we made our second deposit, I again asked if there were any changes to the space, no response. When we thankfully went in one month before (they wanted to meet just a week or so before the wedding), they had painted a giant, hideous mural on a wall in the reception space, in front of which they usually put the sweetheart table. These kinds of murals are everything I hate about traditional reception halls and had it been there when I looked at this place, I never would have picked it. Some people might like it, but not me. We were horrified and asked that they try to cover it up. We offered to put the band there and to put our sweetheart table on one side, which was fine, but we were kind of hidden from everyone. We asked them to put a curtain behind the band, which after some coaxing, they did and paid for, but there was a lot of drama about it right before the wedding. In advance, I had asked them about doing a cake tasting since it was included in the package and I don’t really like cake all that much. They said we couldn’t because they didn’t use a bakery with a storefront. Flash forward to the meeting I insisted they do one month ahead and they tell us that they now use a new bakery and we need to meet directly with the baker to pick our cake. That was great, but what if we had met with them just one week before? We wouldn’t have had time to meet with the baker since we don’t live in the area.
But, now the day of the wedding… They were fantastic. I mean beyond fabulous fantastic. Their Maitre D’ Danielle is superb. She is extremely organized, anally detail-oriented, kind and one step ahead nearly all night. She should be running the entire show there. Their whole staff was great. I have a thing about toothpicks and skewers-I hate them. There were some cocktail hour items that had to have them and their waiters would not let them be seen at all. As soon as one was laid on a table, they were thrown out. The waiters were responsive, people were never without drinks (and either were we) or whatever they wanted, and the bartenders were great too. The food was delicious. Everything was high quality, especially the antipasto display, and so many people said they couldn’t believe it was wedding food since it was so good. In general, it was presented beautifully except for the risotto we had as an appetizer, which just looked like gruel. They also undercooked both the risotto and the rice for the chicken and fish dishes, at least the ones I got (others said it was fine and delicious). I wish we had gone with the fabulously yummy penne a la vodka we had in our cocktail hour. We had asked for local cheese and Bob the owner went all around god’s creation to get them for us. They were awesome, just sad I didn’t get to eat more. In general, sad I didn’t get to eat more of delicious food. Also, we had specialty cocktails and without us asking, they created a special martini bar for them where they froze the bottles of liquor in a block of ice and had cucumber cups to offer people a taste of the cocktails if they didn’t want to drink the whole thing. Bob went so far above and beyond, it was amazing. I cannot say enough good things about the day of our event. If you have some patience and some faith, go with the Fountains. You will not be disappointed. You cannot beat the setting either. We had such a great venue and I am so happy we discovered and went with the Fountains!
Cake: Lady Fingers Bake Shoppe via the Fountains (Monroe)
www.ladyfingersbakeshoppe.com
Delicious and perfect. We wanted something different-a NYC skyline and didn’t have an example to go on except for a few pictures of a cake, which wasn’t exactly what we wanted, and dishes at Fishy’s Eddy we like. Our cake came out perfectly. Kim did an amazing job. It was so yummy too, my dad can’t stop talking about it or eating it! We were sent home with tons of it.
Day of Coordinator-JoAnn Provenzano, What Dreams are Made of (Kingston)
www.whatdreamsaremadeof.biz/
One of the best decisions I made was hiring JoAnn and it is totally worth spending the money to have a Day of Coordinator. I know that she was a big part of things going well at the venue (and if there was anything wrong, I never heard about it because of her). Her staff helped set up our room perfectly. They made sure all of our many items were packed up and put in my parents care. She was more than just a day of coordinator-she helped us so much in advance, especially with the mural/curtain debacle at our venue. She was just such a reassuring presence throughout the day and I felt very confident because I knew JoAnn would be taking care of everything. She also got along with my parents extremely well and just felt like extended family. JoAnn is also extremely reasonably priced. You won’t go wrong with her.
Band-Kazz Music Orchestra (Kingston)
http://kazzmusic.com/index.html
Awesome! This is a new band so we got a pretty good deal on them. Get them while you can because they will be in high demand once people learn about them. Joe is a pleasure to work with. Artists can be, shall we say, flaky. Not Joe! I think he might be as, if not more, detail-oriented than me, which is hard to do. He was so responsive throughout the hiring process, hardly ever took more than a day to get back to us. He has a very thorough and informative contract (more than just numbers, but lots of helpful information). He has a very inclusive planning document he insists you fill out beforehand. I was so impressed by his organization and he made me feel so confident in their abilities to deliver what we wanted. And deliver they did. They learned so many songs for us-crazy songs no one has heard of because my husband is a crazy audiophile. They did a better version of our first dance song True Companion than Marc Cohn. The lead female singer sounds like Aretha Franklin and she is just off the hook good. When we were discussing songs, I asked if they had any U2 in the repertoire, which they didn’t. Joe asked me if I wanted them to learn anything, but I had told him no since they were already learning so many songs for us. Well, he surprised me and they sang Angel of Harlem, which has tremendous meaning to me and I don’t know how he knew it because I never mentioned it. The rendition was spectacular. That was really special to me. The only negative thing I would say about them is that Joe needs to be a bit of a louder more obvious presence at the event since people didn’t always hear his announcements. Their sound is so great and they exceeded my expectations. I just wish our friends had danced more! Hire them while you can.
Florist-Robin Anderson, Country Flowers (Napanoch/Ellenville)
My flowers were so beautiful-right out of a magazine and beyond my expectations. I’ll try to post pics once I get some because no description can really do justice. We had asked for a chuppah that would be made out of birch and just have some branches on top. We wanted something that was simple and rustic. We didn’t want flowers on it even. Well, Robin created the most beautiful chuppah I have ever seen. She put these beautiful vines on top with little orange (my color) berries. She also added some flowers (at no charge) to the corners that were from the flowers used in our bouquets and centerpieces. It was more than we wanted. Our bouquets were gorgeous, as were the boutonnières, and the centerpieces were everything I wanted and then some. Robin got my aesthetic maybe even more than I did. The flowers were fresh and full and she skimped on nothing. She gave us flowers for the top of the cake and for behind my flower girls ears for free. Robin is sweet and easy to work with and again, felt like extended family. I loved that she also used some flowers she grew herself in her nursery, which is her primary business. I loved my flowers and Robin created décor that complimented and improved our already beautiful venues.
Photographer- Hillary Harvey (Kingston)
www.hillaryharvey.com
I can’t speak yet on the quality of our photos, but working with Hillary was an absolute pleasure. She is so sweet as is her assistant Ellie and we and our guests felt so comfortable around her. She was able to coax great poses out of people without being annoying. There is nothing pushy about Hillary, but she gets all the shots (at least I think so). I didn’t even notice her taking pictures during our ceremony and she blended right in. She handled our somewhat crazy family with their politics flawlessly. We had done a pretty thorough photo scout with her in advance, but Hillary still managed to create some additional shots within our venues that I think are going to be beautiful. I loved working with Hillary and really hope I have another reason to work with her again.
Church-Stone Church (Cragsmoor, NY)
The Stone Church is a couple of doors down from my parents’ summer house so I’ve known it for most of my life. It is the most beautiful place in the world and if you want a special place to get married, this is it. The only drawbacks are a lack of parking, which ended up not being an issue at all for us.
Make Up-Yvette Kronick, Your EyeDeal Image (Pine Bush, NY)
www.youreyedealimage.com
Yvette was a calming presence for me the morning of my wedding. She is very kind and she did a beautiful job. She was on time and was able to work very quickly (we were running very late). She kept my make up very natural, but still with a bit of a pop. My husband was very worried that I wouldn’t look like me, but I did, a more beautiful version of me. Yvette is so reasonable as well, at least 1/3rd of the price of many others I asked. She uses Mary Kay make up, which she also sells. This was good because I am allergic to Mac, which is what most people use. I loved Yvette.
Hair-Angelo Amiano, Reflections Studio (Pine Bush, NY)
I really like working with Angelo, but his personality is not for everyone. He and I really clicked, which I think is really important. I have very thick long hair, which is a huge pain to deal with. It took us awhile at our trial, but we found a perfect style. Unfortunately, my hair grew a lot in between the trial and the wedding, so we weren’t able to do exactly what we had done. Angelo did his best, but it wasn’t quite what we had had. I was very happy with it, just not in love with it. Everyone else thought it was beautiful though. He did a great job with my bridesmaid and my mom. Still, I would definitely recommend Angelo to people and will probably make a special trip to get him to cut and style my hair in the future.
Shuttle Bus-Trailways (Middletown, NY)
I have not heard any different, so I can only assume they were on time. The bus was clean, I took it back to the hotel, and the driver nice. They were flexible with us about making multiple trips. I have not complaints. Also, they were the best priced of anyone.
Hotels: Courtyard Marriott/Hampton Inn/Microtel (Middletown, NY)
No real complaints about the hotels. Our room was nice at the Marriott. Shawn, their sales coordinator, is a bit unresponsive leading up to it, but was great the day or so before. The only issue was the breakfast restaurant that could not handle any kind of crowd in the morning. They were slow, not so bright and ran out of food.
Rehearsal Dinner: Culinary Creations (Pine Bush, NY) www.culinarycreationscafe.com
Yum! The food here is really good and the portions were enormous. We could have definitely gotten less. They created a beautiful menu for us with the image from our wedding invitation. It is a small place, but it was so nice just being somewhere without competition from other customers. Plus, they don’t get have their liquor license so we got to bring in local wine from a favorite HV winery.
Feel free to contact me up with specific questions. I would not change a vendor from our wedding. We were cost-conscious, but every penny we spent was worth it when it came to our vendors. I had the perfect wedding and they are big reason why. I’m actually sad I don’t get to hang out with them any more. My biggest piece of advice to brides out there is follow your instincts and only go with vendors you like. If you are uneasy about a personality, there is a reason and no matter how cheap they are or how well recommended they are, if you don’t click with them, don’t hire them.