Cynthia Keeley is author of Cyn’s Spin and contributor to The MOB Blog.

I found myself spending a lot of time trying to contact the wedding coordinator at the Sheraton, as she wasn’t very good at either returning phone calls or emails. The bakery they suggested as a preferred vendor had gotten less than stellar reviews online, so i wasn’t sure what my options were for using someone else. The venue was a little over an hour from here, so I couldn’t just pop up there whenever I wanted, as I also found out the people I needed to deal with weren’t always on the same weekly schedule. I’m not normally easily frustrated, but this woman was driving me up a wall with her lack of response, and when she finally did, her less than helpful answers were certainly trying my patience.

We had a written contract which spelled out everything that was included in the event. There was a garden/gazebo area that was to be where the ceremony would be held at no additional cost, barring inclement weather. I wanted to know where the ceremony would be moved to, just in case, and her only response was for me ‘not to worry about it’. To me, it was BIG DEAL, so when someone tries to pacify me with an insane response, it makes my blood boil. Would it be in the Ballroom? The cocktail hour Atrium?  Another smaller room inside? WHERE??? She refused to answer me, but she did manage to throw out that the garden area would cost an additional $500.00, since that wasn’t part of the original ‘deal’. Of course I, in my most ladylike voice, told her she was wrong. It was clearly spelled out in the contract I had in front of me, but she continued to argue that I was mistaken. I told her to find all her paperwork and to get back to me when she was looking at the same copy I was. I won that one.

I needed time to back off from dealing with her, so I gave myself another week before I tried talking to her about the bakery. Quinn & Graham both decided they didn’t want fondant on their cake, so my job was to talk to the baker and find out if the cake could be made with all butter cream. When the manager finally called me about the bakery, she was quite annoyed that I’d bothered to check them out online, and highly insulted that I was looking around for someone else. Because of the terms of my purchase of the wedding package, she told me that I really had no choice but to use the baker they recommended. Evidently I wasn’t being given the same opportunity as the previous bride in choosing the bakery, so I bit the bullet and called the baker.

She was quite nice to me and I felt good moving forward. I had a picture of another bride’s wedding cake I wanted her to make, so I sent it to her by email to see if it would be any problem. She answered right away and said it was fine. It was a square stacked cake with black ribbon banding on the tiers with crystal brooches where the bows were tied. I’d already bought the vintage broaches from a few Etsy sellers, so I thought we were all set in the cake department. I made sure she knew we wanted it made in butter cream, and she said it was again, no problem.

It was a problem.

The event manager contacted me and told me the cake HAD to be made in fondant, according to the bakery. It was for a June wedding, and she couldn’t guarantee the icing wouldn’t melt if we used butter cream. Let me just quantify this by saying that while I love to bake, the thought that the cake would be ruined never crossed my mind. The bakery and van was air conditioned as was the ballroom, so for the short amount of time it would be exposed to the elements, it would melt? Of course it worried me, but the EM’s words to me really stung, when she accused me of ‘not wanting to spend any more money than I HAD to’, by not wanting the cake done in fondant. (Evidently the cake we were allowed was only the butter cream, but they were pushing for the fondant so I had to pay the $200. more). Can we say sneaky? I had no idea this was the case, but I was beginning to regret this whole EBay thing. UGH.

Thank goodness the meeting with the florist went well, and she was a doll. Quinn wanted me to meet with her as she couldn’t take off so much time from work, so we picked a few things from her website we liked, and went to her shop to discuss them. She made some suggestions and we wrote up the contract. She didn’t even want a deposit! She did, however, mention to us that we had to come to her shop the day before the wedding to approve everything before they were delivered. A smart move on her part! She wanted to make sure everything was how we wanted it and she had no intention of having a tearful bride on her wedding day. (It turns out that it was a GREAT thing, as there were a few things I needed changed. When they brought out the bouquets, the BM’s were much bigger than the bride’s! They immediately fixed it, by tightening up the girls’, and loosening the bride’s and adding some coordinating filler. Perfect!) If at all possible for any of you planning, I highly recommend doing this.

Once we worked out some of our ‘issues’, the event manager and I did OK when dealing with each other. She had a storage room where we were able to keep many of the things we needed to get there before the wedding, so that was a huge help. She was also on the lookout for our chair cover delivery so it was stored with all of our things. It seemed like everything was all set….we had the photographer and DJ and officiant all lined up, and it was just waiting for the big day to arrive now!  Next up is MY dress dilemma and how I managed to buy six dresses!