Showing posts with label Passion Fruit Chefs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Passion Fruit Chefs. Show all posts

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Caribbean Tourism Organization

A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to take part in a mini-trade show that the US Virgin Islands Department of Tourism was sponsoring for the Caribbean Tourism Organization. I actually took a part of it with the St. Thomas & St. John Wedding Association. It was really a fun way to meet travel agents in the Caribbean market. I, along with Eric Johnson of Paradise Pictures and Ashley Armitage of Ashley Photography, represented our group (which includes Passion Fruit Chefs, VI Desserts, Chris Robbert music, Sugar & Spice Artistry, East End Flower Shop, DJ Snow and HiDef Video - check out the website at www.viweddingassociation.org!).

Our little booth:



We didn't have any give-aways at our booth, but Biras Creek of Virgin Gorda had killer canvas tote bags they were giving away! I chatted up the rep from their resort in hopes she would hand me one, but no such luck. I love give-aways! Next year, I'll have to pretend I'm a travel agent instead. =)

The highlight of the show for me was the Caribbean Ritual Dancers. They put on an AMAZING show and even had a traditional moko jumbie perform and entertain the crowd. We've hired them before to entertain at weddings and they are always a huge hit.





Thank you to the Wyndham Sugar Bay for hosting the event and to the tourism department for sponsoring it!

Friday, March 5, 2010

All fixed, I hope...

Not my email. I'm still having some problems with that. I found out that my IP provider used to be involved in the porn industry and therefore, a LOT of other IP servers completely blocked it. So I have had a few brides that were not getting emails from me. Still working on getting that fixed, but it does seem to be improving. So what is fixed, you ask? My website. I didn't even know it was broken! Actually, I changed the top of our website so have one long picture at the top of each page. But unfortunately, what I took to look artistic was looking horribly distorted to others. My husband pointed it out first but of course, I dismissed his opinion. Then my mother-in-law pointed it out, followed by a few other vendors on the island...so I took the hint and realized my artistic interpretations were not being appreciated and fixed it. Hopefully things look a little better now. =)

I wanted to share this image from a wedding we did last month at Sand Dollar:



One of the things that I think can really make a wedding FABULOUS instead of "just great" is the fine details. While I LOVE fine details, it's not really exactly what I do here. What I mean is, I don't come up with them - you do - and then I make them happen. I'm great at offering ideas, but at the same time, a lot of these fine details are your own hard work with DIY projects. For example, the above wedding...the bride brought with her the menu cards, the place cards, she shipped the sand dollars to me in advance, and had the linens specially made and brought them with her. When it comes to stationary products, the Virgin Islands is not going to be your best bet for a source. It's best to bring that with you - ideally, matching your invitations to pull everything together. This reception was held a Villa Sand Dollar - so the sand dollar at each place setting was just so perfect. They were beautiful sand dollars, pristine white and delicate and a perfect balance to the table. We do have access to all different kinds of table linens for your reception, but being a small island, the choices are definitely limited. The gorgeous linen this bride picked out would not have been something we could have gotten for her. She worked hard on her inspiration and it was my job to help her bring it all together - working with the florist to bring her floral inspiration to life, placing out the menus & name cards in the right spot, putting the sand dollar on as the finishing touch...it really was a gorgeous wedding and a perfect example of what you can do:




A few other special touches: The bar menu



Flip flops for guests to enjoy on the beach:



Probably one of the coolest things I've seen in awhile - the bride's brother made these wooden blocks to hold the guests place cards! We always have a problem with these cards and any wind that may occur - but these were perfect in keeping the place cards in place. Gotta be nice having a brother that's handy with woodwork!



And lastly, you've probably seen candy stations done before at weddings but bright, bold colors would not have gone well with this particular wedding. Our bride chose instead nice neutral tones for a little snack station after the ceremony, she even brought the wooden spoons with her to keep with the natural theme of the evening. It was really just lovely!




Something else I should probably work on - trying to fix blogger so that my pictures and captions line up! Ah well...baby steps, baby steps...