Saint Joseph, MI, USA < change city >

Response from the couple:
Hi Anna,
Sure no problem. I had my wedding there in August and it worked out wonderfully. As for the owners, Amy seemed fairly decent on email, but the phone took some days to get a response. Keep in mind there's no phone at Mill Creek and cell phones don't really work there either, so they don't know you've called until they go back to Blue Dress or into town. They frustrated me on several items at times too, but most of my issues were because they didn't know yet - they were still constructing a lot last summer. I think their website could be better too (a list of available tables and their sizes as well as recommended layouts seems pretty easy for them to do, but it's missing.) If you want to chat about it, that would be fine too. You can call me on my cell [phone number hidden (log in to view)] if you would like. In the end, my reception went wonderfully and the whole venue was beautiful, so hopefully that will at least calm any fears you have about it working out for your wedding day!
Good Luck!
Jeni

Response:
Hi Jeni,

Thanks for responding to my post. I am now getting into some of the nitty gritty details for the big event.

Here's my dilemma: I am interested in either starting early in the afternoon (3 pm) or going late (like until 1 am instead of 12). I have been to many weddings that seem rushed and end up with very little time for dancing. We have so many friends and family travelling from very far and I don't want to have a short event that starts at 5pm. In the contract, it notes access to the barn doesn't begin until noon (which seems really late to me) and music must end by 11. It seems very restricting.

I want to approach Amy about this but also want to chat with other brides first, before I get too worked up. How strict was she about the 12-12 (w/music stopping at 11) and the vendors out 2 hours before guests arrive? I am trying to compose the day of timeline and if vendors can't arrive until 12 and I want my guests to arrive at 2:30, I'm just not sure how this is possible.

If you encountered any similar situations or have advice on this regard, please do share!

Thanks.
Anna

Response from the couple:
Hi Anna,

I looked into the same. Basically, if you are willing to pay like an extra $100/hr (or so), they will let you in an hour early and/or stay an hour late. (or at least that was what they were doing last year) I ended up not wanting to spend the money, but people were so tired by 11:30 p.m any way, it didn't matter for us. We were a bit rushed to get out of there, but we did a LOT of decorating ourselves, and there ended up being a torrential downpour at 11:10 that really wreaked havoc with our plans!

As for the vendors being out early, that was more of a leftover rule for the Blue Dress barn because their driveway was a problem. (the vendors there block access to the parking lot). They didn't care about that for me at Mill Creek. For their end times, I think it was DJ at 11:15 and bar at 11:30 or the other way around. I didn't like it either, but the guests didn't seem to care at all...

And just a head's up, I told everyone that the event started at 6, and we had guests show up over an hour early! Total pain in the butt since my aunt's weren't done decorating, so you might want to buffer that even more if you are concerned about that. I decided that if they were rude enough to arrive WAY before they were wanted there then they were fair game to be forced to help set up!

I hope that helps!
Jeni

Response:
This is really helpful. I think I might just go ahead and pay for that extra hour before-hand. We want to start our ceremony at 3 or 4 in the afternoon and I can't imagine my team of friends and family can get the place ready in just a few hours.

If you have any tips or suggestions about decorating, lighting, outdoor/indoor decorating, let me know. I also noticed with the contract their are strict rules around decorating.

Thanks for all your help!

Anna

Response from the couple:
Hi Anna,
Kirby was there for my walk-thru and I just made sure to bring up anything that I thought they might care about with decorating. I think I got a lot more flexibility from him just because he knew about things in advance. In terms of hanging items, as long as you are not putting holes in anything or putting out things that could cause the barn to burn down, you're probably okay. He has nails periodically around the barn that you can hang items off of, so we did that instead of trying to hang flowers / ribbon from their lanterns that can get hot.

Outside, they just don't want any damage to the grounds or flower beds. I put up Off! Lanterns that required shephard's hooks, and they were okay with those in the flower beds. I also took my pew bows from the church and hung them off of the log stumps lining the drive. I think the rest of my stuff was just sitting out, so there wasn't anything else that I was worried about. I'll have to think if there was anything else I used. I know one bride that hung items from the rafters. That did not go over well with them, but I don't know the details.

Good luck!
Jeni