"Overall, their whole mission was to make things simple and easy for us on our wedding day and they certainly succeeded."

Without Carina and McEmsara of Luxe Events as DOCs at my wedding, I would not have had any flowers (or only black, frozen flowers) at my wedding, no generals for my army of volunteering friends to help with the setup, and who knows what else because they shielded me from plenty of other potential chaos, I'm sure.

We started working with Carina about 8 months before the wedding as a result of winning a day-of coordination package giveaway she hosted. Even if we hadn't won, I was seriously considering signing up for some of the partial planning coordination or DIY coaching sessions, which I think are a brilliant idea--I was chugging along but would get stuck on certain bits and also just worried that I was forgetting something obvious. All the other wedding planning/coordination services from the NY/NJ metro area seemed to be either too much or too little--full service wedding planning or only DOC services. It's great to have something that's in-between and flexible to your needs.

I was incredibly, incredibly impressed by how professional Carina was at all times, particularly since we were working with her through this giveaway. I had prepared myself to be a relatively low priority for her, but it was actually the total opposite. From our first meeting, Carina did a great job of really listening to us and our vision for the wedding, which was pretty casual, low-key, but fun and crafty too. She was always available and happy to help me when I had the most random questions like where to buy cheap ribbons in bulk to decorate the ceremony chairs, getting back to me really quickly even in when I was at the point in the planning process where waiting 2 days to get an email back seemed like an eternity.

Carina never pushed us to spend extra money on items that were unnecessary, which was really important to us and our careful budget, but she and McEmsara weren't afraid to use their experience and speak up to persuade us when something was really worth it to make things easier on the big day, like staying in a local hotel the night before instead of in the other places available to us that would have been at least a 45 minute drive. That was definitely a good call, as I felt so much more at ease to be in town where the wedding was to be held starting from the night before, rather than needing to rush down the morning of.

Overall, their whole mission was to make things simple and easy for us on our wedding day and they certainly succeeded. They kept all the various moving pieces (and people) on schedule, executed my ambitious DIY projects without a complaint, and as I mentioned at the beginning, saved us from having to use flowers that had blackened and frozen after being stored in the venue's refrigerators the day before by making an emergency run to Trader Joe's to buy beautiful and fresh flowers. I would have been super cranky if I had to be the one making sure everyone was in the right place at the right time, since I hate coordinating groups, but they made it look easy. It's only now as I look through the many wedding photos from our photographers and guests that I can see them literally working the whole time in the background, keeping it all together. Thank you, Carina and McEmsara!