Weddings

Jake and Bailey Hernandez are shown in this photo from Photography by Ashley Nares.

“I was born and raised in Sterling. I remember begging my dad for more Polaroid film for his Spectra 2. I think this is where my love for photography started. I loved capturing everything around me, and today I get to capture all your special moments in life ... It’s all about being with your loved ones and celebrating your love with each other, but most important making memories!” — Ashley Nares, nareseventco.com/about

For more information about Photography by Ashley Nares ... See her ad on page 41

Online: Go to nareseventco.com

Social media: “Photography by Ashley Nares” on Facebook | “photographybyashleynares” on Instagram Phone: 815-535-3214 E-mail: nareseventco@gmail.com

Looking for a romantic getaway? Andrea Canas (right) can help. The independent travel agent from Dixon prides herself on personalized service to help deliver couples to their destination. “I’ll sit down with them and get their vision and what their expectations are ... There are so many different scenarios that we can do. I like to hear about their expectations and what they’re hoping for.”

ALEX T. PASCHAL/ APASCHAL@ SHAWMEDIA.COM

If your walk down the aisle is going to take you around the world, that’s gonna take some legwork, so it’s a good thing Andrea Canas is around.

Canas is the person couples go to when they want to go somewhere without the stress of trying to figure out how to get there. The independent travel agent from Dixon brings years of experience to helping clients plan destination weddings and honeymoons.

She prides herself on a personalized approach to travel consultations, helping clients discover destinations they’ll love at a price they can afford.

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“I just need some pieces to the puzzle, and then I help them complete it,” she said. “There are so many different scenarios that we can do. I like to hear about their expectations and what they’re hoping for, and try to get as close to that as possible.”

Canas works as an affiliate with Epic Travel Partners, which itself is an affiliated company of Montecito Village Travel of Santa Barbara, California. They provide resources and packages to Canas, who works with clients to arrange what they’re looking for. She recently became a member of the Destination Wedding and Honeymoon Specialist Association, a worldwide network of romance travel specialists.

With so much legwork to planning a trip, it’s best to have a lot of tools at your fingertips, and Canas has them.

The travel agency industry has turned to electronic resources more and more over the years, which makes the work-from-home concept easier and more client-centered. Canas has worked from the office of her Dixon home since 2014, which is how many agents operate these days, she said, as opposed to having a brick-and-mortar office that clients come to.

That change has been good for both agents and their customers, she said.

“It’s tons more freedom. I don’t have to ask for time off, don’t have to worry about how many vacation days I have, or work someone else’s hours.”

While she also plans events and trips for other occasions, honeymoons and destination weddings are the biggest part of her business — about 75% of what she does. When she’s not tending to clients, she’s educating herself on how to best serve them, keeping up to date on travel trends.

Learning about the clients and their travel habits is important, so that Canas can size up what they may be doing during the trip. Will the trip be within budget? Will the trip be something they’ll both enjoy? Many couples don’t have a grasp on just how much money a trip can cost, but Canas does, and she can help couples determine the best fit for their budget.

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Andrea Canas brings more than 25 years of experience booking trips, but even with all the miles she’s helped clients log, she still gets a kick out of keeping customers satisfied.

Canas likes to meet with her clients in person, either over coffee somewhere in town or at the couple’s home.

“I usually ask them about their previous travel,” she said. “I like to know where they’ve been before, and what they liked about that trip. You have two people, and one may like snorkeling and one might be a diver. Or, one may want to see cultural things and the other one may not. So we have to come to a happy medium on where they want to go, according to their budget; when they want to go; and learn what their preferences are and what their deal-breakers are.”

Mexico and the Caribbean have long been top destinations for couples. Smaller places in the Pacific, such as Tahiti, the Maldives and Bora Bora, are also popular spots. Another big trend, Canas said, are trips with certain wellness concepts in mind, such as engaging in digital detox — going “off the grid” for a while. Canas said she’s also seeing a growing demand from couples looking for destination weddings where the focus is on one wedding at a time, as opposed to destinations that are juggling multiple marriages on a given day.

“I’ll sit down with them and get their vision and what their expectations are,” Canas said. “I always say, ‘What’s your deal breaker?’ Most of the time, people are like, ‘I don’t want to change flights.’ ‘I want four- or five-star [hotels].’ ‘I want choices.’ A lot of it is safety, and budget is always a big one, especially now.”

Travel planning can be tricky, and many couples find it hard to juggle all the details that need to be worked out when their hands are already full planning their wedding. Canas said she’s seen clients who have tried doing the work themselves and often get overwhelmed with what they find out. Putting those concerns in the hands of a travel agent saves a lot of time and reduces stress.

“Sometimes the laws change and there’s a lot of keeping up with paperwork and everything,” Canas said. “Everyone wants to feel special and everyone wants to have their own stamp on everything, and that has changed [from before]. No cookie cutters, so everything is about their style and what they want.”

Another benefit of handing things over to an experienced travel agent: They’ve often been to some of the destinations themselves, so they can bring that first-hand knowledge back to their clients — and if she hasn’t been there, she usually knows someone who has.

If there’s a spot a client has in mind, and Canas hasn’t visited it, she can turn to her trusted network of contacts through her affiliation with Epic Travel Partners and Montecito Village to help.

One piece of advice Canas likes to offer clients is not to put so much faith in online reviews. Oftentimes, reviewers base their opinions on their own expectations, which can differ than those of the clients she works with.

“The web is great and I love the internet, but it’s very hard to go by reviews,” she said. “You don’t know who is the reviewer. That’s where I come in. Everyone’s palate is different, as well as their expectations. A few years ago I went to a five-star resort in St. Lucia, and just for kicks I went on Trip Advisor just to see what people were saying. They were bashing it left and right. I get there, and it was amazing. I didn’t know what those people were expecting.”

Another tip: Plan destination weddings and honeymoons at least a year in advance, Canas said. That way, there’s plenty of time to get everything set up, and it allows time for any changes that may crop up.

But even with all that advance planning, “life happens,” Canas said, and unexpected changes can still throw a wrench into the best-laid plans. That’s where having an experienced agent can help. They know how the system works and can better navigate it to work through the issue.

Having booked her first vacation more than 25 years ago, there’s not much that Canas hasn’t seen. The recent COVID-19 pandemic was a mess for travel agents to deal with, and the effects are still lingering: Those who delayed weddings and honeymoons are getting around to doing them now or in the next year.

Destination weddings can come in different types — even unannounced ones. Canas said she’s done elopement travel, where couples go somewhere and come back home married.

One such trip had the couple going to Kaua’i, Hawaii’s fourth-largest island: “That was fun,” she said. “They sent me a video link, and it was just beautiful. Everything was great.”

Moments like that, and myriad others that she’s shared with clients through the years, put a big smile on her face.

“When people return and they send me pictures, or I meet with them after the travel is done, just to see their faces light up and have that joy with those memories, that does it for me,” she said. “That’s worth everything. Those are once-in-a-lifetime things, so it’s an honor, and I’m going to take it seriously.”

Though reality begins to set in once couples return home, during their destination adventure they get to get away from it all and begin making memories together.

“People want to feel like they’re on their own private island,” Canas said. “I think they like just feeling disconnected, in a good way.” n

More Info

To plan out a wedding trip with Andrea Canas, email andreaplansadventures@ gmail.com or call 815-7163261. Go to instagram.com/ andreaplansadventures to learn more about popular destinations.

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Clothes not only make the man, they can make the wedding, too.

That’s why it’s important everyone look their best, and when it comes to the men who march down the aisle, a Dixon business owner is happy to help make sure the future mister of the “Mr. and Mrs.” measures up to the expectations for the big day.

Mark Kaleel brings generations of experience — and a trusty measuring tape — to help him help couples make their dream wedding come true at the long-time family business, Kaleel’s Clothing and Printing.

The third-generation clothing shop owner has been witness to the evolution of men’s wedding wear for years, from seeing his father and grandfather size up men of all sizes over the years, to following in their fashion footsteps today. As the years go by and the trends have evolved, Kaleel and his staff have kept up with what’s popular, and that’s helped keep the family business popular among soon-to-be newlyweds.

When the weather’s nice and the number of weddings start to pick up, Kaleel and his staff handle as many as a half-dozen weddings a week, and many of them come from customer referrals.

“We rent a lot of tuxes here,” Kaleel said. “Word of mouth gets out that they get a good fit here.”

As far as what makes a good fit, it just all depends on tastes and trends, and these days the trend tends toward tighter fits.

Kaleel has seen suits go from traditional and modern fits to something more snug — slim and ultra slim fits are the preference for many men these days. Traditional fits have a more classical and fuller cut, while modern fits have narrower lapels and are more narrower through the body. Slim and ultra slim fits take it even further: Slim fits have the same waist dimension as a modern fit, but are narrower through the body, have even narrower lapels, and have a shorter jacket. Ultra fits are trim and fit closest to the body.

These days, grooms have a lot more fashion options than when the basic black-and-whites were about the only things brides saw waiting for them as they marched down the aisle. These days, a host of patterns, colors, and styles are available, and Kaleel’s Clothing and Printing owner Mark Kaleel (above) will be happy to show you what’s available.

ALEX T. PASCHAL / APASCHAL@SHAWMEDIA.COM

Some young grooms learned in high school what they like in formalwear — remembering the look and the feel of what they wore for prom or homecomings — and bring that to the fitting room when they’re picking out their suits.

“It used to be more of the modern fits and the traditional fits where it’s more of a ‘boxy’ cut, but it’s going toward the ultra slims and slims,” Kaleel said. “Mainly the younger guys and kids, they want them fitting tight. Prom time, they want them tight-fitting.” Navy, gray and black are popular suit colors, with bow ties making room for traditional ties with patterns.

Whatever a couple’s choice, though, Kaleel recommends making sure they plan ahead. Measurements have to be taken, suits lined up, alterations made — at the very least, he said, allow two months before the wedding.

“We won’t call the wedding orders in until everyone is measured. Then they’ll ship them the Monday of the week of the wedding.”

Another tip: Kaleel said grooms should bring in a swatch of what the bridal party is wearing to help with the color match.

“Some people come in and they don’t have a clue, but a color swatch helps a lot and we can match it with what we offer,” Kaleel said, adding that just snapping a picture on a cell phone, while convenient, isn’t the best way to color coordinate. Things like lighting and picture quality can alter the view of a hue, so having a swatch in hand is best.

“They need to come in with a color swatch of their bridesmaids’ dress colors, so then it can be matched up,” he said. “We’ll go through different categories and find them the color that matches best.”

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These days, wedding don’t have to be black tie affairs. Grooms can pick from a palette of colors that’ll liven up their formalwear. Vests, cummerbunds and tuxedos come in a variety of colors, too.

ALEX T. PASCHAL / APASCHAL@SHAWMEDIA.COM

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Kaleel’s utilizes Jim’s Formal Wear for suits. Jim’s has been in the clothing business for 100 years, having started in a small downtown shop in Trenton, 40 miles east of St. Louis, and has grown to become a national chain. Jim’s clothing doesn’t have too far to travel to get to Kaleel’s — from one end of Illinois to another — which has turned out to be a good arrangement for Kaleel and his customers.

When it comes to the groom’s party, the more the merrier: When a party rents six tuxedos, the groom receives theirs free.

Come Monday’s at Kaleel’s, there’s a lot of suit swapping when Jim’s van pulls in, with new orders delivered and previous orders picked up. Most other companies won’t deliver suits until a couple of days before the wedding, but there’s more time with the arrangement Kaleel’s and Jim’s have, and that allows for more time if a fit needs finessed.

Another brand Kaleel’s carries is Milroy’s from Waterloo, Iowa. Milroy’s is Kaleel’s go-to more for proms and homecomings. While there’s enough wedding-related inventory to go around, Jim’s is Kaleel’s wedding source of choice.

“This is a real good company,” Kaleel said. “Not a lot of companies have a lot of inventory, but Jim’s does. It’s a big company. They’ve been around a long time, and their customer service is great. When we call for something, we have it here right away.”

Taking care of customers has been a long-standing point of pride for Kaleel’s since Mark’s grandfather, Nemer, opened his Country Peddler wagon in 1905. Nemer emigrated to the United States from Lebanon at the turn of the 20th century and set up a horse-and-buggy wagon of dry goods to peddle throughout his new home in Spring Valley at the age of 17. He went on to open a brick-and-mortar location in Earlville in 1939, renamed Kaleel’s Mens Clothing, which later expanded to Amboy and Mendota.

Mark’s parents, George and Mona, ran the Amboy store until retiring a few years ago. The Dixon location opened in 2014 with mens clothes and a small line of womens clothing, and printing services. It expanded in 2020 to grow the womens inventory and printing aspect of the business, though mens clothing and accessories still remain the heart of the store. Carhartt work clothes are their main clothing line, but they also carry Wrangler casuals and Van Heusen dress shirts.

ALEX T. PASCHAL /APASCHAL@SHAWMEDIA.COM

Kaleel has even seen his Carhartt inventory get used for some outdoor weddings.

“A lot of them have been buying Carhartt jeans and getting a shirt or vest, and maybe a tie, for casual outdoor weddings,” Kaleel said. “They’ll buy Carhartt jeans from me, maybe get a belt, and get boots. A lot of people don’t like to get dressed up, and they can talk their bride into doing it this way. We’ve had quite a few of those.”

Kaleel’s does free alterations on items purchased there, and also offers alterations on other items, for a fee. It’s another way the business takes care of its customers, with whom Mark and his staff enjoy talking to and hearing wedding reception stories from — especially how their suits are received.

“It’s nice when we get to talk afterwards and see how everything went. It’s nice to talk to the bride and groom,” he said.

But regardless of who walks through the door — from neighbors they know to friends they’ve made to couples they’ve met for the first time — Kaleel said there’s one thing they can be sure of: “People know they can come in here and get a good fit.” n