How did you pick a date ??

[JillEBean]

Hello,

 

I'm wondering how everyone decided on their wedding date?? did you know before you went to the travel agent or did you get what was avail at your destination ?? I'm more concerned with the "day" than the "date" as I want my ceremony on the 3rd day of the vacation so I'm not waiting for days and burnt by the time it happens.

 

Any suggestions are appreciated.

[echo2_62]

Hey... okay so a couple quick things to consider when you're picking your date (which also affect the 'day' you'd prefer as well).

 

First of all - where do you want your wedding? Mexico, Cuba, Hawaii? Consider costs for you and your guests, weather, peak travel seasons, stat. holidays (which can be different from ours!) etc.

 

Do you and FI have times of the year that you can't travel for work reasons, times that are difficult to book off for vacation? Would your guests find it difficult to travel during the holidays? Would summer months be too hot for everyone? Are there stat holidays in the destination country that would limit the quality of your experience (I think DR is very strict around the easter holiday so some resorts will only have limited staff on site and not offer as many options that week). Is it hurricane season? Will you have enough time to obtain all the necessary paperwork in time for your wedding coordinator/location?

 

Hopefully that can help you eliminate a few months of the year to start!

 

If you're down to choosing between a couple months, sometimes the size of the resort itself may dictate some of your decision. A smaller resort could fill more quickly so you may have to choose a wedding date that is farther down the road so that you have a better chance of getting everyone booked.

 

Even if you're able to email a couple of resorts to find out what the availability is over a few different weeks, they can likely give you an indication of how busy they are and what times tend to book faster than others.

 

 

One really important addition for you as well. You definitely need to find out what the rules and requirements are for the country you want to get married in. This will directly impact the 'day' of your wedding. For example, Mexico requires that you be in the country for a minimum of four full business days before you can legally be married. So if you arrived on a Saturday or Sunday, you could have your wedding on the following Friday. But if you arrived on a Monday, you couldn't get married until the following Monday because your arrival date does not count towards the requirements. Other countries will be different in this regard so make sure you know for each one. Oh and that's for a legal ceremony only. If you plan to do the legal part locally and just do a symbolic ceremony somewhere else then you don't have to meet the same requirements.

[Jocy]

Another thing to consider is which airlines fly to your chosen destination and on which days do they fly. This was the determining factor for us because all flights from the UK (where my family live) were Wed-Wed only. And i wanted our "wedding" to be the 6th out of the 8 days. So we new we wanted a Monday and we just asked the resort which Mondays they had available in Jan/Feb (the least rainy months in our chosen destination!)

 

Good Luck!

[IrishgirlinNY]

We went with May 28. Our decision was based on the people that we want there. My best friend is a teacher and needs it on a holiday weekend, it starts of the timeframe of when my dad can take vacation, etc. We didnt want a summer wedding so we had to go with a holiday during the school year. The date really didnt matter to me. My fiance didnt want late in the year. He wanted either late 2010 or early 2011. We are pushing a two year engagement and he didnt want to wait any longer. A big part is also the availability of the resort, obviously. Good luck with picking your date!

[Married_In_Maui]

We choose the week we wanted to travel, then scheduled the wedding according to the days that the resort had open. We got married on a Thursday after arriving on a Sunday. I actually liked getting married a few days after being on the island, it gave me the chance to relax & I had an awesome tan by the time the wedding came around (just be careful & use sunscreen Good luck with your planning.

[hat0112]

I think echo2 62 gave you a lot of great information to pick a date. My FI and I had our date picked before we started planning though. We are getting married on 10/22/10 in Aruba. We picked that date because 1) it is our dating anniversary and 2) because I will have my braces off by then. And picking Aruba was easy since we wanted to go somewhere new and since October is hurricane season, Aruba was the perfect choice.

 

Good luck!

[**~Linda~**]

We picked January because of a few different factors.

 

#1 Hurricane season is over by then so the weather tends to be clear and gorgeous.

#2 Summer is way to hot in the Caribbean for FI and his family. The sun is way to extreme and like almost everywhere in the world its wedding central so the places are usually booked to the T.

#3 Months of March and beginning of April are usually full of rain down in PR so not such great weather for a beach.

#4 January was a great month for FI and his family to get away from the cold for a few days and into the beach!

[trobin01]

We took most of what was mentioned above into consideration.

 

But another huge one factor for us was budget! The travel for our guests was significantly cheaper outside of the December-March high season. We wanted it to be cold at home (Ontario) and not too close to Christmas and not too expensive for our guests. This is how we arrived at the beginning of November. Just something to keep in mind.

[riokayak]

We picked February, because most of my family is in northern Minnesota, so by presidents weekend most people are ready for a warm vacation. We ended up deciding on the 19th because it was FI's late father's birthday.

 

We haven't sent out our invites yet and had planned to keep the list pretty limited, but its been so fun hearing from people that want to make a vacation out of it that our list has grown! We rented a house for the ceremony and party, so space isn't really an issue.

 

My suggestion is pick a time of year that will make the decision for people. MN and ID are beautiful in the summer so I would feel bad making people leave to go somewhere then, but the winter is perfect for our families.

[GracieBebe]

Once we decided to do a DW in Europe, we knew we would be there an entire week so it didn't matter to us what day we actually got married. We chose 9/9/09 for obvious reasons, so when we realized it fell on the 5th day after we got there, a Wednesday, that worked out for us. It gave us enough time to get acclimated to the time change and the area and time to explore around.

 

We also found out in Chinese culture that 999 means forever, forever, forever which was so perfect!