You’ve found your soul mate, and you’re engaged! So now what? Congratulations what an exciting time as you embark on a new chapter in your life. One of the first things you’ll need to consider is the date for your big day! It seems rather easy, but there are actually several factors and considerations to think about in choosing the day to say “I do.” Here are some tips to help you narrow down and select the perfect wedding date for your celebration.
Planning
Make sure you have allow enough time to plan the celebration. You don’t want to rush things, planning a wedding takes a lot of patience, research and time. You’ll need the TIME. I usually suggest at a minimum, nine months, but 12 months would be even better. There are so many details that you’ll need to work through and plan that you will need that much time to plan it out. In addition, many venues, photographers, and Disc Jockeys only have a select number of dates available, and many of them book a year or more in advance.
The Budget
Next, don’t forget to take into account your wedding budget. You do have a budget, right? If you haven’t developed one, now is definitely the time to put one together, it will help you stay on track and in check. In addition, your budget will help you to determine several factors including the season, day of the week, size of the venue, indoors or outdoors just to name a few. Most wedding vendors offer discounts for off season weddings usually between November and April, depending on where you are located around the country. Most vendors also offer discounts on Fridays or celebrations that occur on days other than Saturday. At the same time, expect to pay the most on a Saturday or on a holiday, as these are the prime dates for events, and there are only 52 of them throughout the year.
Guest Considerations
As you begin to narrow the list of choices on dates, it’s always a good idea to keep the interests of your guests in mind too. Do you plan to invite a lot of out-of-town guests? Will they need to get accommodations? Where is your event taking place? Are their other events at the same time that might hinder their ability to get a hotel room? Do they need to get airline tickets? If so, does the date you are considering fall during a black out time? Are you planning to invite guests that also have children? If so, will the date conflict with things like school, or sports? These are all considerations that you will want to consider as you work on finding a date for your wedding celebration.
Room Décor
As you finalize your considerations for choosing a wedding date, you might consider your favorite season, and the décor you plan to use for the room. Do you like Fall? You could use oranges, and browns, along with leaves, and pumpkins. What about Spring or Summer? Tulips make a great alternative for flowers, and they are quite inexpensive. Do you want to have the event indoors or outdoors? No matter what you decide, check with the wedding vendors that interest you and see if the date you are considering is available. Once you have finalized the wedding date, make sure you send out “save the date” cards, your guests will be glad you did, so they can plan too. Good luck!
