Picking The Date

Although you have to pick the date before you can start making any plans for the ceremony and reception, give some thought to the type of wedding you want as you sit down with the calendar. Do you dream of a swirling-clouds-of-lace Cinderella wedding? Then you’d better have more than a week or two to make the arrangements. For an elaborate af-fair with all (or most of) the trimmings, allow at least two months. Even better—three to six months of planning time will give you a little wiggle room.

On the other hand, if time is of the essence or you’re just not the Cinderella-wedding type, in less than a month’s time you can plan a small, simple wedding ceremony and recep-tion that will be just as lovely and meaningful as a grand affair.

Another factor to consider when choosing the date for a last minute wedding is your out-of-town guests. Very few people can afford to pay undiscounted airfares, so try to give at least a few weeks’ notice if you have family and/or friends who’ll need to fly in or make arrangements for lodging.

A third factor in choosing your date is the availability of wedding service vendors, such as caterers, florists, and pho-tographers. Peak wedding months are May through October. Holidays like Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and even April Fool’s Day are also very popular. If you’re planning on a tight schedule and your date falls within one of the peak times, your options are going to be more limited and you may have to make more compromises than if your wedding date were in a less-busy period. Instead of a full meal, for ex-ample, you may have to settle for a light hors d’oeuvre buffet in order for the caterer to squeeze you in between the six other weddings that were booked last year for that same day. When time is tight you might consider hiring a wedding consultant to help you with arranging the details of your wedding. Consultants who have worked in your town for a while will know the best vendors to call for your specific needs and will have resources and knowledge that will be invaluable in planning your wedding. They may tack on an additional fee for planning your wedding in such a short amount of time, but the stress and hair-pulling they’ll save you may be worth it.

Peak wedding periods not only affect the availability of wedding vendors, they also determine how much you’re go-ing to fork out for their services. Which leads us to number two of the Big Four: setting a budget.