Why we wanted a LONG engagement
You can ask any of my girlfriends and they’ll all tell you that I’ve always wanted a long engagement. For years, that’s been my motto.
My thought process here is that if you are only engaged once in your lifetime, in a time period where you call someone your fiancé and experience the joy of being in this new chapter, why would you rush it?
This is nothing against anyone who eloped, got married quickly or did anything different. Honestly, I wholeheartedly believe people should do what feels right for them, but since Peter and I are going on 10 years of being together we aren’t in a rush to get married. It sounds backwards when I type it out, but basically we know we are always going to be together, so we didn’t feel the need to rush a wedding. I’ll mention this was always our plan regardless of covid, which speaking of, maybe this will be encouraging for people who now have to have a long engagement due to the pandemic!
6 Reasons to Have a Long Engagement
You get to enjoy the honeymoon stage of engagement
We laugh because we have now been engaged for about 8 months and we just booked the venue/set the date. I know some couple’s who have the venue booked weeks after getting engaged, but when I say we enjoyed the honeymoon stage of engagement, we enjoyed it. For reference, we got engaged in July of 2020 and set a goal to pick a venue by New Year’s Eve. To be honest with you, our idea of venues changed SO much throughout those months, like I’m talking internationally, regionally, size wise, everything. I will definitely write more about the venue shopping process soon because that was a beast, but for now just know that we ended up choosing summer 2022 in Minnesota.
In retrospect, I am super glad we took the first several months to enjoy engagement before jumping into planning. Of course, we also had a move at the end of the year that consumed most of our energy, but regardless, my best advice would be to enjoy this time. We ate pizza 24/7, celebrated with cakes and champagne, spent lots of time staring at my ring, and enjoyed the whole honeymoon period.
You have time to plan
This is MAJOR. It’s weird because I always thought I had a vision for my wedding, but when it comes time to make decisions, it’s hard to articulate exactly what I want. Take venue shopping for example, there were some spaces we toured that just didn’t quite hit the mark. They could be stunning and check every box except for some sort of indescribable energy that I was looking for… like there’s just something off. Well folks, I feel like that applies to lots of elements in wedding planning.
Pete and I are the first of our friend groups and siblings to get married, which means we don’t really have a guide or reference to help us. Of course our families have been helpful, but there are so many things that go into planning that I never knew about! One thing that has been helping us is our Excel Spreadsheet that outlines all the major tasks, dates and details (thank goodness for Pete’s type A brain that keeps us on track!).
3. You’ll likely get the vendors you’ve always dreamed of
Unless you’ve planned a wedding before, you might not know that vendors book up quickly. For reference, 2022 vendors are already filling up and it’s only the beginning of 2021. So, having more time is a huge advantage for you to get your preferred vendors. It’s also great because sometimes if you book far enough in advance, you get the current year’s pricing instead of your wedding year’s which is typically more.
4. Payments can be spaced out
Gosh is this nice. All vendors require some sort of down payment, whether it be 10% or 50%. The nice thing about having more time is that you can book vendors in intervals, which means not all of your money is being tossed out at once.
5. You can space out events/celebrations
This is a fun one. We had a mini-engagement party when we went back to MN last August with our families which was an exciting celebration after being engaged a month. Fast forward to now, February 2021, and I just sent out my Bridesmaids boxes which was a fun reset of excitement for the big day. We also just ordered Save The Dates which made us giddy. It’s somewhat funny because we have random surges of excitement with each little task we do. It’s honestly pretty great!
It’s super nice that we have a the flexibility to choose when we want to do Bachelor/Bachelorette parties, Bridal showers, etc. We aren’t really following any guidelines for timing (like some articles say things have to be 3 months before, etc.) because we can do whatever we want!
6. People you invite are probably more likely to go
If you are able to send out Save The Dates and Invites with a fair amount of warning, it seems that people will be more likely to keep that day free and make travel arrangements, especially if coming from out of state. I think especially when it comes to summer weddings, which are huge in MN, it’s great to claim that weekend for your favorite people.
Did you have a long engagement too? What are your thoughts on it? Let’s chat about it :)