reception timing and other wedding logistics

Well, to me, 4 hours is awfully short for the reception! We are getting married in our home town and we have the hall until when ever we want to leave! But I do understand this is different for larger centers, I wouldn't say everyone leaves after the cake is cut, maybe the older guests who don't like to stay for the dancing, heck, most of the older crowd stays until the first dances and then they leave. I would look into getting the venue longer, if worst comes to worst, head to teh clubs!

I only have my venue for a total of 5 hours and since the ceremony will be there also we'll have a similar schedule. The venue I have does allow you to 'buy' extra time if you want to use the place longer. But since our wedding is on a Sunday we figured from 4-9 was fine. I think it depends on your guests as to when they leave. There will always be people who leave early and some who shut the place down. I'd just pay the photog for the extra hour because I'd want some fun pics of people dancing and stuff, but that's just me!

As far as the limo goes I don't know if there is etiquette stating you either both get limos or nobody should. I'd talk to you FH and see if he is bothered by not having a limo or not.

Thanks for the replies so far! I'm not that interested in pics of me dancing, since I think I'll look kind of silly. I figure it's an easy way to save the $250/hr rate the photographer charges.

I don't know if it's a regional thing but almost all the venues I looked at were for 4-5 hour increments. I saw on another site where people said they have 4 hours of just dancing at their weddings! Wow, I don't think I've been to a reception that long, and 2 hours of dancing seems fine.

Luckily we are close to a lot of bars and clubs so the party can certainly continue elsewhere if necessary.

Re: the limo, it was supposed to be a surprise for me from my siblings but they ended up having to tell me about it because I was asking a lot of questions about transportation. We thought it would be fun to keep it a surprise for my fiance though. I figure if he doesn't know it exists then comes out of the church to find it there, it can't be all that bad right?

I think that you could take off some of the time for the dinner depending on what type of dinner you are having. You could also have the first dance toasts, ect. during the first course of the dinner. If you cut off 15 minutes of the cocktail hour and 15 minutes of dinner that gives a half hour extra of dance time. Four hours is the average for the reception.

I did the same thing with my limo. I agree with Konichiwa ask your FH how he feels about it. After all he will be able to ride in it with you to the reception.

Thanks - our dinner is a buffet and we are expecting about 100 guests -- how long does it typically take 100 guests to go through a buffet line?

I was figuring about an hour to the dinner time also (and it will be a buffet for about 90 guests).

The venue that I booked also said that really they don't see a need for more than 6 hours. She said that people just don't stay that long. I know I'd been to ton's of weddings that the reception lasted til midnight so I originally wanted to buy some extra time. But then we decided on a Sunday wedding and figured it was better to end at 9 just in case some people didn't have the Martin Luther King holiday off the next day. Plus it really saved us some money on the budget!

There was a similar question posted a while ago and someone had an excellent schedule. Here is the link to the post: https://www.weddingwire.com/wedding-forums/reception-timeline/8cc1e92cb845e410.html

I don't see a problem w/ the groomsmen driving themselves. If their dates ARE NOT in the bridal party, then it makes sense that they will drive together to the ceremony. If their dates ARE in the bridal party, then they'll still need one car at the ceremony to drive home.

As for the reception, I'm in the same boat. Here in Virgina I got a beautiful reception hall w/ a magnificent view of DC. Only problem is, I only have it for 4 hours!!! Here's where I'm relying heavily on my caterer and my DJ to keep things on schedule. They've both done short receptions and know how to schedule the timing so that we can squeeze in first dance, last dance, chicken dance, toast, toss, cake and coffee into a limited time frame.

Here's the timeline question I asked a while back.

https://www.weddingwire.com/wedding-forums/potential-wedding-and-reception-timeline/58ca3a40c489ca7a.html

Awesome, thanks for these replies, they have been very helpful. To extend DJ, the venue, and transportation (we are providing a bus for our guests) for half an hour it's going to be a total of about $425. At this point we're so far in the hole what's a measley $425?? I think we'll go ahead and do it and get our 2 hours of dancing...

Oh one other thing - southerngirl, did your catholic ceremony end up taking 40 minutes as you had thought? that's exactly what we are having as well.

I agree with Debi in recommending cutting the cake before dinner.

90 minutes of dancing is probably a little short, extending it would be a good idea if your friends like to dance. Another possibility is to have an after-reception party elsewhere for those who want to continue the party. I've seen that work well in situations where there's a core group of 20-something guests but most of the rest of the guests are older.

Thanks for all the suggestions - I went ahead and extended our time for 30 minutes, so 2 hours of dancing now, which I think is a good amount. If people (including me!) want to dance longer there are plenty of bars and clubs nearby.

As for cutting the cake before dinner - I can understand the convenience however we're paying $500 for that sucker so I want people to look at it for as long as possible!!! haha.

Here's a little bit different timeline than you have, but it will allow for more dancing:

5:30 - 6:15 Cocktail hour

6:15 - 6:25 Grand Entrance, then first dance

6:30 - 7 Guests line up and serve themselves at the buffet. You and your parents and bridal party are served first so that you can finish eating first and do other events (see below) while others are finishing eating

7:05 Everybody has their food, and is seated. Do the toasts now

7:30 Cut cake while everybody is finishing their food (you could ALSO do the toasts here if wanted instead of at the beginning of dinner)

7:40 Parent Dances, then lead into the fun dancing

7:50 - 9:30 Fun dancing

If some of my notes above don't make sense, let me know and I can explain more!

Oh, and there are some people that never want to stay for dancing, so it's more accomodating to those guests to get all of the "formal events" out of the way so they can leave if wanted. Those that want to stay for dancing and have fun will! There's no use making somebody stay and sit there just to wait for the cake cutting!

My venue is a historic house with an outdoor garden. There are tables inside the house as well as in the garden and on the veranda so we won't have people in any one centralized place during dinner. Unfortunately that cuts out the possibility of doing the toasts during dinner which would have been a good allocation of time.

The cocktail hour is in the garden so I'd like to get as many things over with after our grand entrance while we still have everyone's attention and they are all gathered in one place. That's why I was thinking doing our first dance then, the parents' dances, and the toasts. I can see where it would make sense to do the cake here too, but while the guests may have had an hour to look at it, I want to have time to enjoy looking at the cake too! That's why I was thinking directly after dinner. Nobody is going to bolt the minute dinner ends, so if we do it here (and this would be before 8pm) I think that would be a good compromise :-)