Times??

The purpose of cocktail hour is for your guests to have something to do while you take photos. So what do you expect them to do for the two hours in between ceremony and cocktail hour? Especially since everything is in the same space. This is really inconvenient and I would expect a good amount of guests to skip either the ceremony or the reception. It seems like a better idea would be a 3 pm ceremony, 3:30-4:30 cocktail hour and 4:30 reception.

Agree with PP about timing, but also wanted to add that as you know it will be cold in Wisconsin then so not sure how long you want to be outside taking photos.

If you want to have cocktail hour at 5, I would have your ceremony at 4:30. I agree with Caytlyn that the ceremony is too early in your timeline and would leave guests with nothing to do for that two hour gap. If you're worried it would be dark by then, I would move everything up by an hour: Ceremony 3:30, cocktail hour 4-5, dinner at 5

Our ceremony is at 3, we're having our cocktail hour from 3:30-4:30, introduction/first dance/welcome/prayer from 4:30-5, and dinner at 5.

View Quoted Comment Thanks as I was typing it out it just seemed incredibly ridiculous to have the ceremony that early! I guess I just needed someone else to tell me that

Maybe you can also do some photos before the ceremony?

There shouldn’t be any gap in time between the ceremony and cocktail hour. I understand wanting to maximize daylight though... in this case, I think you could just make your reception earlier, rather than making the ceremony later. Ceremony 2:30-3. Cocktail hour 3-4 (photo taking during this time). The reception starts at 4 (but by the time everyone gets seated it’ll be 4:15). Toasts, first dance, etc. By then it’ll be 4:45. Serve the first course for dinner at 5!