12 o'clock wedding

Our ceremony is at 1pm and our venue were saying they prefer earlier ceremonies as things have a habit of running on and think of it this way - more time to enjoy with your guests! Not sure what type of venue you have, but I think people are used to a bit of 'down time' between the breakfast and the night do, I wouldn't worry too much about keeping people entertained as people know the drill with weddings and will generally mingle around, they may also appreciate a bit of a lull to relax after the breakfast and gear up for the party! Having said all this, I worried about it too, and we have got a hamper and filled it up with board games (silly ones like hungry hippos or quick ones like packs of cards, not monopoly etc!) so at least that gives people something to pick up if they want to without the pressure of feeling like they 'have' to be doing something in particular.

I went to a wedding with a 12noon ceremony and it was one of the best weddings I've been 2! Although I'm getting married at 2:30pm! We had drinks and canapés after the ceremony, with all the photos and then sat down for the wedding breakfast, they did have a few extras - singing waiters who I think came before the dessert if I remember correctly! And the speeches were all quite long but I never realised it was a much longer day and had a great time!

It will be perfect!

What kind of venue do you have? If you have nice outside space, maybe you could get some lawn games? Can be very cheap and guests love being a bit silly. I think it's fine, it will just be very relaxed and you won't have to worry about the speeches being too long or the food served too late! And given all that planning and expense surely it's a bonus if you get to enjoy your day for two more hours! ?

I went to a 12pm wedding in 2014 and the day flew by just as much as when I went to a 2pm wedding! We had the option of 12 or 3 but we thought we'd be rushing everything if we went for 3pm so we have gone for 12 also, I wouldn't worry.

I'm getting married at 12. By the time were done eating there will only be an hour or so before evening guests arrive so have lawn games. Found a guy who rents 4 for £50 he's in Chesterfield if you want details if he's close enough for you he's delivering to me in pontefract for 15 extra.

Jadeee, that's why I went for 12, those were the options to us and thought 3 would be too squished together. That hour between 2 and 3 seemed too much!

We have a hotel venue, which doesn't really have a lot of outdoor space. There's a patio area, but I'm not sure if the guests will be able to access this in the period when they're setting up for the evening do, I think there's only one door and nowhere for lawn games.

I think that the area we'll have in this time is a bar area, which is lovely and has some great views. I know I'm being silly really, it's a longer day and more time with people. I spoke with the lady who will manage the wedding on the day, and she's going to email me through some info on how the day will run, I just admitted I have NO idea what I'm doing and she was so helpful! Once I've got that through we can start planning what we can do, but I like the games hamper idea and we should be able to do that with charity shop finds or cheapy purchases.

We're getting married at 12. Initially we had wanted 1pm but they had another wedding at 2 so it was either 12 or 4. As it turns out we will be pushed for time - unfortunately there is an hour's journey between the church and reception venue - so it has worked out for the best and I'm glad we aren't starting any later

To answer your question, most of our gap will be filled with travelling I guess but we are also doing canapes and garden games before our main meal to entertain people during photos.

My first wedding was at 12. After the photos and meal I think there was about 90 mins before the evening guof was arrived. Some people went to their rooms to freshen up but the rest of us just relaxed in the bar. It was lovely and Ingot to put my aching feet up for a bit which was bliss haha.

This is our running times:

12:30pm – Ceremony 1:30pm – Exit Ceremony 1:30pm - 2pm – Photos 2pm – 2:30pm – Travel to Venue 2:30pm – 3:45pm – welcome drink and bride and groom photos 3:45pm – Guests called in for wedding breakfast 4pm – 6pm – wedding breakfast served 6pm - speeches 6:30pm – 7:30pm Room turned around for evening 7:30pm – Evening Guests Arrive 8pm – Fist Dance & Cake Cutting 8:30pm – BBQ & Cake served to evening guests

If there is a bar for the adults, kids will tend to entertain themselves as long as there is some space for them to run around. Every wedding I've been to has never had any entertainment between the reception and evening do.

We're getting married at 12pm. We wanted 1pm, but our Registry office doesn't do odd numbers, only evens we thought 2pm was too late (don't know why, we just did) so 12pm it is.

We're going to start getting ready at 8am (ugh) but I'm pretty low maintenance so I'll be relaxing with tea while everyone stresses out I'm getting my nails done the day before (hopefully - nail lady hasn't got a 2017 diary yet) so it'll just be hair and getting dressed on the day

I think it depends what time you want your evening guests to arrive, really, and whether you are having the reception at the ceremony venue. Our venue splits the reception room into 2 so you have the meal in the big bit and the band set up for the reception on the other side of the curtain. What this basically means is that it'll be quite seamless from ceremony to reception (in theory) so timings aren't as crucial.

Maybe you could have some quietish music during the gap and use it to mingle with your guests? It will allow the guests to mingle more with each other too

Also getting married at 12. We are doing a quick quiz after the Wedding Breakfast - We are writing the question our selves and will give the winning table a free drink each so its pretty cheap :-)

We had a midday wedding and the timing worked really well. I have copied our rough schedule below for you :

1.15 - Groom arrives at church
11.30 onwards - guests arrive at church (some are arriving en masse in the coach we organised!)
11.45 - Bridesmaids arrive in car
11.55 - Bride arrives
Midday - ceremony
12.45 - 1.15 - pictures @ church and faffing!
1.15- - 1.30 - getting people on coach (or their own cars)
1.30 - 1.45 - travel to reception venue
1.45 - 3.15 - drinks reception and photos
3.15 - seated for dinner
3.30 - dinner served
5.30 - speeches
6.30 - evening guests arrive
7.30ish - first dance and cake cutting

Even though we ended up running slightly ahead it still felt really nice. It actually meant we had a bigger gap between the speeches and evening guest arriving. This meant we got to speak to everyone. We were fortunate that the weather was nice and everyone sat outside either drinking coffee or more wine and chatting. We did have some lawn games- croquet, giant jenga etc. However, these were mainly for the children, although some of the adults did join in.

Hope this helps.