How to pick a date for elopement (or wedding)

We had a number of factors we wanted to consider.

- we didn't want a hugely long engagement, but wanted to have enough time to plan and pay for the wedding that we really wanted. 14 months is going to be the difference between getting engaged and getting married, which for me is perfect.

- we wanted a Saturday as most of our guests work Monday to Friday

- we didn't want it to be during football season - we both love football, as do a lot of our friends, and we are quite competitive, so although it wouldn't have been the end of the world to have it on a match day, we would rather not, so as to avoid distraction by us and our guests!

- we wanted a chance of nice weather so that guests could spend time outside at our venue. It is a country club, so has everything indoors if needed, but also a nice garden for photos etc. Of course, we know that in England the weather is never going to be predicable at any time of the year.

We wanted to avoid other people's special days - my daughter's 21st birthday, for example, so that we don't try and take over their own celebrations.

H2B "quite fancied" May or June.

This meant our choice of date was quite easy. We narrowed it down to 2 Saturdays but before looking at the first venue, my MOH rang to say she had just been invited to another old friends (of hers) wedding on the first of those Saturdays, so we struck that off the list and came up with 6th June. Thankfully, all our suppliers, venue etc were available on that date and it is full steam ahead.

We got engaged on 19th August and get married on 13th December (both this year). I didn't want a long engagement (no more than a year) and H2B's gran is very sick, and was given 12months to live, which 'runs out' in February and we wanted to try and get her there in the best health possible. As that was the most important thing to us, as long as other important family and friends could make it we were happy with any date. H2B is a teacher and can't get time off work like most people and lots of our friends are in the same boat so it had to be a Saturday. We considered the 6th and 13th December and made our peace that being such short notice and so close to Christmas some people wouldn't be able to come but H2Bs gran was so happy we don't mind that, plus if we booked it for summer next year and she tried to hang on then died a few weeks before it would be awful. Our photographer (who is a very good friend) couldn't do the 6th so we picked the 13th, an so far, everyone invited can come!

I always liked the idea of a winter wedding- you can never guarantee the weather in the uk- at least I can say it's really really likely to be raining!

It's just that it's my 40th birthday. We always said we'd get married on that date, so we organised everything else around it. It does help that we both like cold weather, and the lack of popularity of January as a time to get married meant that it was easy to get our chosen date, but those were just added benefits.

We didn't want June or October as those are the months we had our first weddings in (superstition I suppose), we didn't want June, July or August as they are peak times and I don't like it too hot. So we settled on September. Originally we wanted the 13th but couldn't get the venue, then tried 6th but couldn't get a registrar! So we ended up with 5th September as it was the only day we could get everything we wanted. My only other criteria is that I didn't want a date with 8 in it as I hate that number (again strange superstition). As it happened, the day we got married was 888 days exactly from the day we met. OH wouldn't let me change the date though! Oh well nothing bad has happened yet...

We wanted a spring wedding as it's our fave time of the year. We didn't want to wait ages but needed time to arrange stuff. Needed to be in school hols and not a weekend. Xx

We chose our 10th anniversary as our wedding date.

Its a summer month, so hopefully some chance of dry spells, a Saturday so most people should be able to make it and gave us 2 years to plan and save for it.

We initially wanted a summer wedding but then saw the price difference for an off season wedding which was the 1st weekend in October & de we took it. Not as romantic as the other stories but that's how we came to our date. X

We found a venue that we liked, and looked at the days they had available in the next 12 months. We wanted a saturday to avoid work for people, avoided dates there were major events at the nearby stadium - this left us with only a couple of dates that weren't too close, so we picked a nice sounding one!

Thanks for sharing your stories everyone! I have started by making a calendar and marking the days that we wouldn't want to get married for various reasons. I think we will have to decide on a venue and then see what they have available to narrow it down further!

I completely understand about practical reasons, I know that I want to wait till I have been in the UK for two years (end of March next year) plus some leeway, as that means I won't need a certificate of no impediment (proof that I am free to marry), any paperwork we can save ourselves is a bonus. ?

So we are looking at May to mid August (as my parents will be here visiting for the second half of the month) with a few dates excluded.