Wedding day schedule ideas

I would be inclined to get the welcome drinks started sooner. 40 minutes between the end of the ceremony and arriving at the venue is a long time for guests to wait around with no refreshment while you have photos. If you can get the drinks served near where you're having the pics taken, that might be better. Your sit-down meal at 4pm seems like a good time. Depending on how many guests you have and whether it's buffet or table service, it could take anything up to 2hrs to feed everyone two courses, so you'll probably get to 6pm before you hit that 'blank' spot. Could you put the cake-cutting in here? Or toasts/speeches? Speeches can take aaaaaages if you have very chatty people doing them!

Your venue staff might need that hour between 6 and 7 to 'turn the room around', or if you have a DJ/band they'll need time to set up. But as long as the bar is open and there are some fun things for guests to do or look at (like all the games you mentioned, plus some indoor things in case it's wet) they'll probably be OK for an hour - but definitely no more.

Personally, I would say have your first dance as the, well, first dance... i.e. you and H2B are 'opening' the dancing. After you've finished your dance, everybody else jumps in and the party gets started. You wouldn't want your separate evening guests to miss this bit so make sure you save it for after the time they all arrive.

I know where your mum's coming from with the one-meal idea, but I agree it's really hard to feed two separate sets of guests - day and evening - with just one meal. The day guests could probably hang on until 6pm since preusmably they'd have had some lunch before the ceremony, but that's too early for your colleagues coming from work. Also, if you're planning on dancing until 11.30pm people will definitely get peckish again later. Anywhere between 8-9pm seems like a good time for an evening snack to refuel everyone.

Every wedding is different, so just do whatever you feel will work best for your crowd. We're starting early at 12 noon and finishing at 10pm because our families and friends are all early-to-bed-early-to-rise types, but night owls would probably reel back in horror at a party wrapping up at 10pm!!

It's your day and your pennies, so you're the boss!

Thank you lucyjo you have made me feel better already.

I think we will have 2 meals, an hour after the evening guests arrive I think may be about right, or maybe 8.30pm to spread it out a little, and an hour of games sounds about right to maybe please everyone. I think there will be four speeches but I don't think any of them will be particularly long.

Your timings almost match ours duration wise so I will take that to be a good thing ?

We have a meeting with the vicar this evening so she may give me some times as suggestions.

We have deliberately scheduled a 2 hour 'break' into our day- so people have time to have a breather/ rest/ pop home and deal with pets (local people obviously!) etc.

Our timings are along the lines of:

1pm Ceremony

1.30 reception drinks, canapes and photographs

3pmpm 'receiving line'

3.30pm sit down for 'lunch'

5.30 'free time'... we have a bouncy castle and some garden games booked for those who stay at the venue/don't want to rest and there is always the bar!!

7.30pm Evening reception starts

8.20pm Cake cutting followed by the dreaded 'first dance'

9.30 Evening food

12.30 The End!

Hope that helps!