Miss Peacock, Chicago
Age and Occupation: 26, PhD Student
Fiance's Age and Occupation: 29, Internet Whiz
Engagement Date: December 5, 2006
Wedding Date: September, 2008
Blogging Since: December 13, 2007
Venue: St. Clement Church, Cafe Brauer (or a big church wedding and a fancy party at a cafe in Lincoln Park.
About Me: I am a grad student with a secret obsession for all things wedding related. I also love to read, travel, drink champagne and go for walks with our dog, Maisy, and Mr. Peacock. We are planning our very vintage wedding in the greatest city in the world, our hometown of Chicago. I am so proud to be a Bee!
150 Days
April 8th, 2008 @ 4:08 pm by Miss Peacock
There are 150 days left until our wedding. 150 days left to the wedding. 150 days left to the wedding. I will be silently chanting that all day long.
Mr. Peacock and I have been engaged since December of 2006. At the time, we had quite a few question marks looming. Both Mr. Peacock and I were thinking about going back to school. Rumors were flying around his office that his company was going to be acquired. If the acquisition happened, there was a good chance that we would be packing up and moving to either Manhattan or California. Otherwise, we wanted to put our house on the market and move closer to downtown. It was all a little too exciting. I got nervous and shoved the wedding date into 2008, under the impression that I would appreciate the extra time to plan. My best friend is getting married in June, 2008 and since we would be in each other’s bridal parties, it might be best to space them out a bit. The date was set for September 2008.
Mr. Peacock in me in our silly, just engaged bliss
At first it was fun. I had my pick of the vendors which helped since both my church and reception sites are very popular places. I had a few vendors tell me that it was too early and they weren’t interested in talking to me yet, which wasn’t as much fun, but it made it easier to weed out my growing list of options. My list of DIY plans also kept growing, since I had almost two years to get it done. We were getting toasts and congratulations left and right. I couldn’t tell our engagement story enough. Being engaged was so exciting for those first few months. Then it really started to drag.
Friends and friends of friends also started getting engaged and choosing dates well before ours. Then they started getting married before us. One friend just got engaged in March and is planning a May wedding. She didn’t need 22 months to plan, only 6 weeks. I wasn’t expecting it, but I was insanely jealous. I just wanted to be married. I have never liked the word “fiance” and around the one year engagement mark I really started to hate it. It just seemed silly to use it at that point. Every time the sun came out on a Saturday I would kick myself for not picking that day. Then I just started kicking myself EVERY Saturday. Who cares if there was a snow storm? I would be MARRIED! I didn’t, and I really still don’t, get what’s so great about being engaged. I just want to be Mrs. Peacock, darn it!
But, as I got closer to the 150 day mark, things started to look up. My mom and Mr. Peacock’s mom started asking about shower dates. I set the date for my alterations. The bridesmaids’ dresses were ordered. My shoes were purchased (yay!). The ball was rolling. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. It is finally happening! I actually woke up this morning excited. I know these next five months are going to go by so quickly and I really can’t wait.
Has anyone else felt this way? Did any married bees look back and appreciate their long engagement?
24 Responses to “150 Days”
I share your pain! I’ve been engaged since Jan ‘07 and will not be married until this October. Two sets of friends have gotten married in between and my personal twist of the knife is the fact that we’ve been together longer than everyone we know! I keep telling myself that in the end it will all be worth the extra time and planning though 
I’m right at the beginning of a 2 year engagement and it just seems so infinte! I want to be making arrangements NOW! It makes me extra frustrated because even though we have a couple of changes that make a long engagement make sense, namely my finishing a masters program and becomming employed, it was really my parents that insisted on it. It’s still early enough that it might be possible to move the date up a little, but I know by the end I’ll just be soooo ready! You made it through and just think of the many many years you’ll get to spend being Mrs. Peacock. It’ll make the 2 engaged ones seems so fleeting!
I know how you feel. We’ve been engaged since 02-09-06 and our date is August…about 130 some odd days left. 2 and a half years of being engaged. We’ve been to tons of weddings of people who got engaged after us and it sucks…and we’ve seen tons of engagements break off. But we (and everyone else) keep telling us that by the end of 2.5 years, you’d have a pretty good idea of what we’re getting into.
As for the planning–i’ve had more than enough time to figure out what i like and what I dont like, and to save, and to have a unique wedding.
I feel ya. We’ve been engaged for over a year and have 6 months to go. I ran into an old co-worker this weekend who was filled with questions: Are you married yet? no? Is the wedding still on? yes? Whats taking so long?
Lovely. Also, I don’t know what I’ll talk to some people about when we are finally married!
I am in exactly the same boat as you, we got engaged christmas eve ‘06 and we’re getting married sept. 6, 08. I agree, the length of time has seemed great, but I have had probably 6-10 friends get engaged and married in our engagement time period and I too have been getting jealous of all of them. It’s all my fault though for choosing the date ( a few circumstances helped with the choice), so I can’t complain too much. At the time it seemed like the right choice, but I can’t help to wish that I had gotten married last year already!
But, like you I am now seeing the light!
Engaged Feb 07
Wedding June 08
I have 61 days left. Being engaged for this long has been horrible. I hate it. But just last night while talking to my mom about some final venue issues, I said “I’m getting married two months from today and I feel fine. I’m not stressed or worried or freaked out about getting things done. I guess this 15.5 month engagement was a good thing.”
Then I thought about it some more and I felt just like you. I could have been married by now!!!
Hehe I might have you beat as far as long engagement! We got engaged in May 2007 and are not getting married until August 2009 so that’s two plus years!!!! I’ve enjoyed having my pick of vendors and locking them into their 2007 pricing for a 2009 wedding but every time I attend a friend’s wedding, it makes me want to get married that much more. In the end, it was for the best as we both have siblings getting married this year and we bought a condo this year but it doesn’t change the fact that I feel antsy. If it makes you feel better, I have 450+ days left!!!
I hear ya! We got engaged last winter and are getting married in June and I’m SO READY!! The down sides to a long engagement, as I see it, are:
- by the time your wedding rolls around, people are kind of “over” it. Especially if you’re the last in a group to get married and, like me, couldn’t shut up about it the first 12 months.
- it’s too much time for type-A people — too much time to over think, over research, over analyze. Which all leads to…
- lots of second guessing.
But there are pros:
- more time to save $$$. NO WAY would we be able to have the kind of wedding and honeymoon we’re having if we had to plan and pay for it more quickly.
- plenty of time to get stuff done. At no point, YET, have I felt like there’s too much to do and not enough time to do it.
I now envy people with 18 month engagements! I’ve pushed mine back from a 21 month engagement to make it a 27 month engagement, due to unfortunate circumstances.
My family is pressuring me to “just have a simple wedding”, but they have no concept of how much their idea of a “simple” wedding costs! The way I see it, I only get to do this once, and I want to enjoy it and not be stressed about it. In the meantime, we will probably get legally married before our wedding. Vegas, here I come!
I completely feel your pain 1000%.
We got engaged at the end of September ‘06, and we’re finally doing it this October. We also purposefully set a long engagement date due to circumstances–we live four states away from our families and where the wedding is taking place, so we knew having lots of time to get things done (and also snagging spots at the ideal times for our church and reception venue because they are also popular) would be essential. Sure, it’s been great to move at a snail’s pace for most of the process, but now that we are six months out, the “honeymoon” of leisurely planning is definitely over.
What’s lit a fire under our pants is a sudden, fierce desire to get pre-Cana over with as soon as possible, as well as finally registering for those gifts we’ve been so longingly looking at during any Crate & Barrel visit.
You’re getting so close! Enjoy this time–this seems to be the point where people start doting on you a little more, and the excitement will really start to build!
We got engaged in December 2006 and will be getting married this June. If I could do it over again, I’d have a shorter engagement. The anticipation is slowly eating away at me!
I got engaged October 2007 and we are getting married September 2009. I know it’s a REALLY long engagement, but my fiance and I were (and still are for another few weeks) in our last year of law school. Since we are both studying for the bar this summer, I can’t really do anything as far as planning. So for me, I am glad for the long engagement now (although I suspect I might not feel the same towards the end).
I understand completely. We just got engaged in January 2008 and are planning an October 2009 wedding. Having so much time to plan and think about it is nice, but sometimes I just want to be married. But with my fiance’s brother having a baby next fall and the other sibling getting married next winter, it will be nice that our wedding occurs after everyone else’s big plans.
I definately got sick of being engaged. It’s supercool to be a fiance, but after about 6 months or so, not so much. Our engagement was about a year and a half, so I had too much time to change everything…about 3 or 4 times. I thought that by the time the wedding rolled around, as someone else said, that people would be so “over it.” But that actually didn’t happen. Although I couldn’t wait to give birth the closer the actual date approached (it really felt like an overdue pregnancy…when is this baby coming?!) But with all of that said, I don’t think I would have changed it. You have to give yourself time to have the wedding that you envisioned or at least as close to it as you can possibly get, and with all of the things that you have to consider (work schedules, life changes, etc.) sometimes a little more time is necessary.
Yes, yes, yes! I’ve been engaged for a year and have another year and a half to go…I know rationally that it’s the best decision because it lets us finish our degrees without too much wedding chaos getting in the way, but I’m sick of explaining that to people, and 2.5 years just seems like so long when added onto the five years of dating before that.
And it’s kind of nice to hear other people who feel jealous when their friends get engaged later and married earlier. The jealousy keeps flaring up and I feel awful about it, but…for some reason I can’t help it.
By the time I get married we will have been engaged for 27 months. I think waiting that long is just pure craziness, but we had to have a long engagement because we couldn’t get married until he was done school for financial reasons. I was sooo jealous of my friends that got engaged after me and got married before me…but its all ok now. We’re about 2 months out and the end is in sight…I think its gonna be ok.
I’m also at the beginning of an 18 month engagement. My DIY list is constantly growing too, thanks to my newfound LOVE for weddingbee!!!! You all have inspired me so much, and now I am kind of thankful that I have time to do everything I want to do (but I still cannot WAIT to be married!!!!!)
I read your post and thought, that’s me! I totally get it,and while I am not even half way through my engagement ( got engaged sept 2007 and will be married july 2009) I too have felt a twinge of jealousy at the thought some other lucky couple could possibly marry before us. I also don’t like endless questions like ” why are you waiting so long?” Especially since we are almost the last to get married and have already been together 6 years. I wish we had more money saved!
Our engagement has been long (but now I can finally say- “next month!”)… and recently as the time winds down and my lull is coming to an end, I decided I needed to appreciate every last day for two reasons:
1- every day of DYI projects and planning, is a day that you get to live your wedding through all the fun details… esp when people always say it will fly by… so enjoy two years of celebrating your big day!
2- i think we’re all pretty lucky to be able to share that special coveted “engaged” title because its always so fascinating to everyone as they share in the anticipation of what they know will be the best day of your life… i will be a bit sad to give this special time up.
I am excited to be my honey’s Mrs. but this is a time I will never live again and I know when my future (hopefully) baby girl are plans her wedding, I will be wishing it could last forever too!!
When all is said and done, our engagement will have been a year, which still sometimes felt too long for me, so I can’t imagine it being longer! Though if it had been shorter, we probably wouldn’t have gotten the venues we wanted, etc.
As much as I don’t like the whole fiance/engaged thing because I just want to GET ON WITH IT, I have appreciated the time to gradually sync our lives together. We don’t live together, but we started sharing a cell phone plan, got a kitten, switched to the same accountant, etc. to prepare for marriage. It is a much needed transition period. I just happen to not like transition very much.
I think we need a support group! Who’s in?? 
Xangeleno- every time I see cheap tickets to Vegas, I send it to Mr. P. He thinks I’m joking.
Me too! Me too! Engaged in January 2007 and getting married this labor day weekend (August 2008… the END of August 2008). I just hit the 143 day mark today…. the wait is killer. I joke with everyone that for my second marriage I will elope! I’m so ready to be married… and being super Type A I’m driving myself crazy with trying to plan every little detail… reading wedding bee doesn’t help only because I get more and more ideas that I had not thought of!
Long engagements get very very boring since we are not in the same city. We got engaged aug 13, 2007 and getting married sometime in 2009. I want to get married n be Mrs. soon. He wants to study, so the long wait. Sadly we haven’t picked a date which drives me nuts every other day. If only I had a date, n in this year.
sigh! lets beat these blues.
I know exactly how you feel! We were engaged in May of 06 and we each lived in different cities and didn’t know when we would finally make it back in the same area code…so we set it for Oct. 08…and it’s finally coming! I kinda like it so long because I don’t have the panic that some brides have…I think FI likes that I’m not panicking too.
lol.
