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Some people like quick engagements, some go for the typical year, but me and Mr. Starfish… well, we wanted to enjoy the “honeymoon” period. I’ve called him my boyfriend for 5 years pre-proposal, I’ll call him fiance for 2, and then I get a lifetime to call him my husband. We chose a long engagement for a few reasons. I understand the short engagements if you don’t want to wait, but we’re planning a whole life together so we decided two years in the grand scheme of things wasn’t that bad, and honestly, the time is flying by.
So why wait? Here’s a few perks to a longer engagement:
1. Top choice of vendors. At two years out we still didn’t get our first choice date at our venue, but we did get one in our top 5. For every other vendor so far, we have been able to get our number one choices, like our photographer, David Bibeault.
2. The Budget. The longer we have to save will equal our dream wedding. We only had a fraction of our budget saved when Mr. Starfish asked me to say yes. So, the extra two years has given us the time to really save for our dream wedding. Plus, we’re gaining interest on all of the money saved for a longer period of time. Interest alone has already covered two extra guests at our wedding! It was also helpful for our families, who are also helping to pay. My parents had just helped pay for Sister Starfish’s wedding, so we wanted to give them a break before wedding #2.
3. Time for DIY! I have so many projects for our wedding and if we had a short engagement, there is no way we would get things done.
4. Time to enjoy it. I think it’s fun being a bride-to-be, and I have two full years to enjoy that status.
5. Extra reasons to celebrate. Due to our long engagement, our friends threw us an engagement party and my bridesmaids brought me out for a one year countdown celebration. They were fun extra events that aren’t too common, but we loved that our friends made these days special.
The downsides to a long engagement?
For us, there really hasn’t been any… until we started house hunting. We’re in the midst of purchasing our first home, and to be honest, some days I’m just over wedding planning. There are days I wish we were married and could start focusing fully on the home instead of worrying about coordinating schedules, booking appointments, and budgeting for two huge life events. Our lives are pretty hectic and it’s sometimes hard going through it all together. I keep hoping things will calm down once we close on the house, but who am I kidding… I know I’ll want to renovate and decorate, so it looks like the Starfishes have a busy year ahead.
How long was your engagement? Did you find any perks or downsides to having a longer or shorter engagement?
We got engaged Dec 1st, 2009 after dating for five to seven years (depending on who you ask and what you consider “dating” - lol). I was shooting for October 2010 but FH said “I thought we could get engaged and then relax!” So now it’s October 2011 (he was willing to do Spring 2011 but I was dead set on a fall wedding.)
So, our engagement will be one year and ten months! I’m sooooo glad we are waiting (lots of family drama NWR going on) as I have more time to prepare, obsess, and do projects!
We got engaged just after Christmas 2008 (also graduation). We’re getting married May 2011. As grad students, we have The Qualifier (read: all-consuming-evilness-that-is-the-single-most-important-deciding-factor-when-it-comes-to-whether-or-not-you-get-to-stay-in-grad-school test) one year from our start date (so January 2010) meaning up until January 2010 we pretty much had to live, eat, breathe qualifier so no real wedding planning there. I wanted a spring wedding before it gets too hot, so January 2010 to May 2010 didnt really sound like a whole lot of time. So we decided on May 2011 and have finally started *actually* planning. We got our first choice ceremony date and I’m literally 1 day away from writing the deposit to secure our first choice ceremony. (Our weekend is the ONLY weekend she still has available in May of next year. CRAZY!) I’ve enjoyed our long engagement. I feel relaxed about it, there’s a lot to do but I have a lot of time. I agree wholeheartedly with all the points you made there. It’s been a nice ride 
We got engaged Christmas 2008 and will be married June of 2010. It sounds like a long time but it will by so quick! Now I feel like I don’t have enough time.
We got engaged Dec. 27th of 2009 and will be getting married August 14th 2010, so our engagement will be a little less than 8 months. This has been the perfect amount of time for us! It has given us long enough to still get the vendors we wanted, put a little money in the bank, and still enjoy each other while not being consumed by the planning. I would highly recommend a shorter engagement if your wedding is BOTH 1. small (less than 75 people) and 2. budget-friendly (under $10,000). A year was too long for us, and 8 months have given us time to make decisions and move forward. I was lucky to find my wedding gown and bridesmaids dresses early on, and we have family friends helping us (we are close friends with the florist, wedding band, and my FI’s mom is making our cake). If you can utilize the help of close friends and family and keep things small and uncomplicated, a shorter engagement is an exciting time, kind of like a rollercoaster that is continuously swerving!
8.14.10! Can’t WAIT!!!
Well said, starfish!
@ktbrady- we have very similar stories! We got engaged December 9, 2009; after dating for over five years, and we are getting married October 1, 2011 (def wanted a fall wedding!)!
We have the same philosophy as Ms. Starfish- we have our whole lives together, so no need to rush anything. We also need to be careful with our budget…
The only downside we have seen is it provides more time at family functions for people to bug us about our wedding plans, etc… But really, I wouldn’t have it any other way! We only have this one time in our lives to be engaged!
We chose a long engagement (19 months) for many of the same reasons, but honestly I regret it. I am too indecisive and having this much time to mull things over gets to me. Also, I think the initial specialness of “being a bride” wears off, and I think a lot of my friends are tired of hearing about the wedding. I think it works for some, but for me, a shorter engagement would have been better.
We got engaged February 21, 2010 and will be getting married September 26, 2010–just seven months. So far, every venue I contacted was free, and the photographers I’ve contacted were free–I almost feel like I could have done it in a shorter timeframe (not that I’d want to!).
I wanted a late summer/early fall wedding, but I didn’t want to be engaged for a year or longer. I don’t see the point–I’m not planning anything that requires that much time to save money or DIY anything, and we’d like to take advantage of sharing health insurance sooner rather than later.
We’ll be engaged for 25 months by the time we get married. I think the longer engagement has it’s ups and downs but in the end it’s what works for us so I’m happy
Our engagement is just under 13 months. I guess we did the budget thing a little different than other people–we figured out when we wanted to get married and then decided how much we could save before that point. That time pretty much dictated our budget, but it’s nice, because we feel confident in what it is that we can afford. It’s true, it’s fun to be a bride, but I think if I was planning the wedding for two years, I’d be so over it by the time it got there!
We were engaged for 4 months … and if I could have done it in less, I would have. Being engaged was fun but super-stressful. I think I would have found a lot more things to spend money on if we’d had longer.
Ours will end up being just under 15 months, which isn’t too bad but I think I would’ve preferred around a year…Too long to stress about everything!
We got engaged in July 2008 and will be engaged for 27 months by the time we get married SIX months from today
I couldn’t agree more with this post. We got our top choice for every vendor (David was actually our first choice photographer as well and we booked him before we booked our reception!). I think budget & having time to save money has been the single best thing about a long engagement.
We met in January 2009, got engaged in December 2009, and we’re getting married August 2010… there is NO way on earth I could wait any longer than that! I’m pretty much the least patient person ever. And honestly, I would have married him three months after we met if I could have.
Having extra time to save money, and time to plan and execute DIY projects has been so helpful!
i think we might be on a short timeline. from what the mister has said already, he doesn’t want to wait too long between a proposal and wedding. thankfully i’ve known for a while that we’ll be getting married so i’ve been taking advantage of the lead time to saving money and getting any diy projects in line so i can start asap. so it’s really like a long engagement but backwards.
We got ‘fake’ engaged (don’t ask lol) in July 2009 and officially engaged on Valentine’s Day 2010. 
We don’t have a set date, but it could well be 3-4 years before we have the wedding. Definitely agree with all your points, especially #3! I always go overboard with DIY ideas, so hopefully I’ll be able to do things at a slower pace.
G’luck house hunting!!
I just got engaged, and we won’t be getting married until NEXT June and I’m already dreading the wait!
Ours is almost two years. I am pleased to say we had full pick of the vendors and venues we wanted. We also have plenty of time to buy, make, and collect wedding items. The downside is that there is so much downtime in between. I am ready for the event planning portion to be over.
I’m in the middle of a 2.5 year engagement. I’m just excited for the big day (almost a year away now!).
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Mrs. Starfish, Boston/Newport Age and Occupation: 25, Operations Assistant Fiance's Age and Occupation: 25, Sales Engagement Date: October 8, 2008 Wedding Date: October 2010 Venue: The Atlantic Beach Club About Me: I'm a perfectionist who is a planner at heart. I don't do well with surprises. I love planning, crafting, Newport RI, family and friends, and most importantly, Mr. Starfish---all of which will be big components in our October wedding in our favorite little city by the sea.
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