Am I Crazy?

AmeliaAndSeth8890

Okay, be honest fellow Grad-Student-Brides. (Or any form of College really). FI and I just started talking dates and settled on March 31, 2012. Here's why: It avoids siblings' birthdays, siblings' graduations, holidays, our own birthdays and months we just don't like (hot months, cold months, yeah we're a little picky).

So here is the problem. There is no way to know my school schedule (this will be the spring semester in an M.Ed. program). March 31 is a Saturday, so we would have Sunday to recuperate. And most likely I wouldn't have class on Fridays (haven't seen too many that are on Fridays), so we would have the day before also. Three-Day weekend style. QUESTION: Has anyone else done something similar? Did it go well? Are you planning to do this also? Nervous/not nervous? Thoughts? Thanks guys!!

Any other considerations I deem important/relevant:
1) He will not be in school anymore, just me.
2)  We are having a semi-DW - it's about 4.5 hours away in Savannah, GA.
3) We are fine with not having our honeymoon follow immediately and plan for after the semester is over in May.
4) We are trying to avoid my younger brother's graduation and prom, my brother and sisters birthdays, our own birthdays, major holidays (mother's day, etc).
5) We do not like June. At all. Or July. Or August. There are several reasons why, but that should suffice unless you really want to know. lol
6) We are having a semi-small wedding. Around 50 is what we are estimating.

LauraT25

I think it sounds fine.  You'll have to be on top of your game with the planning, but it's doable.  I've known a few couples that have done exactly this type of thing and it was fine.  Since you're planning long-distance, I would recommend having everything pretty much done before that semester starts.

alliesono

Hi there!

My take on this is that if both your and your fiance are cool with this scenario, then go ahead and do it! I'm also in grad school, and I had a friend get married last May (before the semester was over) under similiar circumstances. Just be wary that it will probably be harder than you think to go back to day to day life just 2 days after your wedding, I know she struggled with that.

Best of luck!

ledalia

It was important to me to have my honeymoon directly after and we wanted a fall wedding so we chose Thanksgiving break. We are honeymooning in Savannah. If it isn't important to you to honeymoon immediately, then I don't see why there would be a problem. However, even though you don't know your class schedule for spring 2012, you should still be able to check the academic calendar. I'm not sure where in GA you go to school but I go to UGA and you can view the academic calendar for 2012 right now. You might be able to do it during Spring break.

AmeliaAndSeth8890

Thanks ladies! That was helpful. I'm not sure why, but I can't access a calendar that goes any farther than summer 2011 right now. I may just not be looking in the right place. I go to UWG; I will definitely be looking more to see if I can find that schedule thanks. Yeah Spring Break might be a good thing to try for - thanks!

Yeah I can see it being difficult to go from a wedding day back to school or work on Monday, but I know a lot of people that have done it. Have any of you ever done it? I'm honestly not sure how I feel about it yet.

Ledalia - where in Savannah are you honeymooning? It's such a beautiful city.

singingjessi14

You're not crazy at all! In fact, my FI and I have a very similar situation. We're getting married February 27, 2011 because we didn't want to get married in the summer or winter, didn't want to wait until next fall, and didn't want to take the attention away from my sister's graduation in May.

I'm a grad student and will be graduating in December, but he will still be in school, and I will be subbing. We're taking the following Monday off (getting married on a Sunday) and will probably be taking our honeymoon over summer break.

I can't tell you for sure how this works because we're still a little less than four monthes out, but so far so good! We're also having a smallish wedding of 55ish

AmeliaAndSeth8890

SingingJessi - Thanks so much for the response and Congrats on your wedding! Only a few more months! Let me know how it goes after? I'm sure it will be great.

Yeah I was just a bit worried about not having enough "transition" time, but I don't really see this being a problem. We already live together and I'm sure if he wants to he can take a day or two off work, and I don't know my schedule yet. I probably won't until this time next year.

I just kept reading people talking about taking a week off of work before the wedding and then going on their honeymoon and was just like uhh...? lol.

I'm sort of curious about whoever voted no they did and it was horrible? PM me?

julbgordo

I think if you both are game for the situation, then go for it.  I voted no but only because I couldn't imagine getting married during the school year, but that's just me.  Good luck

singingjessi14

I'll let you know how it goes! I've heard of people taking a week or more off of work for last minute wedding stuff/honeymoon and we knew we could do that! With a smallish wedding, and not being super picky about the details, I don't think it will be too difficult. We currently live together too, so I'm not too concerned about the transition.

LauraT25

FWIW, it was super hard to transition coming back from the HM.  I don't know that it really matters either way.  I've had friends that did it, and while it seemed weird seeing them the following Monday at work 'as if nothing happened', I don't know what we were expecting, exactly.  Once I was married, it seemed just as weird to me to come back to work married at all, HM or not, and it had the added blah factor that accompanies coming back to work after ANY vacation.

That being said, I'm glad we took our HM right away because I felt like I needed a vacation, badly.  Not just from the stress of wedding planning, but also because we hadn't taken a vacation that summer, which we normally do.  However, if it hadn't worked into our schedules, I would have taken the HM later and thought nothing of it.

AmeliaAndSeth8890

LauraT - thanks Honestly the thought never crossed my mind that it will be weird anyways. (Shows how much thought I've put into it so far, um..) And most likely, though I can never be sure, very few if any of the people I have classes with will be invited as I will have known them for less than a year and our wedding is small anyways. FI might have a harder time with it, but he can take time off of work if he wants to. You can't exactly do that in school.

Maybe we can balance it by having a small vacay in the Fall over break so we don't "need" the HM as badly. Plus Thanksgiving & Winter Break. It actually makes me like my date a little better. We are planning to HM in either May or June, just have to avoid the graduations and whatnot.

Thanks everyone for your helpful input -- and good luck in your school semesters.

wldktz10

I personally think you're a little crazy planning all of that so close together (I waited until after the semester was over and I was still majorly overwhelmed). But if you're dead set on it because of all the considerations with dates and what not, worse comes to worse you can always not go to class on Monday or Tuesday if you need the extra time to recuperate. DH and I got married in January and I have classes then (different school/degree now), but I plan to miss a few each anniversary to celebrate. There's nothing wrong with missing a class or two if you don't miss any others the whole semester.

sessionswedding

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/special-topic-wedding-boards_students_am-crazy?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Special Topic Wedding BoardsForum:684Discussion:6cef0fab-29ad-47a0-9490-cdd5fa38f06bPost:606c9db9-f632-41c8-a0dd-f713d1bdc7be">Re: Am I Crazy?</a>:
[QUOTE]It was important to me to have my honeymoon directly after and we wanted a fall wedding so we chose Thanksgiving break.
Posted by ledalia[/QUOTE]
My FI and I are doing that exact same thing next year.  I have already graduated, but he will still be in school then.

AmeliaAndSeth8890

wldktz10 - Well we aren't that worried about our anniversary date being during the school year because I will be very close to completing my Masters (aka done with school anyways). Yes I could always miss the following Monday but I'm not going to count on that since I won't know tests and schedules until that January.

Did you vote No I did it and it was horrible? Why exactly was it hard - lots left to do last minute?

ledalia

Amelia - We are staying at The Inn at 909 Lincoln.

We are driving back on Thanksgiving Day and I will have three days to recuperate, unpack, put away wedding gifts/complete our registry with cash gifts, and catch up on homework.

StacieAllmond

I live in Savannah, so I can clearly see why you don't want it to be in the summer months! lol

AmeliaAndSeth8890

Stacie - definitely WAY too hot! I would die!

And Ledelia - yes I definitely see that it would be ideal to have those days, but we simply won't no matter when, unless we compromise what we want for everything else. We feel like this is a smaller compromise.

I am looking into when our Spring Break will be in 2012, but I'm not sure if it will make a difference.

DramaGeek

We got married on what was supposed to be the Saturday after finals.  Since I was a senior, most of my finals were presentations and things done the week before exams, so I wasn't worried...until they changed the calendar and suddenly our date was the Saturday BEFORE finals week.

One week before our wedding, I had a performace (I was a theatre major).  The week of our wedding I was going to regular classes and trying to cram finals in.  The day before our wedding, I had to take 3 finals, finish moving out of my apartment and into our house, get my nails done, pick up my dress, and go to the rehearsal.  Did I mention school was an 75 minutes away from the house we were moving into and our wedding location?  Also, all of the OOT family wanted to hang out.

Because of that, I vote to do it sometime when you've got at least a day or two beforehand that you can do all the last minute running around OR be smarter than I was and appoint someone to do all those things for you.

lmrini89

My FI & I are getting married over thanksgiving weekend. I'm taking the week before off of school (only skipping 2 days, not bad). This is mostly due to the fact that we go to college and live in Minnestoa but our family and wedding is in Michigan. Our wedding is Nov 27th. Then the next day we will fly back to MN and classes will start again the next day. Although we may skip classes that monday.
The planning has been somewhat stressful. I had 13 months to plan but was only in Michigan for a couple weeks the whole time (total of about 8 weeks here and there) due to classes, internship, etc. But my mom, sister & FMIL have been awesome helping.

You will have lots of time to plan. Just don't leave anything for the last minute! It should be fine. Just stay organized

starryeyedsarah

We're getting married Labor Day weekend in 2011 because my FI is a teacher (duh, they have at least Monday off in the district!!) which leaves us two other days to recoup.  And, I'm only going to be graduating from grad school in May of 2011 so we're not going to have the money for a honeymoon just yet ... maybe over Christmas/New Years'!

AmeliaAndSeth8890

StarryEyedSarah - JUST an FYI - you get honeymoon deals if you honeymoon within a certain amount of time after your wedding. It might be 30 days (in which this is useless to me at least) but it may be 6 months or so. Just something to keep in mind because, as a fellow student, I know every discount helps! Good luck with your wedding.

Sabrinarose8

You might be crazy, but I think I am too since I plan graduate with my masters degree a week before my wedding.  I think that as long as you are an organized student, the wedding during the semester shouldn't be too much of a problem.   I currently live in Savannah, are you thinking of having your wedding in one of the downtown squares?  I saw a few weddings in various squares last weekend and they looked pretty.  I would just suggest that you avoid having your big day around march 17, St Patty's Day.  Downtown is crazy busy during that time.  It might be difficult for guest to find parking, hotels, etc.  Plus at night, there are tons of crazy drunks in the streets, not very romantic.  Good luck!

AmeliaAndSeth8890

Sabrinarose - yes we love the square idea and we're planning on March 31. Do you think that will give the area enough time to calm down from St Pattys? We went there this past year for St Pattys and yeah, not my ideal wedding scene.

Sabrinarose8

I think March 31 would be great, the crowds are gone, tons of flowers in bloom, and nice weather. 

JoyMatt424

I think you will be just fine. Like you said - it's a Saturday so you have Sunday to recooperate. School is school and you may have to skip a few classes when you get close - but everyone skips a class occasionally due to dr appointments, sickness, etc. Since your FI won't be in school - I really think it'll be ok. And it's definitely not necessary to take a honeymoon directly after the wedding, IMO.

AmeliaAndSeth8890

Thanks everyone for all the feedback, it has been helpful in finalizing our decision.

We are sticking to our original March 2012 date and will plan accordingly when we get to that point...in a few months.