My FI and I have been having some anxiety over choosing a wedding date. We are unsure of Summer 2011 or Summer 2012. There are a few issues with each and I'd like to hear some outside input!
Currently, I am in a volunteer program and FI is in school. If we get married in 2011, I would be just finishing my volunteer program and he would have two years of graduate school left. As I am a teacher, I wouldn't begin earning a salary at my school until August 2011, as I would still be considered a volunteer on their payroll despite the fact that I have been teaching there for two years. Most likely I would teach summer school over the summer, but that isn't very much money to live on and I'm worried about the stress it would put on the first few months of our relationship.
However, if we wait to get married until 2012, my FI would have virtually no time off of graduate school. In his program of study, he needs to go to school full time during the summer of 2012, leaving few weekends available to get married. I am unsure of how much time people usually take off work when they get married as most of my friends are teachers and have gotten married in the summer when they don't have to work. Is it normal to get married on a Saturday and go right back to your "normal" life the following Monday? I would like at least a little time to relax and enjoy each other before making our way back into the real world!
To complicate matters, our parents are both paying for the wedding. His parents don't have a preference on a date; however, my parents would like us to wait until 2012. It's also possible that my dad might get laid off within this next year and while my family is still fairly well off, I certainly don't want to cause them any extra financial stress.
My mom has suggested that if we want to get married earlier, FI and I should just do something extremely small with both of our immediate families and then have a larger wedding later on. FI and I aren't crazy about this idea because we both are very close with our large extended families and would like for them to share the experience with us. We feel that having a second wedding would feel somewhat tacky and fake.
We do need to decide soon as we feel we need about a year to plan. Any suggestions?
