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I'm having one of those all inclusive packages. 1 hour cocktail followed by 4 hour reception (dinner and dancing).
Ooops. I included cocktail hour! Our reception (with cocktail hour) is from 5-11. If I'm putting this much work into a party, it better last a while! Plus, all of the guests are staying at the inn we're having it at, and the inn is on the top of a mountain in the middle of nowhere. I figure it's best to keep people entertained a while.
Bubbles.jpg (4.5 KB, 29 downloads) 2 years old 
I too am doing a cocktail hour at 6:00 and dinner and dancing from 7:00-11:00. We are also having an after party on the beach at the hotel where everyone is staying. Me and the hubby-to-be will be fashionably late to that! 
We have the place for 5 hours. We're having a 1/2 hour ceremony and approximately 30-45 minute cocktail hour for picture time, so that leaves about 4 hours for reception time. Hope this helps!
So far it's a tie for 4 and 5 hours ... which is what I am trying to decide between! Here's a potential timeline:
5:30-6:00 Ceremony
6:00-7:00 Cocktail Hour
7:00-11:00 Reception (4 hours)
We can extend til midnight, but I feel like we might lose too many guests before our "send off" and I really want to do a send off!! And we were thinking of doing an after party at a bar that is just down the street?? Do note that all the events are in the same building -- so there is zero travel time.
What do you guys think we should do?
That looks pretty good. You may want to keep in mind that there's a good chance that your ceremony will start a little late, that it always takes guests forever to find/take their seats when they go in for dinner. (I've never actually read to think about this, but it occured to me when I was plotting out a timeline; maybe I'm nuts!!). So if you're waffling between 4 and 5 you may want to go long to account for this. That's why I ended up putting a 4:30 ceremony on the invites instead of 5:00. If it helps, our timeline is:
4:30 - 5:00 Ceremony
5:00-6:15ish Cocktail hour
6:30-8:00 Dinner
8:00-11:00 Dancing
I was thinking of planning for a little wiggle room too. Having the cocktail hour be an extra 15 min to plan for the moving and settling of people. Will also give us a bit more time to take some pictures. Might be a good plan to do an "hour and a half" cocktail hour ... but really only have it be an hour ... and then have the reception be from 7:30-11:30. Good thought!!
Our ceremony will be at 6:00ish, followed by dinner at 7:00 and festivities to follow. We're hoping for a pizza & s'mores afterparty, so it may even go longer than that. 
I'm pretty lame and am only doing a dinner reception. This is mainly because my wedding is so small, the reception is at a resturant, and half of the people in attendance are old- like parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents. I rather not offend them with the type of music I like, and I rather not be miserable with dancing to crap all night.
We are doing a cocktail hour pre-wedding also.
So just dinner it is. 2 hours max.
Ooops, I voted first...I put 4 hours, but it is actually 1 hr cocktail 3 hr reception
Josalyn that is not lame!!! It's your wedding, you rock it however you want to rock it (or not due to the old people and their lame music! ha)
Maybe you could plan an after party (of no cost to you) just tell your younger friends and cousins to meet you at a bar afterward for some more drinking and dancing? You can wear your wedding dress to a bar, I'm sure you'll get a few free drinks! :)
Mine is four hours. I have the options with all of my vendors to extend an extra hour if we would like!
It looks like 4 hours has taken the lead. I think I like four hours, seems like enough time to get the party started ... and finished :)
Cocktail hour from 8 - 9 or 9:30pm, reception to follow until 12:30am.
3:30 ceremony 4:30 - 9 for the reception :) 10 - ? for post-party!
hydrangea.JPG (97.5 KB, 38 downloads) 2 years old 
Mine was 4 hours and I will tell you that everything went by so fast my head was spinning; I was on a plane to Jamaica before I even knew it was over! If I could have afforded it I really wish we had done the extra hour. There aren't too many things I would change about my wedding -- it was darn near perfect, but more time to spend wiht my guests and with my groom would have been wonderful.
1 hour cocktail time 6-7pm, followed by reception 7-1pm (i paid for an extra hour) and hopefully we can party the rest of the night away in the hotel everyones staying at! if my family had their way it would be a three day party but we don't have unlimited resources!
Five hours seems like it's taking the win now. I think you're right, more time to spend with all the guests is more important!
approximately 4 hours... 7-11. i can't imagine it going any later than 11, but you never know!
I am only going to 11pm, and then having a more casual after-party after. This will relieve half of the guests who are older or who have children and can go relax without having too late of a night, and then those who stick around I can have a more budget-friendly lounge atmosphere where we can be silly and hang out and chat in a chill mood rather than dancing or feeling weird because grandparents are watching you...
We'll have a cocktail hour, and then our reception will be approx. from 6-11. But, it could go longer if we end up wanting it to.
Hmm ... you are all making me think way too hard, why dont you just make a decision for me ... do we want the more casual after party so I can change and relax a bit more? or do we want everyone to stay a litlte later and keep the DJ rockin' all night long?!? Too many decisions.
We plan on dancing all night long! After a sunset ceremony we'll be going right into dinner, followed by dancing until the place shuts down at 12:30!
We're having a 5 hour reception with an after party, our venue dictates that we have to be quiet after 10, so we're takin it inside.
Beesting I love your name! :)
You are all getting me so darn excited, another freaking 11 months! haha. I'll just have to live vicariously through you all over the next year.
My hotel venue closed at 11pm so I had no choice but to end it at 11pm. It was fine though, everyone had a blast.
My timeline:
4:45pm Guest arriving & getting seated
5:00 to 5:45pm ceremony
6:00 to 7:00pm cocktail
7:00 to 11:00pm dinner reception (4 hours)
Ours will be four, five including cocktail hour.
My timeline:
5pm- Ceremony
5:30- Cocktail Hour Starts
6:30- Introduce & 1st Dance, followed by start of Dinner
7:30-10:30- Dancing
We are doing a send off a little before the end. I thought about extending it to 11pm b/c we all love to party, but it costs extra so we're just sticking with the normal.
Our reception will begin after our 3:00 ceremony (probably around 3:30) and ends at 8:00 :)
It will end up being about 3.5 hours. We have the venue for five hours, but that includes the ceremony.
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Just trying to get an average! I'm asking about the actual reception time, not including a cocktail hour if you are having one.
Thanks!