Wedding Stationery {and the Art of Timing}

As many of you know, I am on a 'life' hiatus... so I couldn't be more honored and thankful that some of my fellow bloggers will be filling in for me while I am away!  I am thrilled that Jenna of Heartcarry Press and Little Bit Heart will be the first guest blogger in a series on Bona Fide Bride, and I couldn't wait to share her with you!

I'm Jenna, the Heartcarry Press part of Little Bit Heart, where we design custom papergoods. The most frequent wedding stationery questions we get are all about whens: when do we mail out save the dates? When do we start the invitation process? When do we order day-of papergoods? I know that your wedding paper can be a bit overwhelming, so at least knowing when things need to be done can be a great first step :)

Let's start with save the dates, since they're the first piece of wedding paper that goes out. These should be mailed 6 to 12 months before your wedding. If your wedding falls on a holiday (hello, New Year's Eve!) or if you're having a destination wedding, you want to be closer to the 12 month side. It's a good idea to start contacting stationers around 3+months before you'd like these to go out.

Once your save the dates are out, you'll move on to the next step: the invitation process. Your invitations should be mailed out 6 to 8 weeks before your wedding- we use 8 weeks as our guideline for our custom clients. Again, you'll want to get in contact with your stationer at least 3+ months prior to your mailing date, especially since your invitation suite will most likely be more involved than your save the date.

After the date is saved and the invitations are mailed, don't forget about those pretty paper details for your wedding day. This means your placecards, programs, table numbers, signage, favors... whatever you'll need on the day of. Timelines get a little tighter here, since you may not have the information for your placecards or program until the last couple of weeks before your wedding. Try to talk to your stationer about these pieces during the invitation process- they may want to order the supplies when they place your invitation supply order. 

Hopefully these guidelines will help you plan your papergoods timeline- happy planning!

Images:  Little Bit Heart

Thanks Jenna!  

xoxo Kristin