When should I send out invitations for a DW? TIA!

uh.. they say invites for DW should be about 3 to 4 months in advance especially if you don't do a save the date... otherwise i think you'd be fine with 2 to 3 months. I probably should get going on mine. I need to order paper. i'm procrastinating.

Actually no i just got busy with the prewedding invites!

I actually thought it was more like 6 months.  I personally think the 2 to 4 month range is not enough time to decide financially if you can book a vacation.

I think it's really personal preference, but here is what we are doing. 

We have 2 lists of people, 1 of people who we think are going to attend, and 1 of people that we know will not attend due to outside circumstances (jobless, going through radiation, etc.).  I am sending out STD's, in the next 2 weeks to the first list and they include an 'Intentions' card, which they are asked to send back if they already know they won't be able to make it as we need preliminary numbers for our coordinator.   If they respond 'no' on the Intention card, they don't get a real invitation, therefore freeing up a spot for someone that we couldn't invite. 

Then, in February we are sending out our real invitations asking that the RSVP be sent back by April 1st. 

Being that we are having a DW, we have to have concrete numbers so that we know where we are budget wise.  Plus, our venue has size restrictions, so we are somewhat limited and need to know who is coming sooner rather than later -hence the intentions card. 

I would send them out as soon as you know all the detail, I'm waiting to get my contact from the venue, and them I'm going to start to work on save the dates and invites and I hope that I would be able to get the save the dates out by this November, FI and I want to give people as much time as we can, which we are trying to give them a year( that way people can not complaine they didn't have enough time). and then the invite will be sent out by Febuary and the RSVP deadline would be April the lastest May. our wedding is 11/12/11.

I read on Martha Stewart weddings that you should send save the dates as soon as you know where your having your DW and then the actual invites 8-10 weeks before the wedding.

hmmmmm...we are sending save the dates mid-september which will include our website that has all the logistics and travel info. We figure people will have from Sept-December to make up there minds and see if it fits in there budget.

Then we will send invites January 1, 2011 with a RSVP deadline of Feb 28th, 2011 the latest. We figure by this time it's either a yes or a no since we already told you to save the date.

The wedding is the end of May and we need to have exact counts as well.

Thanks ladies!

I'm doing 2 months in advance however we sent our STD out in March (about 9 months in advance)

We sent ours out 2 weeks ago, with an RSVP for Aug. 15 (Sept. 1 for their deposit with the travel agent).  Our wedding isn't until March, but because deposits are due by Sept. 10 (see that buffer there between what we told everyone it was due and when they're actually due?) And the balance has to be paid 60 days before we leave, so we wanted to give everybody as much time as we could.  Plus, I think my wedding book says 9 months is good for a DW ("The Wedding Book" by Mindy Weiss).