Talk:Ariel/@comment-34665880-20141114035329/@comment-1672596-20141114092945

Hard to say. While I do want to have Ariel and Eric wed immediately in order to ensure she didn't lose her virginity before marriage (especially when right now some people managed to bed each other before actually getting through the marriage ceremony, even when they at least did the proposal beforehand), I also see enough reason to assume Ariel and Eric did in fact wed months afterwards.

Basically, weddings take a lot of time to plan out (something Grimsby even implied regarding Eric's insistence of having him and Vanessa/Ursula married by sunset when hesitantly complying to his orders.). There's the preparation of the dresses, which even with todays technology takes a while in order to make sure it is flawless, often requiring redos if they aren't to their liking or even if they aren't the right color (like, for example, using red or green for a wedding dress especially if it is supposed to be their first wedding, to use a Sister Sister reference). There's also training for how things are supposed to proceed as planned regarding the actual wedding ceremony. We also have to have the invited guests present (and not just the humans, but especially the merfolk), and Ariel would need to convert to Catholicism beforehand (since Eric's kingdom was clearly Catholic due to the outfit the priest was wearing), which itself takes time as I can attest from knowledge about RCIA via my mom who organizes it. Oh, and speaking of which, they also would need to make sure they get an exception made by the Holy-See regarding marrying on a boat, considering the nature of Ariel's heritage (after all, I doubt Ariel's half of the family would be able to attend the wedding if it was in a land-locked church, which in Catholic doctrine is the only way a marriage can truly be valid). That's also not getting into the use of their needing a new cake as well and cleaning up the mess caused by the previous wedding. Hopefully Eric and Ariel are strong enough in their faith to not have sex before marrying, even if they at least managed to propose beforehand, if it turns out they took months between those two events.