I am relatively new to baking, but of the 4 or 5 fondant cakes I've made over the past year, I have found myself always scrambling to finish my cakes on event day and completely stressed out hours to days beforehand trying to get it done....even when I make my gum paste figurines weeks in advance! What I've been doing is: 

Night 1: baking cake, making icing, cutting and assembling cake, frosting, (time for bed, so) place cake in fridge overnight

Night 2: color and roll out fondant, cover cake with fondant, start making and applying decorative fondant pieces into cake (I can do this well into 4am, at which point I call it quits, so) back in fridge

Day 3: Wake up and freak out that I only have half a day to finish up cake and spend all my time up until event frantically finishing up last pieces....and never really feeling done. 

I'm a hobby baker so as you can see, I only have time to make cakes in the evening. My main problem is that it takes me a loooong time to do all the pretty fondant stuff to apply onto cake. Can I alter my timeline so that I can give myself more nights to do the decorative part? I am under the impression that you should cover your cake with fondant within a day of serving, so that leaves little time for me to make and apply the decorative pieces onto the cake. I am also not sure of the implications of taking the cake in and out of fridge to decorate. Any advice or suggestions?

color your fondant and icing the weekend before. 

Bake, and assemble cakes the weekend before. Wrap well and put in fridge.  (With or without fondant  - Your call there)  it will be fine for a couple of days, and one way or the other the fondant covered cake ends up back in the fridge

i tend to do the cake to almost fully done-sometimes stacked, sometimes not, a few days prior  

I do wait until it is out the fridge / after I am transporting the cake to add gumpaste flowers or similar  but even those are fine for a short time if they were properly dried  

Bake your cakes and make your icing ahead of time and freeze them.  You could even stack, fill, crumb coat and final coat your cakes, stick them in the fridge to allow the icing to set, wrap well and place in freezer until you are ready to decorate.

Color your fondant the weekend before you need it.  If fondant is wrapped well it will stay fresh for a long time.  No need to try and color it the day you need it.  You could also make the decorative items ahead of time.  If you need them to stay pliable just place them in an airtight container and they will stay soft.

I think baking, stacking, filling and icing ahead of time then freezing will help you out a lot in regards to your stress level with time.  So say you have a cake due on Saturday, I would get the baking etc done the weekend before or even two weekends before (whenever you have time) and color the fondant.  On Thursday morning take the cake out of the freezer so that it can defrost during the day.  Thursday evening cover the cakes in fondant.  Then Friday you are left to add all of your pre-made decorative accents.

start your timeline two to three days earlier

I agree with Freckles 0829, most everything can be done well in advance.  You can do different parts, as you have the time, so that everything is ready to add onto the cake once it is covered in fondant.  I always do this, just because I am old and lazy and don't like to do too much work at one time.