How long does it take to get to shipping from preparing to ship

So I ordered an 8th gen iPad and Apple Pencil on September 4th. The Apple Pencil had an estimated delivery date for Sept 9th but was delivered on Sept 7th. However my iPad has an estimated delivery date from 7th Oct to 15th Oct but my card was charged on 9th and since Thursday it says “preparing to ship”. Can preparing to ship take weeks? Or can I get my iPad early? I read a lot of posts in the community which say that it takes 1-2 business days in the preparing to ship phase before it changes to shipped. However that’s not the case here