personalized wedding

Meaningful Rituals: Your Wedding Ceremony, Part 3

 in Ceremony / Guests / Personalization / Rituals / Unity Rituals / Weddings  tagged personalized rituals / personalized wedding / unity ritual / wedding / wedding ceremony / wedding guests / wedding rituals / weddings by

Meaningful rituals can raise your wedding ceremony from interesting to truly memorable. Over the last two weeks we’ve talked about ways to make your ceremony uniquely yours by starting with the basics and using thoughtful choices of music and readings to reflect your personalities and interests. Choosing to include meaningful rituals is yet another way to make your ceremony your own.

Ring Warming, courtesy of Midwest Life Shots

Starting early in your ceremony, a ring warming ritual can bring your guests into the ceremony in a real way. Sending your rings among your guests to be imbued with their love and best wishes for you, this ritual happens in parallel as your ceremony continues. Or later in the ceremony, having your guests imbue pebbles with their wishes can create a memento of your ceremony.

Unity rituals that celebrate your exchange of vows are common these days, but the ritual itself doesn’t have to be. Love letters, tree plantings, handfastings, and flower blendings are all newer, interesting rituals with lovely symbolism. If your a traditionalist a candle lighting or sand blending can be made special and personal with add-ons and personal wording, too.

Love Letters

The absolute most meaningful rituals are those created expressly for you. Working with your celebrant you can celebrate your heritage, honor a special moment from your courtship, or share a part of your life through a custom written unity ritual. Examples I’ve written for couples include ice cream sharing, Turkish tea brewing, cairn creation, and whiskey sharing. In each case we were able to share something significant about the couple as part of the ritual, letting the guests know them a little better and creating a memorable moment.

Investing yourselves to collaborate with your celebrant you can define the outline of your ceremony, including those elements that are meaningful to you. You can share your personalities through selecting music and readings that you love or that represent your feelings toward each other. And you can select or create meaningful rituals to draw your guests into your ceremony and celebrate your love and commitment as a couple in a memorable way.

As 2020 couples begin to engage with celebrants to craft ceremonies you are limited only by the creativity of you and your celebrant. Have fun as you make your ceremonies uniquely your own.

Choosing Readings and Music: Your Wedding Ceremony, Part 2

 in Ceremony / Music / Readings / Weddings  tagged ceremony music / ceremony readings / custom wedding / custom wedding ceremony / personalized wedding / wedding ceremonies / wedding ceremony by

Choosing readings and music that reflect your personalities, values and interests is a great way to start personalizing your wedding ceremony. Last week’s blog got us started with the basics needed to legally marry, but there is so much more you can do with your ceremony. Especially if you are inviting family members and friends to share your wedding day, you’ll want to start the day with a ceremony that reflects who you are as a couple.

Music is a great place to begin. Using music that is significant to you for your entry and exit is fun for you and shares something about you with your guests. I’ve heard “Storybook Love” the theme from “Princess Bride”, “Everything is Awesome” from the Lego Movie, “Marry Me” by Train and “I Like It, I Love It” by Tim McGraw. Each offers an insight into the couple – fanciful, fun, contemporary, and country western. You can include more personal selections to back a unity ritual, as prelude music or postlude music as your guests leave the ceremony space. Of course, if you’re going for a traditional ceremony feel you might stick with “Canon in D” by Pachelbel, “Trumpet Voluntary” by Jeremiah Clarke, or even “Bridal Chorus” by Richard Wagner – you know, “Here Comes the Bride”.

Another way to reflect your personalities in your ceremony is through the reading or readings you select. Perhaps you have a dog or two that you view as family members. A lighthearted reading about what you can learn about love from your dogs may be a perfect match for you. If you’re avid cyclists, there’s a reading for you, too. And if you shared years of friendship before moving on to a romantic relationship, there are a number of readings to select from. Once you’ve selected your reading(s), consider who will offer them during your ceremony. The person who introduced you, a beloved grandparent, or a mutual friend of yours will provide an additional memorable moment to your day.

As you work with your celebrant to craft your ceremony, carefully choosing readings and music that reflect you provides additional insight into your relationship and shares more of your personality. Letting your guests know more about you is a great way to invite them into your celebration. Watch for next week’s blog about additional ways to personalize your ceremony.

Leveraging The Season

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Leveraging the season is a great way to make your wedding ceremony feel timely and current. Decor, flowers, even the colors you choose can focus your day on the time of year you are marrying. If you have a favorite season and have chosen that for your wedding, even better!

A recent harvest themed wedding I officiated included pumpkins and mums. The bride is a very outdoors person, and table decorations included cross sections of a tree with deer antlers, flowers and candles. Pumpkins marked the entrance to the venue (in this case, decorated with the logos of the sports teams they follow). Huge burgundy mums on pedestals marked the ceremony space, and the bridesmaids wore burgundy dresses. The bouquets were mixed fall flowers from the bride’s garden. All these touches effectively leveraged the current season and the interests of the couple.

A winter wedding from a few years ago relied on ice blue and silver to accent the overall white theme of the day. Flowers, dresses, table decor, even the cake followed the winter wonderland theme fitting in perfectly with the frigid January day. A winter solstice themed wedding celebrated the return of the sun with its light and warmth.

Spring offers all kinds of themes from growth and rejuvenation to the Spring Equinox and fresh light colors. Seed packets can be gifted to guests to plant and a tree can be planted as your unity ritual. Perhaps a refreshing Spring themed cocktail can serve as the signature drink.

Summer weddings offer the opportunity to celebrate the long, warm days being experienced. There is a reading that begins, “Now in midsummer, a wedding…” which may be a perfect selection. Fans for your guests to stay cool during the ceremony make great favors, and decor in the rich, vibrant colors of summer fits right in. Offering cold water or lemonade before your ceremony can set the right tone.

If you met during the season you are marrying, got engaged during this time of year, or have birthdays around the wedding date those ideas can all be integrated into your ceremony and your day. Finding ways to connect the season to your relationship allows you to make the ceremony and your wedding day even more personal.

Whatever month you choose to marry, leveraging the season helps with your budget as you utilize nature and decor – think flowers in season – and allows you to customize and personalize your wedding day in myriad ways.

Personalizing Your Unity Ritual

 in Ceremony / Personalization / Rituals / Unity Rituals / Weddings  tagged personal ceremony / personalized rituals / personalized wedding / unity ritual / wedding ceremony by

Personalizing your unity ritual is a wonderful way to share part of yourselves with your guests during your wedding ceremony. Unity rituals usually follow your exchange of vows and rings and are meant to be symbolize your coming together in marriage. There are a number of meaningful unity rituals that you can choose from, but creating a new ritual that reflects you, your interests or values can add extra significance to your ceremony.

Through the years I’ve had the opportunity to write unity rituals for couples that connected to them in various ways. Here are some examples:

Personalizing Your Unity Ritual – Hot Toddy

Hot toddies: This couple was serving hot toddies as the signature drink at their fall wedding, so we had them build one during the ceremony. We spoke about the sugar representing the sweet and loving moments in their marriage, and the lemon representing the more challenging times they may face together. The alcohol represented the strength of their love and passion for each other, and the hot water reflected the need to provide support and warmth each and every day. The ritual connected their guests to the couple and to the festivities to come. As toasts were raised with the signature drink during the reception, it hearkened back to the ceremony itself.

Personalizing Your Unity Ritual – Craft Beer Sharing

Beer sharing: With many couples enjoying craft beers these days, this unity ritual may have broad appeal, but it was especially meaningful for this couple – he ran a craft brewery and had invented the beer, she had named this particular brew “Sunny Days”, and they shared it and toasted their marriage with it during their ceremony.

Personalizing Your Unity Ritual – Cookies and Milk

Cookies and milk: This unity ritual shared an intimate part of the couple’s lives with their guests. Each day they shared milk and cookies at the kitchen table as they shared the events of the day with each other. They each had their favorite cookie. One needed non-dairy milk. They will carry these preferences and needs into their marriage, retaining their individuality. But by connecting each day they will ensure that their marriage and life together remains their focus.

Personalizing your unity ritual as these couples did allows your guests to know more about you as individuals and a couple, and connects the ritual to you in a memorable way. Whenever they share a hot toddy, toast with a beer or share milk and cookies it reminds them in a subtle way of their wedding day, of the promises they made to each other, and of the life they are building together. Let your unity ritual be just as powerful for you.

Personalizing Your Wedding Ceremony

 in Ceremony / Music / Readings / Rituals / Unity Rituals / Wedding Vows / Weddings  tagged ceremony music / ceremony readings / personalized wedding / unity ritual / wedding vows / weddings by

Personalizing your wedding ceremony is a favorite catch phrase these days, but what does it really mean? Wedding ceremonies are full of traditions and can feel formulaic – seen one, you’ve seen them all. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Especially if you are planning a ceremony outside of a religious community the options are nearly endless.

Here are some ideas of ways to personalize your wedding ceremony:

  • Choose music that is meaningful to you. Country music, a single violin, guitar or harp, a movie theme or a classic rock’n’roll song can all be perfect if they are perfect for you.
  • Enter the ceremony space in an authentic way. Perhaps you’ll choose to walk in alone, with your parents, with your children, with your partner, or with your extended family. It all works, as long as they are the people you want to surround you at this moment.
  • Select a reading (poetry or prose) that reflects you as a couple or speaks to you in some way. Adding a reading that doesn’t resonate with you in some way is wasting time.
  • Write your own vows. The promises you make to each other on your wedding day are the most important words of the day, so make sure that reflect what is in your heart.
  • Consider unity ritual options beyond a unity candle or sand ceremony. There are a number of rituals with lovely symbolism, so take the time to explore the possibilities. And as with readings, if it doesn’t speak to you, consider passing on a unity ritual altogether.
  • Especially if you are having a smaller number of guests, look for meaningful ways to include them in your ceremony.
  • Include the important people in your life in your ceremony. Yes, it’s all about the two of you, but having significant people participate will make it special and memorable for you.

Personalizing your wedding ceremony isn’t difficult, but it takes some additional time and effort. An experienced, trained wedding celebrant can help you unpack these ideas, offer options and suggestions of her own and write custom elements and rituals to make your ceremony truly unique. Enjoy the process of personalizing your ceremony and treasure the memories for a lifetime.