wedding


Ceremony Length: What is Too Short and Too Long?

Selecting the right ceremony length for your wedding will ensure a significant, meaningful ceremony experience, and will keep the attention and interest of your guests at the same time. Finding the right balance between too short and too long is actually fairly easy to do when you have control over the content of your ceremony.

When you choose a customized wedding ceremony you are able to decide what elements you wish to include and can choose the target length of your ceremony, too. Readings, unity rituals, and even your vows can be selected with an awareness of length and complexity if you want to keep your ceremony on the shorter side. The Love Story segment (or homily or sermon) can easily be expanded or reduced as well.

So how short is too short and how long is too long when considering your ceremony length? This is a significant moment in your life and should not be rushed. You are making promises to each other that are meant to last a lifetime. And you’ve gathered your family and friends to share this moment with you. They may have traveled long distances and made significant efforts to share this moment with you. With all that said, I recommend that you not plan for a ceremony shorter than 15 minutes (and add a few more to allow for the entrance and exit of the parents and wedding party). Shorter than that is likely to leave everyone feeling that they blinked and missed the ceremony.

On the other end of the ceremony length spectrum, I recommend that you limit your ceremony to 30 minutes or less. No matter how interesting, creative and meaningful your ceremony is, after 30 minutes your guests are going to be getting restless, anxious to check their devices and ready to move on to the next part of your wedding day. Remember that if your ceremony is not bound by religious requirements, you’re not taking time with impersonal rituals or elements. The entire ceremony is focused on you, your love and the commitment you are making to each other, so you can cover a lot of ground in 30 minutes. Select a target ceremony length that gives you time to recognize this important moment in your life and you’ll have wonderful memories to look back on for years to come.


Children in Your Wedding Party: Tips for Success

Children in your wedding party can be sweet and fun, if you plan appropriately and are willing to be flexible. Children will do as they please in the moment, but following these tips will increase the chances that the reality will match your vision:

1. Select children of the right age. If you want them to walk down the aisle independently (or with another child), age 5 or older is optimal.

2. If you choose to include younger children in your wedding party, consider having them walk in with a parent who is also in the wedding party, or be escorted all the way to the front by a parent not in the party. While this may be nontraditional, it may work best.

3. Have someone the children know monitor them as the wedding party lines up, so they can be whisked away in case of a meltdown. Additionally, have a familiar face near the front that the children can walk to so it isn’t a sea of strange faces.

4. Plan for the children to sit with family members during the ceremony. Little ones standing in front during the ceremony are likely to create a distraction for the wedding party, the guests, and you if they get bored.

5. Keep the children in your wedding party on their normal eating and sleeping schedules as much as possible.

6. Take pictures that include the children as close to the ceremony time (before or after) as possible. This minimizes the amount of time you expect them to behave and follow instructions.

7. If the children in your wedding party are your own or if both their parents are in your wedding party, have a caregiver in attendance to remove the children if needed. Ideally this is not a very close family member who will be unhappy if they miss part of the ceremony. A day care provider, babysitter or grandparents (but not your parents) are all good choices.

Even if you follow all of the above tips, remember that the children really are in charge. They will decide if they walk up the aisle… or if they run or refuse to move at all. They will decide if they toss flower petals, hold the sign facing out… or drop the ring pillow to the ground. They will decide if their faces are ringed in smiles, or smudged with tears. If you choose to have children in your wedding party remember to go with the flow and be prepared to deal with the unexpected. Sometimes the unexpected makes for the most memorable moments…


Honored Guests: Helpful Ceremony Preparation Tips

Honored guests at a wedding ceremony include grandparents and other immediate family members who are not in your wedding party, along with readers and any other ceremony participants. There are a few ceremony preparations that can ensure these important people in your life feel respected, remembered and special on your wedding day.

First, as you’re placing your floral order, consider which of these people should receive a boutonniere or corsage. This simple but very visible sign marks them as honored guests throughout the entire day.

Next, create a space plan for your honored guests. Lay out the first few rows of your ceremony venue, ensuring a reserved seat for each of these people. You’ll want to mark the reserved area (on both sides of the aisle) with signs or some other indicator of the reserved area. Alternately, you can create individual name tags that can be affixed to each chair. If you opt for this approach, ensure that the ink on the tags will not rub off on clothing, ruining special attire.

With the spaces reserved, the final step is to ensure that your honored guests land in those seats. You’ll want to communicate to them ahead of time (this is a great task to delegate to mothers or other trusted people) so the family members know to look for their seats or identify themselves to the ushers.

Speaking of ushers, they should have a written list or map of the honored guests and where you want them seated. When the guests arrive, even if the rest of the guests are informally seating themselves, the honored guests should be escorted to their reserved seats. This is a bit of special treatment that again will make them feel remembered and respected.

With a little thought and preparation your honored guests will feel special and appreciated as they share in your wedding day. Make sure to get some photos with these folks, too. They make a great keepsake for them and for you.


Music Strikes a Sour Note

Music strikes a sour note in your wedding ceremony when it distracts from the ceremony experience instead of enhancing it. In the best of all worlds, your musical selections start and end on cue, are played at an optimal volume, and reflect you as a couple. Ceremony music can be of any genre, can be offered live or recorded, and can go seriously wrong.

My best advice to you is to hire professionals. Whether that is an experienced DJ playing recorded music or live professional musicians, the advice holds. Music is the most common part of the wedding ceremony to go wrong in my experience, and when it does, everyone cringes. Here are just a few of the experiences I’ve seen during ceremonies:

– In one ceremony, the couple had a friend who was a talented violinist, and they asked him to play for their ceremony. He arrived very close to the ceremony start time, and set up his equipment. Yes, the violinist had electronic tracks recorded that accompanied his live performance. All this could have been wonderful if he had an experienced assistant who managed the electronics while he focused on his violin. Instead, there were long, awkward pauses waiting for him to begin the accompaniment and then a rush while he tried to position his violin and join in. The long pause before the recessional began left the couple standing in front of their guests, ready to leave the ceremony space, but without any music.

– In other cases music strikes a sour note when friends or family are asked to provide the ceremony music from an iPod/iPad or similar device. I’ve seen these devices trying to play music loud enough to be heard beyond the front 2 rows. They forgot to bring speakers. I’ve seen these devices lock between the beginning and end of the ceremony with the person not knowing the password to unlock it. I’ve seen devices that were tested and connected to bluetooth speakers 30 minutes before the ceremony, only to have them time out and refuse to reconnect for the actual ceremony.

– And maybe the worst was the teenager asked to run the ceremony music from a device in the minutes before the ceremony. She didn’t know which songs were for which parts of the ceremony, and we heard snippets of each of them as the wedding party entered and she tried to figure it all out. When the recessional song (“Signed, Sealed,Delivered”) played as the bride entered, I knew it was going to be a memorable ceremony, and not in a good way.

You can prevent the situation where music strikes a sour note during your ceremony by hiring knowledgeable, experienced people. If you have hired a DJ for your reception it is usually a relatively small incremental expense to have them cover your ceremony, too. If you are hiring live musicians, make sure they’ve played for weddings before, and see if one of them can attend your rehearsal to be clear on where your musical selections fit in the ceremony. If you decide to take a chance and have a family member or friend handle your recorded music, make sure you’ve gotten the needed equipment and that they attend rehearsal and actually play the music as you want them to for the ceremony. Music can be a wonderful addition to your ceremony. Make sure you plan appropriately so you avoid the situation where your music strikes a sour note on your wedding day.


Puppy Love on Your Wedding Day

Including some puppy love on your wedding day is another way to make the day truly yours and to share your love with those most important to you. If you have a special pooch in your world you likely will want to include them in your day in some special way. Depending on your dog’s personality and the day you have planned, there are a number of ways to include Fido in the festivities.

The simplest way to include your beloved pet in your wedding day is to have them captured in your pictures. Your photographer can work with you to capture special loving moments for the three of you, and the pooch can be in the formal portraits, too.

Another favorite role for pets is as ring dogs. They can be part of the processional or make a special entrance with the rings firmly attached to their collar. After delivering the rings, they can be kept to the side with a handler they know, or can be removed from the ceremony space.

I’ve even had a dog enter with the groom and sit by his side for the entire ceremony. There was no doubt that this dog was the couple’s best friend. She had been through extensive training and sat placidly next to them, focused on the sound of their voices during the vows, and joining them for the recessional, too.

Here’s a link to a good article offering tips on how to include your dog in your wedding day. I know many owners feel their dogs are well trained, but I highly recommend having the dogs leashed while they participate in your wedding day. You can never know how the dogs will react to large crowds of strangers, all the hugs that they could misinterpret as aggressive moves on their owners, or the random rabbit that they may chase after at an outdoor wedding. It’s also important to be aware that some people are frightened of animals or may be highly allergic. If your pet isn’t contained, they may be so uncomfortable that they need to leave the festivities early.

Puppy love on your wedding day can make it even more special and memorable for you, and if you take care to consider your pet’s and your guests’ needs, your much loved animals can be a great addition to your day.