Weddingbee Blog

I think we’re pretty much on the same page as you, Miss Kiwi. Going to keep it short and sweet! I think a lot of those ceremonies are so nice, but I feel kind of like if we went through with any of them we’d be imitating people who REALLY do them…I feel like no one will buy that we believe in what we’re doing. I don’t know why, but it just seems like one of those things that everyone else can do and it’s great, but if IIII were to try to it would seem fake?

We are doing the sand ceremony. My FI was actually the one to suggest it. We aren’t very traditional people, so we didn’t want to do the candle. We picked out a wonderful vase that we will be able to keep in our home for decoration after the wedding; the sand will stay in it, of course. We are adding a little extra to it by having guests make wishes for us on small pebbles that will be put in the vases (the big unity vase and two smaller pouring vases) on top of the sand.

a lot of these parts of a ceremony aren’t “trendy,” but rather usually tied to a certain religious practice or other age-old traditions (not sure about the sand ceremony, but this applies to unity candle, blessing of the hands, etc.).

i’m all for personalizing a ceremony, though, so it’s up to you. some readings by friends or family that are applicable to you might be a good way to keep the ceremony from being too short.

Miss Kiwi, I totally hear you. I don’t know what we’re going to do for our ceremony yet, or who is going to marry us. My fiance is Jewish, although not religious he has expressed a desire for us to be married by a rabbi, and that’s OK with me. I love tradition, real tradition, and I like the idea of doing the same thing that so many other couples have done before. I’m not religious either, and so it would be odd for me to choose a strictly Episcopalian ceremony, although I do like a lot of the wording (I was raised Episcopal.) I had never even heard of the unity candle ceremony until I started reading about weddings (shortly after beginning to date Mr. Pencils), and only found out about the sand, rose and hands ceremonies since I got engaged. There’s no tradition in them for me, so we’re not going to do any of them. I do think it’s kind of funny that everyone assumes you’re going to do the unity candle ceremony when I think it’s a pretty modern thing–my mom, who is religious, said “the unity what?” I did ask my mom to do a reading, as she’s very good at it, she’s a frequent reader at her church. Not sure what text she’s going to read, though! Certainly not an Apache poem (we’re not Apache) nor a selection from The Velveteen Rabbit (love has made everything better, but we were both already real) nor some random poem we found in a wedding book. For it to be meaningful to us, it probably should be from The Lord of the Rings or Catullus.

Catullus? And I thought some of the Neruda poems were a little racy!

We’re not doing a unity candle - it can be a beautiful ceremony, but I’m an ex-Catholic, and FI is nothing, so I’d feel like a hypocrite doing it.

We have 2 readings - one is from a medieval poem that I’ve loved forever (geek), and the 2nd….sigh. Haven’t decided on the 2nd yet! I need something short and sweet, and FSIL is doing it and is super-shy about speaking in public!

They only taught us the nasty ones - it was a summer course for grad students and I think they were trying to keep our attention. Off to look up the sweet ones now!

We’re 90% likely to doing a Loving Cup/Quaich ceremony, because it is a celtic tradition and FI is Irish…and we want that to be part of the wedding.

I don’t like rose or sand ceremonies–just not for me. We decided against the unity candle thanks to getting married outdoors–like our officiant said, you can’t see the flame, it burns out in the wind, etc. So we looked for a plan B and the quaich came up, thanks to a suggestion from my matron of honor!