Weddingbee Blog

Have you ever felt like people just don’t fully get your relationship with your significant other? Maybe it’s because you don’t hold hands when you walk down the street, and maybe it’s because you share the same group of besties and do a lot of incredibly fun, friend-like things when you’re around other people.

If you’re nodding your head knowingly, you’re exactly like Mr. Jam and me: We’re PDA-hating best friends who poke fun at each other constantly.

Not sounding too romantic, huh?

But because of this, we want to make our ceremony special. We’re talkin’ super-duper, not-a-dry-eye-in-the-house, so-full-of-love-we-might-combust sort of special. It will be the one day where we publicly celebrate our relationship and try our hardest to put into words how crazy in love we really are…

…into a microphone in front of 150+ of our family and friends. Talk about intimidation.

And so Mr. Jam scheduled a conference call with our officiant, who also happens to be a local pastor and his grandma’s nephew. We wanted someone experienced to lead us through this sure-to-be emotional roller coaster of a wedding, and he is just the guy for the job.

The call went a little something like this:

Him: What do you want at your ceremony?

Us: We were sort of thinking [enter a long list of must-have ceremony things]…but, you know, nothing is set in stone…

Him: It sounds perfect! I love it all.

OK, there was actually quite a lot of talking and idea-sharing and meeting-scheduling. But instead of listing it all, how about we take you on a journey of how our ideal ceremony would go down, starting at the very beginning?

Picture this: It’s an early evening in June, and our baby teenage brothers start the ceremony with a bang as the two cutest most handsome greeters anyone has ever seen in their lives. Guests sit on whichever side they choose as one of my many musical uncles strums beautiful acoustic melodies.

The guitar changes its song and Mr. Jam escorts his family down the aisle, followed closely by our wedding party in the pairs we let them pick themselves. My best friend and man of honor is the last to walk down, carrying our weddings bands in a small bowl. Yes, he is an adult ring bearer.

The music changes again, and down the grassy aisle I come arm-in-arm with both my mom and my dad. The weather is warm and delicious, and everyone’s giddy just thinking about what’s to come.

When I’m finally up with Mr. Jam and everyone is seated (and I’ve successfully cried most of my makeup off), the pastor greets our loved ones and talks about our ring blessing, which cues the man of honor to hand the ring bowl to our family members. They will pass it along as we pray, talk about love, and read the heartfelt vows we’ve written for each other.

There will be plenty of crying. Hands will be clammy and I will likely be fidgety. The man of honor adult ring bearer will retrieve the rings and we’ll exchange them to more tears and smiles and lovely emotions, knowing so many good thoughts were channeled into them only moments prior.

More things will be said, but we’ll have a hard time grasping any of it and we’ll have to watch videos later to help us remember. Our moms will come up to us and share a special moment, since they were the first to hold and love us when we came into this world. Finally, we’ll pray and have our first kiss as husband and wife. Everyone will cheer and walk back down the aisle into the best party of our lives…

…and I’m an emotional wreck just imagining it. Words can’t even explain how excited I am for the ceremony, because we’ll be showing the most personal sides of us that no one has ever really seen. I wish we could do it tomorrow and not have to wait even one more day.

Anybody out there feeling nervous about opening up in front of so many people? Will it be the first time you’re displaying your mushy-gushy love for the world to see? Do you have any great cry-proof makeup tips you’d love to share?