Wed Recap: Why teenagers are annoying!

I have mentioned many times how I have a 15 year old daughter from a previous relationship.  Well, today, she is taking her driver's permit test!  Pray for me! 

She and Mr Fix It have been a part of each other's lives since she was 9 years old.  It's kind of crazy...but they love each other and get along great.  Too great...in fact, they sometimes annoy me.  And since Mr Fix It is truly still a big kid himself, the two of them together usually causes me grief.

That said, we definitely wanted to include Little Miss in our wedding ceremony and our vows. 

As you may remember in this post, Mr Fix It made a vow to be a patient and caring step-father to Little Miss.  Well, we wanted her to take some responsibility in our newly formed family as well. 

And so we created a special little part of the ceremony in which she stepped forward and the pastor asked her a brief question about whether she will love and support the two of us in our marriage.  She then was to respond with "I will" after which, Mr Fix It was to place a ring on her finger as well...sort of a little promise ring uniting our entire family. 

Of course, we didn't run through this at the rehearsal and so no one knew what the heck was going on. It's kind of silly and we laughed our way through most of it.  Little Miss wasn't sure where to stand or how to walk around me to join us.  In addition, as you'll see, she totally held true to herself as me and Mr Fix It did with her little 'unplanned' response.  Check it:

I could have killed her!  Little twerp.  Teenagers are so cocky and annoying...they just can't hold to traditions and rules of any type.  Oh well...everyone laughed, and I did, too at the time, but afterwards I told her she was a pain! 

Share time:  Do you have any children or other family members that you incorporated into your ceremony or vows?  Did you have (or do you suspect) that someone in your wedding party may go 'off script' with their role during the ceremony?

Unless otherwise indicated, all photos by Robert Mullins Photography
Raw video footage courtesy of Video Keepsakes of Beverly Hills

Wed Recap: The planner and the wing-it guy

I'm still following up with ceremony recaps - but there's only a few more to go.  However, today is again, one that is sort of a favorite...because it is the only time during our ceremony that I actually got choked up (though briefly). 

In my post last week about our pastor talking about both me and Mr Fix It and why he 'likes us,' he mentioned that I am a planner and that Mr Fix It is a surfer.  Well, in today's post, I am sharing with you our personally written messages to each other. 

And as you'll see in the video, Mr Fix It just 'wings it' and didn't have anything specific prepared or written down.  This is exactly why I didn't involve him in the writing of the traditional vows I shared last week, because he really just waits until he is in the moment to make decisions and share thoughts.  :)

The funny thing is, me being the planner, I knew one day Mr Fix It and I would get married.  And so early on in our six year relationship, I started keeping a journal that every once in a very great while, I would write a note or reminder about something he did or said or something I thought about him.  Basically, as soon as we got engaged, I went back through those old journal entries to gain inspiration and then wrote out this letter to Mr Fix It.  It was written probably a good 9 to 12 months before our wedding and I didn't look at it again until it was time to print it out when we were going over the ceremony with our pastor.  So yes, it was well planned in advance - at least mine was.

So here it is, the video of our messages to each other.

I just absolutely love how our pastor knew how to put us at ease and lighten a mood with a simple statement like when he tells Mr Fix It 'he's not going to top' my message. :)

Share Time:  Did/Will you include a personally written note or message to each other in addition to the vows you recite?  Or will you maybe write your vows as the written notes to one another?  How much time did you put into writing them out?  Did you wait until the last minute or have them prepared very early on?

TODAY'S WEDDING TIP:  If you are reciting traditional vows, consider whether or not you'd like to incorporate a personal message to one another before you actually recite your vows. 

Raw video footage courtesy of Video Keepsakes of Beverly Hills
Unless otherwise indicated, photos by Robert Mullins

Wed Recap: Not your typical vows

As you will see in tomorrow's post, I had a big part in writing out our ceremony and especially our vows.  I truly wanted our vows to blend the traditional with the unique.  Instead of writing our own vows, we wrote personal messages to each other which were read at a different point in the ceremony.  But I still tweaked the 'traditional' wedding vows you hear at ceremonies to make them a little unique and unexpected (the mantra of our wedding day). 

I also loved the idea I had found on another bride's blog to invite your guests to renew their vows along with you so I wrote in a little bit about having married couples hold hands and just give a little squeeze to affirm their commitment to their vows along with ours.  So here is the video of us saying our vows to one another:

Again, true to ourselves, Mr Fix It couldn't help but interrupt me during my vows when he thought I made a mistake.  I love my response to him and the guests laughs.  :)

To make it a little faster and ensure we didn't really mess up much trying to repeat after the pastor, I wrote the vows out on a computer, printed them out and created these little 'vow cards' that our pastor handed us when it was our time to say them.  Each card had our name on it (Stacey's Vows, John's Vows) because they were slightly different since Mr Fix It's vows included a promise involving my daughter. 

Funny thing was, Mr Fix It did not read or know anything about these vows until the moment Lyle handed him the card to read.  In my defense, he didn't ask to see them before the ceremony and didn't ask what we were going to say as vows.   As things went on during the planning process, I began to realize that it was easier to not involve Mr Fix It in anything unless he specifically asked about it or wanted to be included in the decisions.  :)

Did any of you find that there were aspects of the wedding that you either didn't want your fiance involved in or he didn't care to inquire about?

Photos by Robert Mullins Photography
Raw video footage courtesy of Video Keepsakes of Beverly Hills

You may now claim your bride with a kiss!

Disclaimer:  This post is long but is mostly just the script from our ceremony and vows.  You can use it as a resource for ideas or inspiration of what you may like (or may not want to do).  But to make it a quicker read for those of you who are not interested, I highlighted words in red that are the parts that are my favorite and my reason for sharing this with everyone.  It's of course also a way for me to journal our ceremony script for my own memories. 

I was never a big fan of the simplicity of 'You may now kiss your bride.'  It had to mean something that you get to kiss at this very moment, right?  And so when I was browsing videographer's blogs for ideas for our ceremony, and heard a pastor speak those words - "You may now claim your bride with a kiss," I immedidately added that into our ceremony script!  Yes, I have the entire thing already written out and have handed it off to our officiant (my junior high school pastor) for his review and thoughts.  :) 

Side note:  I asked my pastor if he minded me basically giving him a pre-written 'script' for our wedding ceremony and he said he actually likes it when brides do this because it ensures that they will get what they want and makes less work for him other than throwing in a brief message and some personal touches about the couple.  This is why I love him!  You should not think twice about asking your vendors, even your officiant, for what you want at your wedding!

Ok, so I wanted to keep a lot of the traditional touches of the wedding ceremony but also make it personal to us, unique and different from your uber-traditional vows, and not super duper long.  I am hoping the entire verbal part of the ceremony only lasts about 20-30 minutes max!

Here's my ceremony script that I pieced together with personal thoughts, internet research and some other traditional inclusions.  Please note that I am including both personal promises (letters me and Mr Fix It will write to each other) and both traditional (sort of) vows, so you will see the promises I have written for Mr Fix It, but obviously he has not written anything yet :)  Also, of course all of this is subject to change: