I have found my new Wedding Website home in A Practical Wedding.
Here are some of the articles from APW that I like especially.
I was reading one of those articles (or maybe it was a different one, I don't remember well) over at A Practical Wedding when I realised that for the last 6 months I've been engaged, I've focused and fussed and spent countless hours on the internet looking at all the pretty things that we could have in our wedding, but nothing about the actual ceremony. A couple of the articles at APW reminded me that the pretty things should be inconsequential when compared to the ceremony - the most important thing really, isn't it? The whole point and idea of a wedding is that we're committing and promising, in front of our loved ones, to build a life together. We're promising to create happy memories, share new adventures, and help each other grow into better people.
Here are some of the articles from APW that I like especially.
- Reclaiming the Word Wife
- Anna & Mike's Eff It Wedding
- The Wedding Industrial Complex (WIC)
- What Happened With I Stopped Reading Wedding Blogs
- Pre-Marital Counselling
- If You're Not Engraged, You're Not Paying Attention
- Sex, Waiting and Weddings
I was reading one of those articles (or maybe it was a different one, I don't remember well) over at A Practical Wedding when I realised that for the last 6 months I've been engaged, I've focused and fussed and spent countless hours on the internet looking at all the pretty things that we could have in our wedding, but nothing about the actual ceremony. A couple of the articles at APW reminded me that the pretty things should be inconsequential when compared to the ceremony - the most important thing really, isn't it? The whole point and idea of a wedding is that we're committing and promising, in front of our loved ones, to build a life together. We're promising to create happy memories, share new adventures, and help each other grow into better people.
I feel slightly guilty that up until now, the most I've thought about the ceremony is that it won't be a full Liturgical or Nuptial Catholic Mass and that it not be long and boring.
Hang on. That's the completely wrong way to be looking at this, isn't it? That the moment my beloved and I come together as one unit not be "boring"?!
I'm struggling, though, to create even a basic idea of what our ceremony should be like if it's not a Catholic Mass. For better or worse (Grant), all my ideas of love, marriage and unions are based on the Bible, in particular Catholic teachings; but I know you're not interested in that at all. Also, when I think of some of the beautiful phrases and avowals of love from the Bible, I just can't picture them coming out of Grant's mouth seriously... As he's said, we're not an overtly romantic couple; there haven't been any huge declarations of love - we started going out because of a text that said "Will you go out with me?" or something along those lines... So even though in my head revolves images of a princess-perfect wedding where we quote Song of Songs "I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine", "With this ring, you are made holy to me, for I love you as my soul. You are now my wife." (source), I really don't see us espousing romantic quotes like that and keeping a straight face...
Even some of the civil wedding self-written vows here sound a bit silly when I imagine Grant saying them. But, maybe I'm doing him a disservice and doubting him before he's had a chance to prove himself? Some of them sound quite nice now I read them over a few more times...
One vow I know I don't like is: "______, do you take ______ to be your legal wedded wife/husband, to have and to hold from this day forward?" or those boring similar ones "for better for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, blah blah blah". But that's just me. We'll see what Grant wants to do, hmmm?
So, because I want to concentrate on the most important part of our wedding, here are some ideas of vows that are growing on me.
- Interfaith Wedding Vows (The Knot)
- Selected poems and readings (The Knot) - in particular from The Prophet
- Non-Denominational Vows (The Knot)
- Selected self-written vows (The Knot) - mentioned earlier but for ease of comparison included here as well.
*love love love love love*
Kiwa.
Kiwa.
