The Ceremony, Part I

This is an auto-post. Just so you know. When you read this, I will educating others on the beauty and splendor that is my January 2010 release (home decor is like, so much later than RTW fashion). We can only hope that it's a smashing success.

In the meantime, there are things I have yet to share about the wedding. Big, beautiful, lovely things that you simply must know.

Our ceremony, if anything, was totally lifted from a host a resources. The Candyman, being the wordsmith in the house, had final say over the vows and I completely trusted him in this endeavor, even though I did fight with him on some things. With time, I saw he was right.

Th template we used came from our wonderful officiant, Minister Ralph Griggs. Minister Griggs is a wonderful, non-denominational minister. Since The Candyman and I don't belong to a church here but wanted to marry in a House of God, the combination of Minister Griggs with Owen Chapel was personally, the best for us. We could not have asked for more or better.

Minister Griggs has a wonderful (and easy) Ceremony Planner that covers the basics of any Christian ceremony. If he performs the ceremony, the guide is free. You can edit the guide at will to meet your religious and commitment needs (that sounds like a commercial, "to meet your commitment needs, call us!").

He also has at At-Home Marriage Preparation Course that comes free with his services. The Candyman and I found this course very interesting! If you take the course, you save $60 on your TN marriage license. Since The Candyman and I believe in counseling, we didn't have to complete the course, but we got through most of it anyway because it was so interesting. It asks really interesting questions that you don't normally think of. For instance, there was a question that asked us what we would each do if we won a million dollars. Like, for real. Don't be all, "Dude, I'd totally go to Vegas, and then Prada and then buy a phat crib." If you both say that, then um, you might have some issues later in life - I'm just sayin'. What was cool is that we both had the same answers - just allotted differently. My plan was to save most of it, pay off law school loans and help family members with the rest. The Candyman had pay off law school loans, help family members and then save the rest.

For some reason that small activity gave me a huge feeling of being bonded to The Candyman in a new way. It gave me such a comfort to know that while we may not have agreed on percentages, our priorities of what was important to us was similarly sound. The entire course was laid out in much the same way. Simple activities that gave you pause to think and compare. As I have mentioned before, I think counseling either by a priest, minister or counselor is always a good idea.

WEDDING TIP #9 - If you do decide to go to a counselor, therapist, shrink, guru, minister, priest or shaman - know this: if either of you are unhappy or uncomfortable with the individual chosen to assist you in your couple's training, you should choose another.

The Candyman and I had started counseling with an individual who was horrid. HORRID. I cannot and will not tell you the things this woman said to us. "Bu-bye" was what we said to her. Do not feel you have to stick with someone who makes you unhappy, simply because they are a professional in their field. Properly trained people in the field of therapy should make you feel positive after a session. They should encourage you to look inward, seek resolution, practice new behaviors and to be open and honest without being hurtful or unkind. Sometimes these practices are painful and difficult to work through. However, the person who is trained and who you pay to give you sound advice should prove trustworthy to you and your partner. I'm just sayin'....

Anyway, I can't gush enough about Minister Griggs. He performed our ceremony with feeling and with intent. Several people commented on the ceremony and how they liked how we incorporated certain elements. We are just so thankful that we were able to find a minister who was willing to give us the ceremony that The Candyman and I dreamed of having. We both had a little concern about that, living in what can sometimes feel like the buckle of the Bible Belt. The Candyman and I were raised with Christian backgrounds, but neither of us has ever found "home" in a particular church, so we don't go. The churches in Tennessee can often be a little conservatively aggressive to our more liberal thinking. Knowing that we could honor our God as well as ourselves and our beliefs was such a wonderful relief to us, a very natural and obvious choice.

Thank you, Minister Griggs for a wonderful service. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your role in our wedding celebration!

Coming soon - The Ceremony, Part II or How The Thirty-Something Bride and The Candyman Lifted Their Wedding Ceremony from Fellow Bloggers. It could go either way. Stay tuned!

P.S. I had some pictures planned to post with this, but Blogger is uploading black squares at this very moment. My apologies for lack of visual stimulus.

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