Ideas for a non-legal second ceremony

I think your next step is to book an independent celebrant. They will be able to run through options with you and design a bespoke wedding ceremony for you. That's what is usually done as the wedding once the legal stuff has been signed. The registry office is just "paperwork" you can still go on to have whatever ceremony you like - in fact you have much more freedom.

We are doing the same thing Jen2506 ?

We are getting legally married on the Tuesday, just the 2 of us, and then having a weekend long celebration Friday night- Monday morning for family. We have booked a humanist celebrant who will be writing us a ceremony from scratch, based on some of the things we've told her we'd like to include.

She has asked us all about us, how we met, what we like to do together etc and will draft something completely personal and unique for us. It is as tailored to you as you''d like. You can have a fairly basic traditional ceremony, or something completely different.

One thing we are doing is having a padlock ceremony instead of exchanging wedding rings. We'll already be married so we have an ornate padlock that we are going to lock together instead. Essentially locking our love forever (I wish there was a less cheesy way to say that!) We each have a key and plan to throw them in the sea, send them into the sky attached to balloons or something else symbolic.

A celebrant will have loads of experience in non legal ceremonies so will no doubt have lots of ideas for you too if you are not sure what you'd like.

We did exactly this and many of our guests said it was the most meaningful and interesting ceremony they had been to. We got legally married last Thursday 2nd April, then had a humanist wedding ceremony on our 'true' wedding day. Amongst the things we did was communally sing (and dance a little!) To a pop song, we did a hand fasting with vows that we had written, followed by rings and we also had one reading. I would be happy to send you our script if you want?

Hi Jen

i am an Independent celebrant and would be happy to answer any questions you may have regarding how a celebrant can help with creating a bespoke ceremony for you.

My email address is ******@************.**.** or via Hitched

kind regards

Karina

Have you googled ceremony ideas? I too was going to suggest a hand fasting ceremony.

I saw one called the sand ceremony where the bride/groom each had a different colour sand, then both poured their sand into a central, glass vase thing. (To represent the mixing of both people together) They still have this sand vase on their mantle.