How to add the wow factor to your wedding ceremony part 2 - Infinite love

How to add the wow factor to your wedding ceremony part 2

18th December 2019

• Wedding Inspiration
• Getting Married
• Sussex Wedding Ideas

Hello!

If you’ve recently got engaged (congratulations!) or if you are planning your wedding ceremony –welcome, this is part 2 in my 5 part series on how to add the ‘wow factor’ to your ceremony.

I mentioned in the last episode that the actual wedding ceremony can fall quite low on the list of priorities when it comes to making your day extra special. You can avoid that, and make sure you have all your guests smiling and remembering it for all the right reasons by adding a bit of ‘wow factor’.

I’m Sam Goodchild, wedding celebrant based in Sussex. In part one, we looked at personalising your ceremony and I shared some ideas with you.

Part 2, today is all about using ‘Poems and readings’.

Now if you haven’t looked at a poem since school and think they’re not for you, remember, poems don’t have to be highbrow or completely irrelevant to you. And if readings makes you think of Biblical passages, and that turns you off, again, this doesn’t have to be the case.

I’d recommend you’d consider adding one or two poems or readings to your ceremony. But not just for the sake of it. You can make them really relevant to you and your partner and you might find something that puts into words the way you think or feel in a way you could never articulate yourself.

So when considering readings, here are three points to help you:

• Choose Your Mood. Choose poems or readings that reflect either the mood you want for the ceremony or that say things about love or marriage that reflect your views but you feel you could never put into words.
  • There are hundreds on the internet anything from Edward Monkton’s humourous ‘Lovely Dinosaurs’ to Bob Marley’s wise ‘He’s not Perfect’ (which can be adapted to ‘She’s not Perfect’- in fact any reading or poem you find that maybe isn’t quite right but nearly there can be tweaked or changed and used)
• Think outside the box. A reading doesn’t have to be an official poem or passage intended for use in weddings
  • Do you have a favourite book or novel? How about quoting a paragraph from it that you just love.
  • Perhaps you and your partner have a song – the lyrics from it could be read out if they have special meaning for you.
  • What about your favourite film or TV programme? You could quote some lines from it. One bride I worked with loved Sex And The City and we had a Carrie Bradshaw reading in the ceremony:

    “His hello was the end of her endings,
    Her laugh was their first step down the aisle.
    His hand would be hers to hold forever,
    His forever was as simple as her smile.
    He said she was what was missing.
    She said she instantly new.
    She was a question to be answered.
    And his answer was “I do.”
    Carrie Bradshaw - Sex and the city

• Ask a friend or family member to read. This is a great way to honour either a friend or friend of family member who is a confident speaker. They not only get a special role on your day but it makes your ceremony extra personal. You could even take a risk and ask your speaker to choose the reading for you!

So don’t discount readings offhand. I have a bank of readings and poems I can show my couples but it’s a bit overwhelming to look at everything. The best way to approach this, is to narrow down what mood / theme / message you want, and then begin your search or ask your celebrant to make recommendations.
For more tips on how to add the ‘wow factor’ to your ceremony join me in Part 3. Hope to see you there.
If you would like me to help you add the ‘wow factor’ to your ceremony then drop me and email sam@infinitelove.uk or give me a call TEL 07512 347498