On one hand, I didn't really want to do the more traditional vows, where we would just repeat the same thing our officiant said. I wanted something a little more personal and meaningful for us, especially since we pieced together the ceremony wording ourselves.
But on the other hand, Mr. Cola thought that writing our own vows would be a lot of work. And I couldn't argue with that, because I agreed it would be. And then I read Miss Sewing's post about vows, and she brought up the very good point that when a bride and groom both write their own vows, and don't see them in advance, there's a good chance they could end up being vastly different in length and/or tone.
So Mr. Cola and I came up with a compromise: Vow Libs!
We put together the beginnings of some sentences for our vows that we will both use, and each fill in the end of the sentence with whatever we want. We also set the parameter that there will be at least 3 adjectives/actions/promises per line, and an additional sentence can be added after any of the lines if we just can't express our loving thought in one sentence.
This way, we can keep our vows a surprise until our wedding day, but they will be similar in feel and length. We're both fans of short and sweet, so this works perfectly for us!
Here are the Vow Libs we will be using:
Mr. Cola/Miss Cola, ________________________
You are __________________________________
Thank you for _____________________________
Today I promise ___________________________
I will ____________________________________
I vow to _________________________________
And I promise to __________________________
I made some cards with our Vow Libs on them, and lines to fill in the blanks, that we will each fill out with our final drafts a few days before the wedding, and give to our officiant to hold in his booklet with the ceremony text (we will also give a back up copy to one of the groomsmen to hold, just in case the originals get lost).
Now, as for what I'm going to write on my card, I don't really know yet. I'm giving myself until a week before the wedding to think about it, after all, these are going to be some serious and deep mad libs to fill in the blanks for!
What are you and your fiance doing for your wedding vows?
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Such a great idea! We are going to traditional route for vows for the Catholic ceremony, and at Hindu ceremonies, the priest recites the vows for the couple in Sanskit. I'm a crier, so I thought traditional might be the best way to go. But as a guest, I truly love the personal vows and never EVER forget them :)
ReplyDeleteGreat idea to allow for creativity but also make sure the vows “match” somewhat! Since we’re having a Catholic wedding, we’re sticking with the traditional vows, but will each include a brief speech about one another during the rehearsal dinner.
ReplyDeleteThis is a fantastic idea :D Way to solve the problem of varying lengths that could otherwise arise. The cards are pretty too, and it's smart to have a backup copy. Very helpful post!
ReplyDeleteI LOVE that idea! I will be sharing our vows in a future recap post once we get the video...I'm hoping to be able to post actual video to go along with my recaps. :) But we had vow cards as well...though they simply had our 'traditional' type vows on them. And then I had a letter that I wrote to Mr Fix It as well that I read just before we said our vows. He didn't want to 'write' something out...he decided to just wing it and basically said that he was not going to say much to me in that moment because the song he was surprising me with for our first dance summed up all he was hoping to share with me. :) More to come...can't wait to read yours!
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