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Solemnizing your own marriage

arvadareds2005arvadareds2005
First Comment
in Colorado-Denver
So I know that in CO, you are allowed to solemnize your own wedding. Has anyone done this or known someone who's done this? I like the idea b/c it's inexpensive, personal and unique. I cannot think of any friends or family (not even the MOH or BM) I would want to officiate our wedding, and my FI and I are not religious, so we don't want any ministers, priest and the like. 
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Re: Solemnizing your own marriage

  • sakana1840sakana1840
    First Comment First Anniversary
    edited December 2011
    yes, i do.........BUT i'm not sure that they did it here in colorado

    they ran their own ceremony and everything

    technically you don't need a witness or an officiant..........


    Solemnizing a Marriage: Couples themselves may solemnize their own marriage (perform one's own marriage ceremony). According to Colorado Revised Statute 14-2-109, a marriage may be solemnized by a judge of a court; by a court magistrate; by a retired judge of the court; by a public official whose powers include solemnization of marriages; by Indian tribe officials; by clergy; by the parties to the marriage. If you wish to solemnize your own marriage, you will be responsible for acquiring, completing and returning the license to marry to the appropriate county Office of the Clerk and Recorder.

    here is a link to that website, scroll down for the info past the list of counties

    http://usmarriagelaws.com/search/united_states/colorado/index.shtml
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  • JessieR933JessieR933 member
    First Comment
    edited December 2011
    When you pick up your marriage licences, you will get a book to tell you how to do it. 
    Visit The Nest! Visit The Nest!
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  • ksheeksksheeks member
    First Comment
    edited December 2011

    We solemnized our own wedding just recently (7/10/11).  As you mentioned, we are also not religious so didn't feel right having a priest/pastor and we didn't want a stranger like a justice of the peace.  We wrote the entire ceremony and I'm so glad we did because it was very meaningful and personal, but I will tell you that it's also a lot of work - although if you wanted to, you could just take bits and pieces from the many examples that you can find online.

    My hubby and I spoke for various pieces of the ceremony, but we also had 4 other people speak.  We each chose 2 people that meant a lot to us that weren't in the bridal party (I chose an aunt and my brother, he chose two of his uncles).  But you could also just do the whole thing yourselves.

    There's really nothing to the actual process in terms of the marriage license.  When you pick it up there's a paper that will explain that if you are marrying yourselves you both sign on the lines for bride/groom but you also both sign on the lines for officiant.  (You leave the witnesses lines blank).  Pretty simple.

    If you'd like, I can send you our full script of our wedding showing how we structured it, who said what. 

    Best of luck
    Laughing

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  • arvadareds2005arvadareds2005
    First Comment
    edited December 2011
    Thanks! I just wanted to make sure I wasn't the only one thinking about it! I've tried this one of the other boards and everyone is like "i've never heard that" or "that isn't legal, you aren't married if you do it" and the like. 

    I would be interested though if you just generalized on what kinds of things you did, ie pick a poem you liked or whatnot. I feel weird reading someone else's vows without knowing them :"> :)

    Thanks though for sharing! 
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  • ksheeksksheeks member
    First Comment
    edited December 2011

    Happy to help, here's the "general" idea of what we did.  But keep in mind that although we used some traditional aspects we definitely went out of the box in a lot of ways.  If you want ideas on what is traditionally included in a ceremony, we found About.com to have some interesting articles on secular wedding structures/samples.
    http://weddings.about.com/od/yourweddingceremony/a/SampleCeremony.htm

    DH opened by welcoming everyone and gave a quick explanation that Colorado law allows us to solemnize our marriage.  Next, I said that we wanted to take a moment to remember loved ones who couldn't be there and then I spoke briefly about why we chose our ceremony location since it had special meaning for us.

    We chose to build our ceremony around four important qualities of our relationship and we selected four very special people from our lives to speak about those qualities.  Each person told some stories about our relationship and why each quality was important to us.  One of the 4 sections did include a poem that we liked.

    Often, the bride and groom each write their own vows and don't hear the others' vows until the actual wedding.  But we wrote the whole ceremony and vows together.  I'm actually very glad we did the vows together because it led to some very good, deep discussions about what we felt was important for our marriage and lives together.  On the other hand, one of the things I liked about when the bride and groom write separate vows is that you have something new that you hadn't heard yet on the day of... so to bring that into our ceremony, we each wrote a love letter on our own and then read those to each other for the first time during the ceremony (this turned out to be one of my favorite parts, his letter to me was so moving and poetic!) 

    After the love letters, we said our vows. We'd seen lots of examples online of different ways to do the vows and we ended up going with the idea to write them as "we" instead of "I".  We each read a part of the vows.

    Then we did the ring exchange and he finished by saying that with the power vested in us by the State of Colorado we pronounced ourselves husband and wife and I said: "You may now kiss the bride"

    Laughing

    Again, best of luck to you and I'm sure that whatever structure/words/poems/etc that you decide on - it will be a lovely ceremony!

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  • arvadareds2005arvadareds2005
    First Comment
    edited December 2011
    ksheeks
       Thanks for sharing that :)  That really helps give me an idea what can be done. I also showed my fiance this to get him to think about it (he's still a bit of a traditionalist). Thanks again, and congrats on your marriage! :)
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  • mcdaidzdaymcdaidzday
    First Comment
    My soon to be fiance and I are planning on solemnizing our own wedding in Colorado this July.  I did not even know this was possible until I read the fine print on getting marriage licenses.  I love the idea and I love the suggestions here.  I do believe we will write love letters to one another...love that thought! :)

    We are both currently non-practicing Catholics and it isn't that we aren't religious, but it's more that the ideas of being outside, close to God and nature in such a beautiful place are more inspiring to us.  Saving money, time and stress play a part too.  We are driving from Nebraska, so with gas prices being near or above $4.00/gallon this will allow us to take a little honeymoon while we are there too. 

    I wish everyone here a bright future with their significant others and a million thanks!
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  • AksarbenAksarben
    First Comment

    We are also from Nebraska and plan on getting married in Estes Park in September.  I was trying to find the best "Elopement" package offered by hotels and officiants, but it was all so expensive for just the simple little ceremony we wanted.  I am so glad I read the fine print on getting a marriage license in Colorado, too!  I had no idea we could solemnize our own wedding.  I love the idea of having such an intimate ceremony -  And saving money is a big plus!

    We want to cover all our bases, though, and don't want any surprises:  So, we were wondering if we solemnize our wedding in Colorado, will the marriage certificate be valid in Nebraska?  Or, is there anything else we need to do once we get back to Nebraska (go to the County Clerk, etc..)?

    Thank you!

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  • ashinkle93ashinkle93 member
    First Comment
    It is still valid in other states if we solemnize it ourselves right?

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  • InspiredAshleyInspiredAshley member
    First Comment
    My fiance and I live in Colorado but are having a destination ceremony out of the US. Does anyone know if we can solemnize ourselves and return the marriage certificate with the date of our "ceremony"?
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