Courthouse Ceremony & Traditional Reception?

Knottie1450057911

My husband-to-be and I are considering doing a courthouse ceremony with our parents, siblings, and grandparents and then hosting a traditional reception.

Neither of us belong to a church and we respect the church too much to just try to find one to use as our ceremony venue. I've looked into non-denominational churches and other secular venues (that are not outdoors because the weather would give me anxiety) and they are all so expensive! The cheapest I could find was $650.00! I believe our ceremony is important but not for 30 minutes at $650.00. 

Would guests who are not invited to the ceremony feel "unimportant"? We are doing to the traditional reception where we are paying for the food, open bar, and dancing, so I would hope they don't feel like their only invited for the gifts. 

Thoughts?

holyguacamole79

Knottie1450057911 said:

My husband-to-be and I are considering doing a courthouse ceremony with our parents, siblings, and grandparents and then hosting a traditional reception.

Neither of us belong to a church and we respect the church too much to just try to find one to use as our ceremony venue. I've looked into non-denominational churches and other secular venues (that are not outdoors because the weather would give me anxiety) and they are all so expensive! The cheapest I could find was $650.00! I believe our ceremony is important but not for 30 minutes at $650.00. 

Would guests who are not invited to the ceremony feel "unimportant"? We are doing to the traditional reception where we are paying for the food, open bar, and dancing, so I would hope they don't feel like their only invited for the gifts. 

Thoughts?

Technically there is nothing wrong etiquette-wise with your plan. Considering the capacity of a courthouse for guests, there likely wouldn't be room for others.

I'm curious, though .... why not have the ceremony at the venue where you are planning your reception?

thisismynickname2

holyguacamole79 said:

Knottie1450057911 said:

My husband-to-be and I are considering doing a courthouse ceremony with our parents, siblings, and grandparents and then hosting a traditional reception.

Neither of us belong to a church and we respect the church too much to just try to find one to use as our ceremony venue. I've looked into non-denominational churches and other secular venues (that are not outdoors because the weather would give me anxiety) and they are all so expensive! The cheapest I could find was $650.00! I believe our ceremony is important but not for 30 minutes at $650.00. 

Would guests who are not invited to the ceremony feel "unimportant"? We are doing to the traditional reception where we are paying for the food, open bar, and dancing, so I would hope they don't feel like their only invited for the gifts. 

Thoughts?

Technically there is nothing wrong etiquette-wise with your plan. Considering the capacity of a courthouse for guests, there likely wouldn't be room for others.

I'm curious, though .... why not have the ceremony at the venue where you are planning your reception?

I second this question. We did our ceremony and reception in one spot. The DJ did the ceremony music. Ceremony was 6-6:20pm and then we went right to cocktails and the whole traditional reception. I strongly suggest this method. Why do you want a family-only ceremony?

CMGragain

If you would like a Christian marriage ceremony, United Methodist ministers will marry non-church members as long as at least one of them has Christian beliefs.  They would marry you either in their church, or at your reception site.
Nothing wrong with your plans, though.  Just make sure that what you do is the right thing for you.  No re-dos later!

DarthV8r

CMGragain said:

If you would like a Christian marriage ceremony, United Methodist ministers will marry non-church members as long as at least one of them has Christian beliefs.  They would marry you either in their church, or at your reception site.
Nothing wrong with your plans, though.  Just make sure that what you do is the right thing for you.  No re-dos later!

First United Methodist in my city quoted me for over $1,000 to have my ceremony in their church.

To the O.P. it might not be your vision, but you will save yourself stress, money, and any hurt feelings of guests to have it all in one location.

huskypuppy14

Even doing it at the reception venue might be more than 650.00. I had my ceremony outside at my reception venue and it was 1000.00. That included them setting up and tearing down the chairs.

DarthV8r

huskypuppy14 said:

Even doing it at the reception venue might be more than 650.00. I had my ceremony outside at my reception venue and it was 1000.00. That included them setting up and tearing down the chairs.

No separate set up, no extra fees. I'm getting married in a banquet room while everyone is already seated. Not my vision, but it is what I can afford and I feel like a better host. No seats and no room at the justice of the peace so that wouldn't work for me. It's upsetting too because our j.o.p is gorgeous and cheaper than an officiant. I also had to hear crap from my mother about my wedding being tacky. Oh well at least I'm not going into debt and can still throw an awesome reception with free flowing spaghetti and wine.

downtondiva

DarthV8r said:

Even doing it at the reception venue might be more than 650.00. I had my ceremony outside at my reception venue and it was 1000.00. That included them setting up and tearing down the chairs.

No separate set up, no extra fees. I'm getting married in a banquet room while everyone is already seated. Not my vision, but it is what I can afford and I feel like a better host. No seats and no room at the justice of the peace so that wouldn't work for me. It's upsetting too because our j.o.p is gorgeous and cheaper than an officiant. I also had to hear crap from my mother about my wedding being tacky. Oh well at least I'm not going into debt and can still throw an awesome reception with free flowing spaghetti and wine.

Free flowing spaghetti and wine sounds good to me! 

Our ceremony and reception were at the same venue, and I believe the ceremony fee was $500, though of course we did also have to pay an officiant. I don't see anything wrong with your plan, OP, but if you'd like to try to include more people at your ceremony, you might want to at least ask your venue what they'd charge. You may be surprised, or there might be some room for negotiation.

missfrodo

With my venue, I think I had the option to buy an extra hour of space rental, which we bought so we could have the ceremony without shortening the reception.  When looking at venues, ask them if you can rent the space for an additional hour (most places will rent you 4 or 5 hrs to start).  Your venue should be able to accommodate this, unless they have another event booked back-to-back with yours.  Many event centers have expandable rooms, and I imagine it wouldn't cost that much more to rent an expanded space to allow for ceremony and reception.  

LD1970

I got married by a judge at my reception venue. Call the municipal court judge in the town where you're getting married, and the mayor too. See if they'll do it. Mine was free; I knew him, but he wasn't actually allowed to charge had he not been inclined to give me a break.

thisismynickname2

My venue booked in blocks of 6 hours, so we used the first 20 minutes for the ceremony and didn't even need "extra" time. They did not charge us anything more for the set up / take down of ceremony chairs, but some venues we looked at did charge another $200 or so, give or take, for that work. Then our officiant was $400 but that's the one we chose; other officiants we found were as little as $200.

So, yeah, OP hasn't responded yet about why the courthouse thing is appealing besides cost, but plenty of ideas to include all guests in the ceremony! 

SP29

As long as the ceremony is indeed "intimate", what you are planning is fine, but I would look to see what your venue would charge for the ceremony. Myself, I really enjoy the ceremony, so I prefer to see it as well, but I understand when I can't. 

We had our ceremony and reception in one place, same room. The cost was $450, and that included an entire room change over, as we had the seats set up in rows for the ceremony. It was quick though- 15 mins to bring the tables in (with centerpieces and linens set up already) and set chairs around.

However, there was another venue we considered were they wanted $450 for the ceremony and guests would sit at their reception tables (which made me wonder why so much, if there is no difference to the room?), and $700 if we wanted ceremony chairs set up then a room change over. 

MandyMost

I've been to weddings where the couple got married in the reception venue, with the guests seated at the same tables they would have been seated at for dinner. It worked out just fine, and no extra cost from the venue. In fact, no extra cost at all if you have a friend marry you (either an online minister thing, or some states grant the ability to marry someone just for one day, so you don't even have to become a "minister"). 

If the only reason is logistics/money, and not that you want a super-small ceremony, then I'd do something like that. 

lizardbit27

I'm a fan of having the ceremony and reception at the same venue, and this is what we are doing (ceremony in one room, reception upstairs in another room).As others have said, unless you purposely want a small ceremony, look at other options that your reception venue can provide. Our ceremony fee is waived by us going with the venue's "winter" package rate/choosing a date that is during their "winter" time frame (November - end of April).

drunkenwitch

I was also going to suggest just having the ceremony in the same place as the reception. You can hire a justice of the peace to perform it. Also, Unitarian ministers are happy to perform all types of weddings, many will keep them completely secular if you ask.