city hall weddings - how do they work????

jdehart19

we want to have a very simple, SMALL wedding and decided on city hall/justice of the peace. how does all that work - as in what are the "rules" for this? we are thinking going to lunch afterwards and then my then husband and I are going on a honeymoon for the weekend.
suggestions on how all this works(who pays what, proper to have lunch at a restaurant etc.)??????

skippylouwho

This is the truth.  My DH and I had been married before and wanted a simple wedding.

We invited both sets of parents and planned to be married at the court house. We applied for our license and asked then about having a judge marry us 1 week to the day later.  At that time you applied and had to wait 7 days to get married, I'm not sure what the law is now.

They told us no problem, come down and a judge would marry us between cases, no appointment necessary, first judge available would do it.

We paid the license fee, think it was about $25.

The following week we both had the next Friday off (1 week after application) becuase our work places observed Martin Luther King day that day and it gave us a 3 day weekend.  So with parents in tow we went to the court house. The county offices were open, they were going to celebrate MLK day the following Monday - however the judges were all off (must have been city??) were ALL off because they were celebrating MLK day THAT day.  Not a single judge was available.

We called the pastors of our respective churches, not available. Called the mayor of our suburb, not available.  My MIL had done volunteer work, through her church, at her county jail and remember that most jails have chaplains. Our county jail is part of the courthouse building so the receptionist called the jail to ask if the chaplain was in, he was and they put him on the phone with her.

She asked if he would perform a wedding. His first question was "are they in-mates?"  When he found we weren't in-mates he had us come to a conference room in the jail where he married us. He had been ready to leave for the day but because he never got to preside over a "normal" marriage, he was excited to do it for us.  He would not let us pay him. all we paid was for the postage stamp to mail the license in.

By the time we were done it was late afternoon so we went out for an early dinner at a favorite restaurant. My parents picked up the bill.

jdehart19

that's a very odd story - no offense of course - but a very good one to remember for the rest of your life.
where we are it's 3 days before, for the license. i would just hope that you don't have to wait in line or something like that (assuming & hoping a judge WOULD be there).did it seem tacky? and we don't know how the room looks that the judge does it in, nice, a regular courtroom or...? we also want to ensure it is done in the morning right before lunch time (to then go to eat), would that be a issue (like if you have to wait in line)?
maybe someone knows this stuff...??? if not i guess i'll have to contact the court house & get more info.....
either way, stories of how it worked out are greatly appreciated!!!

preciosa4

My husband and I had a very positive experience, actually.  For immigration reasons, we had to separate our civil and religious ceremonies, and we kept some things, such as the ring exchange for the religious ceremony.  That said, it was still lovely.  My family was there, as was his best friend.  (A big group all in all.)  We had to first set an appointment at the courthouse, then get the marriage license.  (We needed 7-30 days in between the 2.  The details depend on where you get married.)  For the ceremony, I wore a nice dress and he wore a suit.  I carried a small bouquet and he had a rose on his lapel.  We had a private courtroom, and the judge was fantastic.  It was simple, brief, and straitforward, but they made it a lot nicer than I expected.  It was quite romantic, really.  I was afraid of standing in line behind a guy in shackes, or something and having the officiant never meet our eyes and just rattle off the formalities.  Not at all!  (Though we DID have to go through metal detectors to get into the building, LOL.)  Afterward, we went out for drinks and then dinner at a restaurant.  My parents kindly picked up the tab and even provided us with a small wedding cake.  It was lovely.