Honoring Cousins

garcias1

This may not be the best forum for this as it's not exactly a Wedding Party dilemma (wedding party is already picked and has all been asked), but I was hoping for suggestions for how to honor my cousins during our wedding day.  My one cousin is a BM.  I have two other female cousins, whom I have asked to hand out the programs to guests coming into the ceremony and hand out bubbles going out of the ceremony (I know this is frowned upon as a boring task, but my cousins have learning disabilities - part of the reason I didn't think they could handle being BMs - and they are excited about it).

So, I have three boy cousins I want to honor.  I want to ask my one boy cousin to be an usher with my FI's cousin.  Then I am trying to figure out a way to honor my other two boy cousins (not because I have to, but because I want to).  We already have an idea of who we want to do the reading, so that is probably not an option. 

So what I was thinking was that I would buy Flip cameras and ask them to video tape the ceremony and reception.  We aren't having a videographer, and my cousins are 19 and 11, so I think this would be a fun thing to do.  I wouldn't require them to tape anything in particular.  I would just tell them to do what they want:  they could just pick up the cameras if they thought there was something interesting to record.  The other option is to ask them both to be ushers for a total of 4 ushers (we are inviting about 220 people, so wedding might be big).

So what are people's thoughts?  Should I ask them to video tape, ask them to be ushers, or does anyone have any other ideas?

Beachy730

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_honoring-cousins?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding BoardsForum:37Discussion:ce35363e-8f69-46c2-a61d-695d572fb5c5Post:885189d5-b690-49f9-b2e6-34b1a346fe8a">Honoring Cousins</a>:
[QUOTE]This may not be the best forum for this as it's not exactly a Wedding Party dilemma (wedding party is already picked and has all been asked), but I was hoping for suggestions for how to honor my cousins during our wedding day.  My one cousin is a BM.  I have two other female cousins, whom I have asked to hand out the programs to guests coming into the ceremony and hand out bubbles going out of the ceremony (I know this is frowned upon as a boring task, but my cousins have learning disabilities - part of the reason I didn't think they could handle being BMs - and they are excited about it). So, I have three boy cousins I want to honor.  I want to ask my one boy cousin to be an usher with my FI's cousin.  Then I am trying to figure out a way to honor my other two boy cousins (not because I have to, but because I want to).  We already have an idea of who we want to do the reading, so that is probably not an option.  So what I was thinking was that I would buy Flip cameras and ask them to video tape the ceremony and reception.  We aren't having a videographer, <strong>and my cousins are 19 and 11, so I think this would be a fun thing to do.</strong>  I wouldn't require them to tape anything in particular.  I would just tell them to do what they want:  they could just pick up the cameras if they thought there was something interesting to record.  The other option is to ask them both to be ushers for a total of 4 ushers (we are inviting about 220 people, so wedding might be big). So what are people's thoughts?  Should I ask them to video tape, ask them to be ushers, or does anyone have any other ideas?
Posted by garcias1[/QUOTE]

It might be fun for the 11 year old, but definitely not for the 19 year old. 

Either ask them to be ushers, or let them be guests.  Or ask the 19 year old to be an usher and the 11 year old to videotape.  However, videotaping would be a job, not an honor, so you would need to pay him. 

frogurt814

Have them be ushers or just have them be guests.  Buy them boutineers and have them sit at the front of the church.  Include them in your big family pictures.

I don't think you should ask them to videotape the ceremony and/or reception.

aerinpegadrak

If you're asking them to film your wedding, you should find out the going rate for videographers in your area and compensate them accordingly.  That's not an honor role, it's a job, a fairly demanding one that will keep them on the sidelines and prevent them from enjoying the party and visiting with family and friends.

I think it would probably be best to have them as ushers.

mbcdefg

If you asked me at that age to videotape your wedding, I'd be very nervous about properly capturing everything. I'd be reluctant to get up from my seat, walk to other tables to talk to family members, I'd be unsure of when to start/stop taping, etc.

So I think that asking them to tape things would put a lot of pressure on them, rather than letting them enjoy themselves.

Plus, I don't think, "Hey, you get to videotape my wedding!" is really an honor, even to kids and teens. Bridesmaid/groomsman is an honor, reader is an honor, usher is an honor. Disgusing a job as an honor isn't really going to fool anyone.

If you have to stretch for a role for these kids, I'd just let them be guests and have fun. Not find a job for them and try to convince them that it's an honor. I get wanting to include everyone, but even kids that age will understand that there are only so many "honorable" roles before things start to get ridiculous.

garcias1

Ok, I am going to rephrase the question, since I think people might be missing the point (mostly because I didn't put proper emphasis where I should have).  My main question is: are 4 ushers too many for my size wedding (220 invited, we are estimating that we will end up with about 150-170 guests who RSVP yes)?  Our first choice is to ask them to be ushers.  But since we thought 4 might be too much, we tried to come up with alternatives.  The only alternative we came up with is the video thing.  I am seeing your point that they might feel an obligation to video rather than enjoy the wedding, so that is probably out of the question.

We haven't asked anyone to be ushers or do the readings yet.  So we have time to change our minds as much as we want.

mbcdefg

No, I do not think that four ushers for a 150+ person wedding is too many.

Especially since people will realize that you're including young family members, not saying, "OMG, my wedding is so big and special that I need a million ushers."

Beachy730

No, 4 ushers would not be too much for a wedding that big.  They can just take turns if needed.  Are you definitely only having 1 reading?  We had 3 different readings in our ceremony, but it was a full Catholic mass. 

mbcdefg

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_honoring-cousins?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:37Discussion:ce35363e-8f69-46c2-a61d-695d572fb5c5Post:4cd0603a-2034-4818-8b00-a06272ad7980">Re: Honoring Cousins</a>:
[QUOTE]We had 3 different readings in our ceremony, but it was a full Catholic mass. 
Posted by dnbeach12[/QUOTE]

So did we. And we could've added a fourth if we opted to have a loved one read/sing the responsorial psalm.

We were also able to ask two loved ones to bring up Communion, and a third brought up our symbolic Gift for the Poor (but not every Catholic church does this, I think).

aerinpegadrak

Or you could add a second reading that maybe they could split.  Like a poem where they could trade off reading stanzas or something.  That way you could include them both, but it doesn't add too much length to the ceremony.

garcias1

We are doing ceremony without mass.  I am not 100% sure how it works, but I imagine that we will have 2 readings.  If there are only 2 readings, then we are asking our godmothers to do the readings.

mbcdefg

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_wedding-party_honoring-cousins?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:37Discussion:ce35363e-8f69-46c2-a61d-695d572fb5c5Post:6e0f69eb-ce27-4b8b-8808-ad79c0dbde53">Re: Honoring Cousins</a>:
[QUOTE]We are doing ceremony without mass.  I am not 100% sure how it works, but I imagine that we will have 2 readings.  If there are only 2 readings, then we are asking our godmothers to do the readings.
Posted by garcias1[/QUOTE]


I think you can have the Old Testament,Responsorial Psalm, New Testament and Prayer of the Faithful in a ceremony outside of Mass. <a href="http://catholicweddinghelp.com/topics/order-wedding-outside-mass.htm" rel="nofollow">http://catholicweddinghelp.com/topics/order-wedding-outside-mass.htm</a>

Ask your priest, though. We had a Mass so I didn't look into non-Mass ceremony layouts, so I may be wrong.

garcias1

Thanks for everyone's input.  I think we will go with ushers for now.  We don't want a ton of readings because we want to keep the ceremony short.  The priest has to do confession later in the day, and we want the ceremony to start as late as possible so that people who are traveling from far away will have enough time to get there.

trix1223

I don't have a comment on the boy cousins thing because I couldn't get past the fact that because two of your female cousins have learning disabilities they're "not up to the task" of being BMs.  Are you kidding me?  Please say you're kidding.  Please.

garcias1

Good point, I didn't think of that.  Thanks Amy - I'm assuming you're the Amy in David and Amy

garcias1

I am replacing this post because it had some personal information in it, and in retrospect, that was a bad idea.
Thanks.