Ceremony programs

hvcfringe

I am starting to think about my ceremony programs and what should be on them and how to organize it. We are having a full mass and have not yet decided on music(still need to contact the piano lady). Can you give me ideas of what your doing/did?

egm900

We're putting everything in the program, including when to sit, stand, and kneel, but we're anticipating 200 guests, with less than 20 that are Catholic.

professorscience

We had fairly simple programs for a mass.  The only thing I included was the responses to the readings and psalm.  Aside from that, I just broke down the different parts of the mass.  I managed to fit it all onto a 4x9 card.

bibliophile2010

I did mine on the booklet setting of Microsoft Word (you do it in the correct order, then it prints the pages appropriately for folding and printing -- great if you have more than 4 pages!). It was 8 total pages. We also did an outer cover that was a piece of cardstock with a cross stamped on it. The whole thing was "bound" with a pink ribbon (though really just folded well and stuffed).

The actual program contained:

Page 1 -- Title page (names, date, place)
Page 2  -- Wedding Party
Page 3 -- Family
Page 4-7 -- Order of mass
Page 8 -- Thank yous, Memorial and Directions to Reception

We included longer stuff: song lyrics, Lord's Prayer, citations to readings. We omitted the quick responses and sit/stand/kneel cues -- I felt like it was one of those things that, unless you were following along closely, you would miss, then fumble through your program and by then it was too late to really change anything. If I were doing it now, with the new translation, I might be more inclined to include responses if pew cards were not readily available (for example, they are at my usual parish, but are not at another parish I attend frequently).

HandBanana

I bought program stock from Target on clearance but had them printed at a printer with the nice raised print.  No images or pictures.  Just black ink on ivory paper but I took a month to pick different fonts and to perfect the layout cause I am crazy.

Cover: Our names, date, church
Inside left: Priest, Wedding Party, Parents, Grandparents, Readers, Altar Servers, Organist
Inside right: details about the mass, readings, order, songs, etc.
Back: thank you note to friends and family, memorial to those who have passed, and an Ani Difranco song quote

newlyseliski

Our church made ours and it was essentially a legal-sized piece of paper folded in half and printed on both sides!  (image in my "Wedding Mass" portion of bio linked below) However, ours were made prior to the new translation of the Mass... so depending on your guests, you may also want to include the new responses in your program or direct them to whatever guides your church may have available to parishioners in the pews for following the order of the Mass!  

OliveOilsMom

I created a Word template and got everything down to 1 page front & back, so all I did was fold them after printing.  We did not do extended readings or other responses, but 90% of our guestlist was Catholic. 

We got married after the new translation and I asked our priest if we should include the new responses.  He said it wasn't necessary.  He announced at the beginning of mass the words had changed and to use the cards in the pews to follow along. 

Eliz77

I am going to work on my programs this weekend and this thread provided a lot of help! 

One question though...I have to somehow distribute directions from Church to reception. Would it be rude to include it with program, like as an insert, or would I be better off having someone hand out direction cards after ceremony?

professorscience

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/cultural-wedding-boards_catholic-weddings_ceremony-programs?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Cultural%20Wedding%20BoardsForum:615Discussion:ad34b071-0bfc-4829-9893-570158fe7f23Post:d4082beb-db8d-419b-9926-2f1f91af8cc0">Re: Ceremony programs</a>:
[QUOTE]I am going to work on my programs this weekend and this thread provided a lot of help!  One question though...I have to somehow distribute directions from Church to reception. Would it be rude to include it with program, like as an insert, or would I be better off having someone hand out direction cards after ceremony?
Posted by Eliz77[/QUOTE]

<div>I think either would be fine, although the second option would probably be cheaper.  My coordinator made some really simple directions and we handed them out as the guests left (I think Father may have mentioned that maps were available).</div>

bibliophile2010

As I mentioned above, we included it right on the programs.

If I was doing something separate, I'd probably try to hand them out, since people notoriously ignore wedding programs.

Eliz77

OK-so you printed them out on programs-I missed the part about Page 8! I was thinking of an insert, but I haven't even started making mine so will see how much room there is-we plan on it being only 4 sided. The directions our venue provides is useless for guests attending our ceremony, and the address is very GPS friendly, so I need to provide something.

christyhal

We included directions on the back of our programs, as well as in an insert in our invitations.  I don't know which people used more, but I didn't hear about anyone getting lost.  

I always carry the invite with me if it has any useful info like that in it, because you never know what will be in the program.  But I suspect a lot of people don't do this, and it's nice to put the info in whatever you're giving them at the church, just in case - particularly if, as in our case, there is construction going on that will affect how to get to your reception but which your GPS might not know about!