Unity Candle

ncramey61513

Is it necessary for the mothers to light the initial candles for the Unity Candle Ceremony?  Chances are, my fiance will not have any family in attendence except his kids.  We were going to have me & my daughter hold one candle and him and his 2 kids hold the other to light our candle, but I don't know if that's ok.  Does that make sense?

lovefuzzies

I think that would be lovely. 

bar10521

I love that idea! I actually like it a lot more than having the mom's do it.

Gumby68

We are having our grandmothers light the initial candles as neither of our mothers will be there. You could each pick someone important to you that will light the initial candle. 

Another idea to include your family would be to have a multi-wick unity candle. My dad did that at his wedding to my step-mom, and we all thought it worked really well. They used a three-wick candle, and it was my dad, step-mom, me, my sister, and my two step-brothers, and we each had our own initial candle. My dad and step-mom lit one of the wicks, and then I think me and one of my step-brothers lit another and my sister and the other step-brother lit the last one. In your situation, it might work better to get a two wick candle so that you and your Fi light one, and the kids light the other. 

One thing you'll want to be careful with if you go with a multi-wick candle is the wax pouring off the initial candles onto the unity candle. A regular unity candle usually comes to a point at the top so it's not a problem, whereas the wick is coming out of a flat part on multi-wick candles. We had a very embarassing/amusing "situation" where the wax poured all over the wicks, and we were unable to light it. The pastor had to come dig out a little area for each of the wicks so that we could light it. Our families got a huge laugh out of it, and we got over the embarassment quickly.