Get married in US before destination wedding?

slw196 · September 2009

We are in the very beginning stages of planning our destination wedding. We are not planning to have a religious ceremony. I see that different islands have different requirements for marriage. I am just wondering whether it is easier to just get married in the US by a justice of the peace or something beforehand. Then our destination wedding would just be symbolic since we'd already be married, which is fine with me. Do people do this? See any pros/cons to doing it this way?

autzen1024 · September 2009

Hi!! Congrats on doing a DW

We are getting married in MX, May 5, 2011. We are going to JOP(Justice of peace) before hand then having a symbolic ceremony. The best pro for us is the symbolic ceremony is SO much cheaper then an "actual" ceremony. We also won't have to be there 4 business days before the wedding and get blood work done and wait for our marriage license, I'm not a patient person

Cons, some people, well most in our case, will already know that we have been to the JOP and might think it's weird that we still wanted to go down to MX and have a ceremony. I am not sure if the marriage licenses are dated, I'm sure they are, and they will not have our actual anniversary on it. We are getting married 05/05/2011 in MX but we will be getting the license a different day. We won't say vows at the JOP, just sign the paper work. So, to us our anniversary will be the day that we say the vows to each other. HTH!!!

Future.Mrs.H. · September 2009

A lot of people do this. I did it. We went to the courthouse, got legally married and out wedding is next month. We chose not to tell anyone, because we don't want people saying that the DW is not out "real" wedding. In our case the reason for doing this was France's recidency requirements. Other people do it to avoid blot tests and because it's just easier to have the marriage recognize in the States, no translation and no other requirememnts.My suggestion is to first choose a place and check how easy it is to get legally married there. If it's to hard just go to the JOP before of after the wedding and get the papers.Happy Planning!

Orchid2011 · September 2009

I know many girls here are doing that. Personally I don't want to do it like that because since this would be my first marriage I want everything to be special and I want to celebrate just one anniversarry. So I'll be doing a legal ceremony in dominican republic and the requirements are not bad at all. I guess is all up to how you feel about it and what is more convenient for you.

DreamsBride411 · September 2009

Awww, Normailed, I remember when you got married - I just happened to check the DW board that day!We got married here in the states (by my best friend's father who was my pastor) in my best friend's dining room 4 days before we left for Mexico. It was truly awesome and made it very special.My BFF's dad married us symbolically in Mexico too - saved a LOT of BS paperwork not having to get married there then going through making our marriage legal here.Make life simple. It took nothing away from our "real" special day.

kreeves42 · September 2009

We too got legally married here in the US before going to Mexico. We went the week before we left and then did a symbolic ceremony in Mexico. We only told our 2 friends that went with us as witnesses since they couldn't come to Mexico. I think it worked out great.

HappyMel · September 2009

We're getting married in the US before the DW too. Like you said, there are so many different requirements and fees. We figured that it would be easier and cut down on the stress of the event if we had the legal part done here. Of course, FI seems to think going to the JOP means just signing a piece of paper, but I'll fill him in on that later

drm6285 · September 2009

We're doing a JOP ceremony too, it just seemed like too much work to go through all the stuff in DR (DR is def NOT as bad as some places, i.e. MX, but still too much work for me). The only people we've told about our plans are our family. At first I worried about people finding out and not seeing it as a "real" wedding then, but then I got over it and decided I really didn't care and that the ones that love us will come regardless of whether our ceremony is symbolic or civil- my TA says you can't tell the difference anyways between the two when you're there witnessing the ceremony.

Get married in US before destination wedding?

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