ethicalweddings.com

Getting married is definitely starting to feel real now!

Over the last week we’ve been home to visit our church, hear our banns being read out and finalise the details of the ceremony with them, have attended our final marriage preparation session, and bought our wedding rings.

We found it exciting to sit in church and hear our marriage being announced and prayed for (and it’s even better when no-one objects!!).

Going through the details of the ceremony with the church, and looking at the marriage vows in our marriage preparation session has brought it home that we’re actually going to be doing it for real. It was a thrill to see our names inserted into the text of the vows for the first time!

We’ve heard the wedding vows a hundred times before, but it’s a whole different thing to think about making those vows ourselves and what it will mean practically to keep them.

If you get the chance to go to some marriage preparation classes I’d strongly recommend them. Marriage is probably going to mean a bigger change for us than for many couples who have already been living together for some time, but I think they would still be worth doing even then as they give you a great opportunity to sit back and think about your relationship, your plans for the future, and to find out ways of communicating better with one another.

It’s a useful chance to actually talk about the commitments you are making, and think about what marriage means to you both. It’s been a good way of re-focussing us and helping us see each other’s needs, which has been very positive for our relationship!

And we have rings! We went on a trip to Cred in Chichester for Valentine’s Day to order our rings, and they were very friendly and helpful. I’ve actually had my ring on already as one of the ones in the shop fitted – despite my dislike of rings I’m now really looking forward to being able to wear it properly!

Probably the most impressive thing about their shop is that they had a screen up showing a slide show of how they source their gold and diamonds ethically, and a pile of petition cards on the counter alongside their promotional leaflets. Pretty cool!

Very exciting I’m sure it will sink in even further when we actually have our rehearsal, but there’s still plenty to do before we get there!

Take care, love, Helen and Mike

(woooooooo, we’re getting married!!!!!!!!!!!! )