Advice for ceremony if already married?

My friend and his wife got married last year in their backyard with their immediate family and bridal party. They plan on having a vow renewal (which is what it is called since you already married) this fall. Their plan is to do it the same way they would have if they weren't already married. The bridal party will still walk down the aisle, the bride will still have her sad escort her down the aisle, and they will exchange vows and rings.

Hi Felicia! It's actually easier than you think to make some small tweaks to your marriage ceremony script to make it work for a vow renewal! ❤️

I'd have your friend open with the piece you loved from your legal ceremony, and also talk about why you're all there today - to finally celebrate together in person! You can definitely touch on the trials & tribulations of the last year.

You can exchange rings again or do a different unity ceremony - either way just tweak the vows and promises to say things like "will you continue to have Felicia as your wife" and "do you reaffirm your love for her, and will you love, honor and cherish her...". I'd recommend looking up sample vow renewal scripts online to see examples!

View Quoted Comment Thank you! I actually love the idea of just tweaking things! Also, I was talking with my husband and we think sealing a box with love letters and wine to open for a future anniversary would be a nice alternative to exchanging rings again. I think we figured it out now! Thanks again!

Sooo this was my exact situation. We got married on March 21, 2020 (covid wedding), did the real wedding this year March 20, 2021 (1 day shy of 1 year anniversary) my uncle married us at both and we considered this year the real wedding even though we were already married. Everything my uncle said was the same as it was year ago as were our vows. I took the 1 year anniversary as an opportunity to get a new band to exchange and hubby kept his old one and just took it off for the cemetery and I placed it back on him. I’m so glad that we had the opportunity to do everything as planned I say go for The Whole ceremony/reception no one will be opposed to it as I’m sure all friends and family attending will be happy to see everything as it was suppose to be a year ago. Good luck!

As well during the ceremony we included in our slideshow the pictures from our legal ceremony so everyone can see that part 🥰

We are doing this in May! We got legally married in July 2020. We actually did not do the full ceremony then - just the basic I-do's. We will have personal, written vows to exchange in May, as well a few other traditional rituals we'd like to do in front of everyone. But we are changing the wording of everything to be "I promise to continue..." to make it sound like more of a renewal.

Following this because we are in a similar boat!

Still hoping more ideas come out of this thread.

Our wedding is in less than two months and I'm actually getting excited for it again. We legally married last year but our elopement was very short, disappointing, and only had a few witnesses. We are hoping to do a ceremony similar to what we would have originally done, but change the wording to reflect that we are already married, and will not exchange rings. Still kinda struggling to figure it out.

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Hey Kari,

My husband and I decided on keeping the opening statement that our friend who officiated last year's ceremony shared - it was beautiful and fit us perfectly. As far as vows, we plan to share what our first year of marriage has been like/taught us instead of redoing them. In place of a ring exchange, we plan to write each other letters and place them in a wooden box with some wine to seal in front of everyone, so basically a little unity thing. We plan to open the box on our 5th wedding anniversary. I think changing the wording and adding in some type of meaningful unity-type thing to do in place of a ring exchange would be good ideas for you to consider. I actually found some old articles here on WW that shared ideas about different things you could do in general for a ceremony that can be easily adapted to the "second wedding" boat a lot of us have found ourselves in. Hope this helps! Be creative and make it your own - given everything we've all been through, no one is expecting a perfect or traditional wedding anymore. This is a chance to set yourself apart!

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Thanks! This is great advice.

Hi Felicia! My husband and I cancelled our wedding on 8/22/20 due to COVID and eloped privately instead. We rescheduled the original wedding for our 1 year anniversary 8/22/21 so that we can have the wedding as we planned with everyone. We are still calling it a wedding but not exchanging vows and changing wording to celebrate our love and our first year of many. I am excited and honestly think this works better than one day because there will be zero pressure or stress for us. Hope you enjoy your celebration!

I've gotten so much backlash on other wedding forums and facebook groups. Being told I am sneaky and deceptive or just trying to mooch money from guests on a "fake wedding." My hubby and I married Feb 2023. Our son was born in 11/22 and he just legally adopted my daughter from another relationship. We were so excited to get married and wanted to plan it at all and do the big day. But my mom was just so against it. She's against everything I want to do in life. She had no issue when my brother and his wife did the same exact thing. Married at the courthouse then wedding two years later. In fact she funded the whole damn thing. He's always been the golden boy. ANYWAYS, that is why we ran off to the courthouse with our kids. I got sick of her being so negative about me wanting a wedding. But now, I really wished I had ignored her and just did what my hubby and I wanted to do. I missed out on the first dance, father daughter dance, father walking me down the aisle, bridal party, grooms party, ALL OF IT. Now we want to plan for a "wedding" for 2025. Am I in the wrong for doing this? Can my dad still walk me down the aisle? Can we still have our bridal and grooms party? How would I word the invites? Now, not everyone knows I am married. They just know he and I are still together. Just my parents and us know. How do I even begin planning a wedding that isn't "real" cause Im being told I am wasting money for a wedding sham.

I believe following your heart and what works for your household and partnership is best. So glad to find this post it has helped me with some true clarity as I have been thinking of this option as well. I love considering it the vow renewal or celebration of our continue devotion to our love.


We must remember the true happiness is when we follow our heart. If our partners agree then that is the only thing that matters. The goal is for us to become so that is trusting in our teamwork and agreements. Thank you all for sharing and helping me without even knowing it. Continue covering peace growth love and protection over everyone’s union❤️❤️❤️

Following! We have a similar situation. We did our 'legal bit' this year in May with family (20 people - bigger than we wanted due to politics but there we are)... and are doing our 'main wedding' in Italy next year on the same date. Post covid costs went wild so after waiting 2 years already we decided to get on with the legal bit in case we had to drop out of Italy due to costs.. Anyway now we're not entirely sure how to go about this. What does one say at the end? 'We now pronouns you husband and wife' sounds a bit strange given we've technically been married a year by then. Can anyone share their order of service?

View Quoted Comment I don’t think it’s fake at all in my opinion some people wouldn’t take the celebration as serious if you focused on sharing that you already married and maybe others will thank you lying. I feel like I just wanted whom ever we invite to the celebration to come enjoy with us. I don’t even need a gift this is my desire after giving my husband his request. Yes we are doing the already married ceremony because he wanted to be married before living together I compromised but still wanted the ceremony we discussed in January. I told my boys he told anyone he could that wasn’t in the plans , now I feel like don’t blurt it out just change some if the wording in the vow.

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There's nothing wrong with a postponed celebration of marriage or an anniversary party. There is, and always will be something wrong with lying to people and misrepresenting what they are actually being invited to attend. Once you involve guests it's not just about you anymore. People have the right to decide and to prioritize as they see fit.