Marriage Certificate Signing

I wanted to so the signing during the ceremony (after the vows) but it turns out in my county we don't sign the license at all

This is something you discuss with your officiant. Usually it takes 5 minutes and you just sneak away during cocktail hour.

Following

Does your county actually require a signature? Ours only required the signature of our officiant (he signed it while we took photos). Some jurisdictions do, some don't, so if you're unsure, call your county clerk's office!

If you do need to sign and/or need witnesses and you want to do it during the ceremony, I'd do it in lieu of a unity candle. There's nothing that symbolizes unity more than signing a legally binding document!

Page Celia

We were prepared to sign right after the ceremony while our families got assembled for pictures but in our county signing wasn't necessary.

Ask your officiant.

Where we live, I have yet to see a ceremony where they did NOT sign the license during the ceremony.

You need to ask your officiant, who is the only person who can help you with this.

For my first marriage, only signatures on the license were the officiant and 2 witnesses. It was 40 years ago, so I don't remember "when" it was done, but it was not during the ceremony. It was either before or after, and done privately, only the 3 that were signing and the 2 of us, no pictures. Perhaps it was a bad omen that they signed 2 originals - one for him and one for me. I still have mine - somewhere.

I didn't even know it was a thing to not sign the license during ceremony. Maybe it's where I am from but it is always done right after the vows. B&G sign and then the two witnesses sign and the officiant signs. Once done everyone takes their places up front and that's when you are announced as husband and wife

I guess it depends where you live. I got my marriage license in Virginia. We had to sign it when we applied for it. At the wedding - the officiant signed it there and processed it with the county.

The only thing we signed was the application for the marriage license. My MOH and FH's BM disappeared with the officiant and out Marriage license...came back and everything was done. This was all done before the ceremony as well.

I signed my first one at the rehearsal and when I was the MOH we also signed at the rehearsal.

We signed at the rehearsal and anytime either one of us has been in a bridal party that's when it was done.

Some states don't require the couple to sign it. Only our officiant signed ours - I'm pretty sure he signed it before the rehearsal dinner, so who even knows if that's legal.

We signed at the courthouse and they printed the paper work with our signatures. I handed the package to our officiant prior to the wedding. While we were waiting for the ceremony to begin, our officiant pulled BM and MOH to sign their sections.

Yeah VA signs to applies and we don't need witnesses

In NJ, the couple doesn't sign it so problem solved, but even if they did, I wouldn't do it during the ceremony. Everyone is too wrought and it's hard enough to get them to do it right when there aren't 100 people watching. I also normally don't have the photographer take photos of it. I had a photographer do a photo dump on FB and all the couples info went right to the page; including the notification to anyone who saw it that, *hey! We're out of town and here's our address!"

I usually have the witnesses sign ahead of time (and the couple too in NYC), so I am not in everyone's hair afterwards (especially if there is no first look) but do NOT do it at the rehearsal. What happens if something awful happens to your officiant? And you have to get a sub? This happens more often than you think; I get those calls. And then you're screwed.

And to not give the license to your officiant ahead of time. Same deal. If you want to make sure it gets there, bring it to your venue and ask them to lock it in the safe.

My officiants are really anal about their licenses because if something is wrong, it can take months to fix it if the local clerks don't catch it.

All that being said, I've done several Canadian couples and apparently it's standard to sign it during the ceremony. I usually did it after the rings, before the pronouncement.

We didn't have to sign the license.

We're signing during the ceremony and taking the opportunity to do a musical interlude while we're doing that. (I'm Canadian and I think it's been that way at every wedding I've ever gone to--didn't realize till seeing @Celia's comment that it must be some national quirk