Premarital Counseling, part tres + ceremony music

Catch up on Part 1 and Part 2.

This was our last counseling session with the reverend before the ceremony. It was crazy to hear him say, "OK- see you at the rehearsal!" We're getting so much closer... wow!

Anyway, so we mainly went over the actual wedding ceremony. We're getting married in a Presbyterian church and he uses traditional vows, which I love. Also, Matt & I will be saying the same thing, which was also important to us.

I feel weird about posting all about the ceremony and music now pre-wedding, so here is a basic summary. I will go into more detail post-wedding, I promise!

Prelude music:
Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring-- Bach
Arioso- Bach
Clair de Lune- Debussy
Air on the G String- Bach


Music for Grandparents & Parents to enter:
Sonata for Clarinet & Piano in E Flat Major by Camille Saint-Saens
[My brother will be playing this, and I'm so excited! He was a music performance major in college but since graduation, I haven't heard him play. Even though I'll be stuck in my little bridal room, I'm happy he'll be playing at the wedding nonetheless :)]

Bridesmaids Processional:
Canon in D by Pachelbel


Bridal Processional:
Largo by Handel


Then we'll have the giving of the bride, followed by prayer and scripture readings. Then we'll have the Declaration of Intent (the I Do part), along with the Affirmation of Families and Affirmation of Congregation. Then coems the marriage vows and exchange of rings. We pray again, then there is an announcement of marriage, followed by the benediction. Then the most famous line "You may now kiss your bride."

Recessional [yes, went totally traditional on this]:
Wedding March by Mendelssohn


Badaboom, badabing. We're married in all about 20 minutes. It's ironic how short it is since this is the most important part of the day. I often lose sight of that, though I wish that wasn't the case. Silly wedding industry.


But I am really looking forward to the ceremony and saying the vows. It is such an important moment for Matt & me, one I want to remember forever.

Invites... done!

Invitations were put in the mail yesterday! Hooray!! I will share them with you in about a week after everyone else has had a chance to receive them. I love them; they're quite spring-like yet simple. 

I will say, I despise stuffing envelopes. Response cards + response envelopes + reception cards + invites + website card all in inner envelope and then that in the outer envelope. Boooo... but it's done!:)

Matt & I had our last premarital counseling session yesterday, and that went really well. Talked about the order of the ceremony and whatnot. So with invites done and having the order of the wedding done, I guess it's official! 


I have my bridal portraits today. Pray that the weather holds out! I will definitely update you on that later.


Until next time, everyone have a great Sunday!

Premarital counseling, part dos + Meeting with Music Minister

Haven't read the first counseling session?? Go here.

One of the things Matt & I did between New Year's and our New Orleans trip was have our second meeting with Reverend Jones, you know, the guy who is going to perform the ceremony. This appointment was not nearly as awkward as the first one, which was nice, but it was really helpful like the first session was. He read us two passages from the Bible, and commented on them and described his own marriage and how it related.

The first passage was from Genesis 2:24- "For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh" [NIV]. I know most of us have heard that verse before, but Rev Jones described it in a new way that I hadn't thought of before-- when you get married, you leave your old life behind as you start a new one [parallels becoming a Christian]. He talked about letting bad habits die as well as getting rid of negative people in your life (that is those that think negatively of marriage and/or your spouse). It seems a bit obvious, but I never made that connection before. 

The second passage was the traditional 1 Corinthians 13:4-8a- "

 ⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.|⁸ Love never fails." (NIV) For this, Rev Jones described various situations in his own marriage. One of the themes he touched on was based on verse 5. In marriage, it is no longer 'me succeeding' or 'you succeeding.' Instead, it is 'we fail' or 'we succeed.' 

Basically, just good things to remember.

After that, we met with the new music director at the church. He is a rather young guy from New York, and very cool & easy to talk to. He was open to anything (i.e. remake of the "I Gotta Feeling" processional), but Matt & I believe the ceremony to be the most important part of the wedding. Obviously it is where we actually get married. Everything else is just (expensive) fluff. Being significant then, we wanted the traditional music. I know I prefer the piano to the organ, and besides not wanting to have the Bridal Processional be the "Bridal Chorus" (AKA 'hear comes the bride...'), I had no preference.

So he gave us several options for each slot where we need to have music, and with the help of YouTube and google, we have been able to come up with a decent list. Once we make the final decision I'll let you know! But I'm excited-- it's going to be pretty and not too formal or traditional. 

How did you pick your bridal processional? Or have you always just known that you wanted to walk down the aisle to a particular song?

 

Premarital counseling, part uno

Now that A&M classes have started, not as much wedding stuff is going on, simply because we've done a lot. That was completely my intention, and I like that now I can focus on my homework, my thesis, and grad school apps. So what I do cover wedding-wise will mostly be from back in the summer, pre-blog. Though, I did do something wedding-related yesterday. I messaged my bridesmaids for a date to go look for dresses. That's something, right? Here's the info on that:

• Location: David's Bridal
• Color: Wisteria 
• Length: Knee length
• I'm going to let the girls choose what dress they want. If they all want different ones, cool, if they all choose the same one, that's cool, too. I want them to feel pretty and confident in front of all those strangers, and this way I have 1 less decision to make!

K, there's your dress info. Now moving on to the topic at hand...

A couple of months ago, Matt and I will visiting my family in Houston, met with Rev. Dr. Jones, the minister that is going to perform the ceremony, for the first of 3 premarital counseling meetings. As he said, the ceremony is the easy part. It's the marriage that's hard. That is something both Matt and I completely agree with, and we want to maintain our focus on our relationship, and keep it centered on God throughout the planning. 

So at our first meeting, we didn't even discuss the ceremony. First, we talked a little bit about ourselves, and then why we loved each other, why we wanted to get married, all that, in addition to our future plans. Then Dr. Jones talked to us about marriage, what to expect, and a lot of other things that I won't go into detail here. He recommended we read a book called His Needs, Her Needs by William Harley, Jr, that Matt has started and says is really good. I can't wait to read it so we can discuss things, but in the meantime, one of my classes this semester is a Marriage Institution class. The first book we're reading and discussing is literally titled How to Make Anyone Fall in Love with You. First, I do NOT recommend this book for anyone because it just builds these superficial relationships based on deception and manipulation. But, I will say that it has shown me that Matt and I have a much better relationship than anyone that follows that book would have. 

Anyway, I know this has been a very vague post, but if you have more questions, ask me. 

So have a great weekend! Date night, Midnight Yell, and A&M's first football game (BTHO SFA!) are all in my plans, so should be fun!