Legal marriage at home before DW Advice?

Ladies: can any of you share your experience in getting legally married at home before your DW? I'm coming to the realization that getting legally married in the DR is just a very cumbersome and expensive process. Between the multitude of documents required, the fees, and having no guarantee that the judge will actually marry us at our ceremony and to top it off we may not have our executed marriage license for some time after...I'm kinda over it. So, now we are thinking of just getting legally married here in the states the week before we leave and have a Pastor marry us in front of our family and friends in a spiritual ceremony. The only thing is I'm not sure if we should have a mini-celebration here when we get legally married? And I mean VERY mini... we would go down to the courthouse/city hall by ourselves and I'll wear a simple white or cream dress, get married by a judge, and have a nice dinner with just our parents and maybe our siblings, OR doing the same thing except have a justice of the peace come to one of our parents homes instead . My fear is that our parents will want to make a fuss over it especially since some close relatives can't make it to our DW, and they'll want to invite the to this instead which in my opinion takes away from our DW. If we do a mini-thing here I'd like to keep it very quiet and no-production; its just tomake it legal, thats all. I feel like our WEDDING is going to be in DR. What to do?!?!! Please share your thoughts and advice!

There are tons of threads on this topic...

We got legally married the day after we came back from Mexico. We took our marriage license and went to a local judge, he said a few words & we were married. Super fast. It was just him & I. No one else and it was perfect. We both wore jeans! We didnt want to do a big or small thing because we will never celebrate that day. Our weddinganniversary is Mexico. After we left the courthouse we went to lunch like a normal day. 

My plan all along was to get married before we left for Mexico but it was actually hard to do! Trying to track down a district judge that would do it & had the available dates was impossible! It was actually shocking! lol But I am glad we did it when we came home because it brought back all our emotions and memories from Mexico. 

We didnt tell anyone about it at first but in Mexico some people asked about the legal work and we then told them but only if they asked. And no one thought any different of our wedding in Mexico.

Basically, its whatever you want to do. There is no right or wrong way to do it. Good luck & congrats!

I think its personal preference.  I knew that the day I stood in front of my family and friends at my destination wedding would be my legal wedding.  Thats mostly why we chose Jamaica, as its so easy to get legally married there, compared to Mexico, or DR.  For us it was really important.  If we had wanted to get married in a different destianation, such as DR, we probably would have gotten legally married before we went. 

I have heard of a lot of brides just simply going to the courthouse with there fiance and having a hush legal ceremony and didnt tell anyone. You could possibly do that.  Then you woudlnt have to worry about your mom trying to make it bigger then you want.  And that way no one will know any different on your wedding day in the DR.

Originally Posted by maridr2012 

Ladies: can any of you share your experience in getting legally married at home before your DW? I'm coming to the realization that getting legally married in the DR is just a very cumbersome and expensive process. Between the multitude of documents required, the fees, and having no guarantee that the judge will actually marry us at our ceremony and to top it off we may not have our executed marriage license for some time after...I'm kinda over it. So, now we are thinking of just getting legally married here in the states the week before we leave and have a Pastor marry us in front of our family and friends in a spiritual ceremony. The only thing is I'm not sure if we should have a mini-celebration here when we get legally married? And I mean VERY mini... we would go down to the courthouse/city hall by ourselves and I'll wear a simple white or cream dress, get married by a judge, and have a nice dinner with just our parents and maybe our siblings, OR doing the same thing except have a justice of the peace come to one of our parents homes instead . My fear is that our parents will want to make a fuss over it especially since some close relatives can't make it to our DW, and they'll want to invite the to this instead which in my opinion takes away from our DW. If we do a mini-thing here I'd like to keep it very quiet and no-production; its just tomake it legal, thats all. I feel like our WEDDING is going to be in DR. What to do?!?!! Please share your thoughts and advice!

My fiancee and I are having a legal wedding ceremony at our home about a week before we leave for Mexico. We are planning on having two people (the minimum requirement for witnessing a marriage in BC) that aren't able to come to Mexico with us over for dinner and having them witness our legal ceremony. We are not making anything big of it...I'll just wear whatever I'm wearing that day, and we will celebrate our wedding in Mexico as our anniversary!

If you really don't want to make a big deal of it, hopefully your parents respect that! Good luck making your decision! At the end of the day, do what makes you happy and makes sense for you.

Originally Posted by maridr2012 

Ladies: can any of you share your experience in getting legally married at home before your DW? I'm coming to the realization that getting legally married in the DR is just a very cumbersome and expensive process. Between the multitude of documents required, the fees, and having no guarantee that the judge will actually marry us at our ceremony and to top it off we may not have our executed marriage license for some time after...I'm kinda over it. So, now we are thinking of just getting legally married here in the states the week before we leave and have a Pastor marry us in front of our family and friends in a spiritual ceremony. The only thing is I'm not sure if we should have a mini-celebration here when we get legally married? And I mean VERY mini... we would go down to the courthouse/city hall by ourselves and I'll wear a simple white or cream dress, get married by a judge, and have a nice dinner with just our parents and maybe our siblings, OR doing the same thing except have a justice of the peace come to one of our parents homes instead . My fear is that our parents will want to make a fuss over it especially since some close relatives can't make it to our DW, and they'll want to invite the to this instead which in my opinion takes away from our DW. If we do a mini-thing here I'd like to keep it very quiet and no-production; its just tomake it legal, thats all. I feel like our WEDDING is going to be in DR. What to do?!?!! Please share your thoughts and advice!

Thanks for the advice girls! He and I talked about it some more and boy is he a tough nut to crack...he really wants just 1 wedding date and is so traditional when it comes to these things! I keep trying to explain its not guaranteed the judge will be available in DR, we may not get back our license after registry for some time, etc. In the meantime I've been researching all the requirements for getting married in our area. We still have 5 months to go before our wedding but really need to make a decision within the next 2 months...YIKES!

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I had the same challenge as you - my FI didn't want to have "2" dates, and wanted to do the legal ceremony in Mexico. I did not. I finally told him that it will be much easier (and less expensive) for us to do the legal paperwork here and have a symbolic ceremony in Mexico. We will do the legal deed before we go to Mexico, so it's official when we are there (this is important to both of our mothers...but we will keep it hush hush). Some of my friends know our plans, but we'll do a symbolic certificate, etc. and really no one will know the difference. 

It took some convincing for the FI - reassuring him that the legal day will not be any vows, any rings exchanged, etc. Just signing the paperwork and getting it filed. I don't think he's completely happy about it, but he'll go along with it. 

Originally Posted by maridr2012 

Thanks for the advice girls! He and I talked about it some more and boy is he a tough nut to crack...he really wants just 1 wedding date and is so traditional when it comes to these things! I keep trying to explain its not guaranteed the judge will be available in DR, we may not get back our license after registry for some time, etc. In the meantime I've been researching all the requirements for getting married in our area. We still have 5 months to go before our wedding but really need to make a decision within the next 2 months...YIKES!

I'm still trying to convince my FI to do the legal ceremony here. I am having wedding in DR and really don't want to do all the paperwork required. If I can convince him it will just be us and my mom (Shes not coming to DR with us). And I won't be telling anyone that we're already legally married and we will celebrate anniversary with our DR date.

Glad I found this thread. It's old but maybe some people can still give me some feedback.

I will definitely be doing a civil ceremony at home - still debating about whether I will do it before or after the Mexico wedding. Original plan - quietly get civilly married here a month before Mexico (on our anniversary of being together). New plan - get legally married after Mexico so that my grandmother can be present as she will not be present for the DW. For this I will wear white. It would also be nice to celebrate this as this day is what makes us legally husband and wife. 

But I would have liked to be already married while in Mexico! Would it really take away from the DW ceremony to have the legal ceremony done before Mexico? But I would also feel guilty doing it before and not telling my father about it. He will be present for the DW. 

Thoughts?

We are doing it a week before and absolutely no one except our witnesses will know and they will be people NOT attending the wedding. It's our little secret. (At first we hadn't planned the witnesses to not attend the wedding. we decided too after a few friends couldn't come and were close enough to ask and would make sure it didn't leak out -- could change in the next 5 months though!)

I don't think it takes away from it at all because at the end of the day the DW is your wedding and your anniversary you'll celebrate IMO ... it's just not legal.

Have to decide what's most important to you. But if your grandma is present I'm sure the fact your DW isn't legal won't be a secret.

Edit. Almost wonder if after is safer so I don't blow my own cover lmao. Unsure why I chose before!

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