***Question to those who did legal ceremony before DW***

[Mrs.Morley]

I am from Chicago and have no idea how I go about this. To avoid all the hassles of getting legally married in PV, we are planning on going to the courhouse and getting married right before we leave (which is in about 3 weeks). My questions are... Do I have time to do this? Do we just go down to a courthouse? Do we need licenses prior to going to the courthouse? Can we just have one of the judges he works with marry us? I want to get this done soon and I have procrastinated too long. Please help!

[Natalie Z]

We got legaly married in a church 2 days before we left. It is easy you both need to go and get your marriage license together and then you have I think 60 days to use it until it expires. If you go downtown to the one on Randolph and Clark there is a judge down there in one of the rooms. I have seen people get married down there when I was picking up my license. You might need to call ahead, don't stress it is easy!!

[PVBride]

This is a really good question. I have been wondering the same thing! I am from St. Louis(originally up by Chi-town!) and will be married in PV. I did find this website about obtaining an Illinois marriage license -

 

 

Illinois Marriage License Information

[Copita]

I am doing this very thing.

Our wedding coordinator said all we need to do is bring our marriage certificate with us (for our symbolic ceremony and symbolic ceremony package/fee)--which, by the way, is actually less expensive than a regular wedding package and includes the SAME THING minus the judge!

 

YOu can get the marriage license, get married, and your marriage certificate all in the same day. Isnt that crazy?

 

P.S. Find out whether your destination venue offers a Symbolic package!

 

[Mrs.Morley]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmmdee I am doing this very thing. Our wedding coordinator said all we need to do is bring our marriage certificate with us (for our symbolic ceremony and symbolic ceremony package/fee)--which, by the way, is actually less expensive than a regular wedding package and includes the SAME THING minus the judge! YOu can get the marriage license, get married, and your marriage certificate all in the same day. Isnt that crazy? P.S. Find out whether your destination venue offers a Symbolic package!

They do offer it. The WC said it would be so much easier to do it this way to avoid all the legal stuff in Mexico. Do you know if I have to make an appointment at the courthouse? I'll call...

[Copita]

We will just go in for our marriage license during regular operating hours (at courthouse). Then from there the lady said we can either choose to get married that day or make an appointment for whenever is convenient for us. FUN!

We are bringing our own minister from church to marry us in DR. I am so excited!

[Mrs.Morley]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cmmdee We will just go in for our marriage license during regular operating hours (at courthouse). Then from there the lady said we can either choose to get married that day or make an appointment for whenever is convenient for us. FUN! We are bringing our own minister from church to marry us in DR. I am so excited!

Sounds like a lot of fun!

I just called city hall and they indicated that we have to go down there to get our marriage license and then we can get married the next day. We cannot obtain the license and get married on the same day. So I think we will go down there this Saturday for the license and try to get married some time the following week.

[Copita]

Hooray! How exciting! The good thing is you won't have to worry about all those legalities at your destination and can get a better deal on the wedding package! WOO HOO! I am always all for that!

 

[starchild]

We did ours a week or so before we left. We both had to appear in person to get our license before we could get married. In L.A. there are several courthouses to choose from but appointments fill up fast and they wouldn't make an appointment for the wedding until we got the license. By then the original date we wanted wasn't available so we had to move it up a bit.

 

Double check with your courthouses to see whether they accept walk-ins or what the appointment process is.

[DreaW]

We did ours two days before we left for Cabo. We made a reservation and filled out the paper info online, then on the Friday we came in we walked right in and they did everything (license, and ceremony) It went by really fast.

 

I would just check with your courthouse that you decide to go to.