Adventures in Obtaining a Wedding License

Well today I had to go at it alone people...no, not wedding tasks...my mom and I actually accomplished a lot today! We had our final meeting with our fabulous wedding coordinators who are going to make the day-of run SUPER smoothly, we picked up two more tall ivory pillar candles for the display on the mantle in the ballroom, met my younger sister C. for a really delicious lunch (she broke away from her internship which was really nice) at an incredibly cute bakery near her office, and even stopped by the florist for some last minute clarifications....what I figured I would write about tonight is the obtaining of our wedding license!

This is what I had to go at alone...well, with mom in tow of course. As I mentioned before, M. won't be getting into town until tomorrow evening so I needed to go to pick up our wedding license since we haven't actually been in town together on a weekday within the last 60 days, which is a requirement. Instead, armed with notarized documents and many different forms of identification for M. (social security card and birth certificate) we made our way into our local courthouse and boy is that an interesting atmosphere. I've actually "visited" our local courthouse once before to visit M. when he was working for a judge, but man oh man...maybe it's the warm weather, but there sure are some characters in there!

After making our way through the "security" check point and being forced to remove my patent leather belt from my eyelet dress (?!?!?! WHY ?!?!!?!)...yeah, because lets be honest, I was

probably the first person they would target as a security threat with my preppy get-up and my oversized black Chanel sunglasses. Believe me, I wasn't the one they should've been watching out for...

We eventually found the Register of Deeds...all the way in the basement and I was set to go. Luckily we hit the office at the right time because there wasn't anyone waiting and someone was helping us immediately. I pulled my folder out of my quilted black purse (oh, maybe this was why security was so intense over me?! Giant black handbag...she must be hiding some

thing suspicious in there!) and laid everything out on the desk...all three filled out forms including M.'s notarized information, my checkbook to pay for the darn thing (and of course I sprung for the $1.00 "keepsake" copy), my ID and all of the ID forms I had on hand from M. Nope -- I had missed something. DARN! Of course -- I needed a photo ID of M.! I'm not quite sure why neither of us caught this while we read and re-read the

"instructions" document about twenty times, but either way, I wasn't leaving there until I had the license in hand. I immediately called M. and had him copy and fax his ID. First try -- too dark. Second try -- still "too dark" according to the lady, but she gave us a break thank goodness. All of our information was confirmed and I swore all of that fun stuff about the information being

correct and we were on our way...don't you love my confused look in the "swear" picture.

Of course I had to document the moment even though I was a little sad M. couldn't be there to experience the beauty of the courthouse with me while we took a very important (and very necessary) step towards our marriage. Oh well, at least I have the keepsake copy of the marriage license and a souvenir copy of M.'s drivers license that looks more like an ultrasound image than an actual person! :)

PS: How nice is it that they lump the births, deaths, and marriages all in one office location? So convenient and efficient, right?!

We're really on our way now....have a fabulous evening! :)