Christmas in Laguna Beach

12/13/14 Wedding Date

Hi Ms. Last Minute Bride!   Do you want one of the hottest wedding dates of this year?
I have 12/13/14 available!!!   The bride and groom who had reserved this date are going to wait until next year to have their celebration so that certain important family members will be able to attend. So:
I have a permit available for 12/13/14 for some lucky bride to be married at the beach in Laguna  Beach, California!!!    We get the sunsets in the ocean in the winter in Laguna Beach.    First person to call me at 949-433-3129 gets this date!

I received a Thank You today from a bride I married way back in 2003.  They did an elopement,
and this is what she said:

Dear Marcy Ann, YHou officiated our wedding at Picnic Beaqch back in 2003.  It was just me and my husband-to-be and I want yu top know that it was the most romantic thing I have ever done.  We have been happily married now for ll years and still very much in love.  I have thought of you often over the years and just thought I should let you know how much we appreciated your patience and graciousness on our special day.  (We were veryt late for our appoint, but you waited for us!).  And the rest is history!!

We are thinking about renewing our vows - and I would love for you to be the one to officiate that too.   I will be contacting you probably next year at our 12th Anniversary!!!   Thank you again so much.

April and Denny

Of all of the different types of wedding ceremonies that I do, the ELOPEMENT is definitely the most romantic, because ----- it is all about just the two of you.  No complications, no worries, no stress --- just the two of you saying your vows to one another and giving all of your attention to just each other.    I recommend an ELOPEMENT to anyone who is getting married - first-time brides, second marriages, vow renewals.   It is "the most romantic thing" you can do for yourselves!!

Anniversary Celebrations

This year has been a year of Anniversary Celebrations!   5 years - 10 years - 25 years!   This past weekend, I did a 10 year Wedding Anniversary Celebration for high school sweethearts.  I have a Vow Renewal Questionnaire that I have couples fill out so I can write a personalized Anniversary Ceremony for them, and one question is How Do You Resolve Conflict.    And these kids said:

WE ARE TEAM PLAYERS, AND WE KNOW WE ARE ON THE SAME TEAM!

I loved this!    

NO GREATER LOVE

Last Saturday, March 22nd, I performed the marriage ceremony for a couple from Arizona.  It was for just the two of them.  They wanted to just focus on each other and not have the celebration of the moment when they would be united in legal marriage be diluted by sharing it with family and friends.   And as I did the ceremony, I experienced the heights and depths, the lengths and breath of a divine love like I have never experienced in my 20 years of marrying couples.    The ring the groom used to marry his bride belonged to his great grandmother who lived 150 years ago.   My company provided a cake table for their cake and champagne for pictures of them cutting the cake and making their toast for their future, and the bride had brought the cake topper that her grandmother had on her cake.  Her grandmother is still alive and is 99 years old.   They wanted to include the life-streams of these great matriarchs of their past in the ceremony.  And the bride and the groom prepared personal statements to read to one another, and I asked them if I could include them here on my blog for all to experience, and they said Yes.  So here they are:

The groom's personal statement:   My Love, I will love you forever.  I will love you during tough times and through the good times.  I will cherish every moment we have, every time we laugh together, every time we cry together.  I will support everything that you do and cheer you on when you start to lose motivation.  I will love you forever.  I will listen to all of your dreams, your hopes, your goals and your fears.  And I will communicate to you all of my dreams, hopes, goals and fears.  I will be your lover, your best friend, and your partner forever.  I will fight for you, I will die for you, I will love you forever.  I will never let anyone or anything get between us.  I will spend the rest of my life with you.  I thank God everyday that you are in my life.  I will never stop cherishing you.  I will love you forever, and ever.

Bride's personal statement: My dearest husband, when I look into your eyes, I see my soulmate.  You are the only person I trust implictly with my whole self.  I see my past life with you, and I see this lifetime with you.  Our souls have been together many times before and we are now here together again.  When you touch me, I know love.  I am deeply grateful for the tenderness, affection, compassion, patience, and effort you give to me everyday.  I promise to stay by your side, and fight every battle with you, hold your hand through any medical issue that comes our way and partner with you so we can help each other to be the parents and team we want to be for our children who will be joining us.  I promise that I will always comfort you, and love you just as you are.  I promise to challenge you and help you grow, and I promise that I will always help you find daily joy and laughter, even if it's just by poking fun at myself.  I promise that for the rest of my life, I will do all I can so that you feel loved and cherished, because you are my sweet treasure from God --- you are the answer to my prayer.  

Who is the Best Person to do your beach wedding?

Hi Everyone!  I have been doing beach weddings now for 20 years in Orange County California and a couple years ago, I decided to localize my business to Laguna Beach California.  In the 20 years of working all over Orange County, I had a lot of girls work for me.  I trained them to work at the same standards of perfection that I require of myself.  And now that I am only working in Laguna Beach, these other girls now have opened their own businesses and they go to all of the other locations in Orange County.    Recently we had lunch together, and we discussed how we could best serve the brides who are looking to be married at the beach.  Since all of us seem to be receiving requests for information from the same brides,  we have decided that we will decide which one of us is the best person to handle that bride's wedding, and we will all refer the bride to that one person.  This way, the bride gets the best person to do it and the rest of us do not need to make a presentation to the bride, which saves us money and time.   So  if you want to be married in Orange County California - at the beach - let us tell you which one of us is the best person to do it!!!

20 years together and now they can be married

I took this picture during the ceremony.   This is Jess and Karen.  They have been together for twenty years and now they are being legally married at the beach with over 100 of their friends and family there to celebrate with them.   In this pictures, Jess is singing to Karen.  They wanted to release butterflies to remember those that had passed, because both of their mothers and their fathers are now passed.  And Jess is singing Ave Maria to Karen while the butterflies are being released.   When we first got to Laguna Beach, it was fogged in.  And the whole reason for being married at the beach was to get the sunset pictures.  So my helper Linda and I had a conversation with the fog.  And we explained that it was SO IMPORTANT to these 2 women to have sunset wedding pictures, so we needed for the fog to leave.   So by the time we got down to the sand, the sun was out on the land, but the fog was still hanging out over the ocean.  But by sunset, the photographer told me that the fog had "vanished!" and Karen & Jess got their sunset pictures!