As a ULC wedding officiant, there is a good chance that you will be asked to perform a wedding in Autumn more than once in your career. Given that officiants ordained in the ULC are often friends of the happy couple or professional celebrants, they can often help the couple by offering wisdom and ideas they have discovered for themselves. A lot of couples are looking to have an outdoor wedding in order to enjoy the crisp fall air, the change of the seasons and the beauty of the leaves, but when you are asked to perform a wedding, you should consider some potential themes for the wedding as well as inform the bride and groom of any thoughts or concerns you have about an outdoor wedding during Autumn.
There are a lot of great wedding ideas for the Fall, and a lot of creative ways to make them happen. As a ULC minister, you are not limited to only performing ceremonies in a church. Outdoor weddings and indoor weddings are equally fine. Some inspiring script ideas for fall weddings including the symbolism of the changing leaves. As time passes through the seasons, the leaves change, fall and regrow. In a marriage, people change, go through cycles, and their love renews itself. Another idea to include in the script for a Fall wedding is the bounty of the harvest. Just as the Pilgrims and Natives sat together to be thankful for the bounty of food they had, two families sit together at a wedding to be thankful for the bounty of love their children have found.
Planning a date for a Fall wedding requires knowledge of the religions of the families of both the bride and the groom. Autumn has many religious holidays, specifically within the Jewish faith. If there are any major religious holidays going on within the month they wish to be married, they will need to be planned around. In addition, if there are any other unrelated large family events around that time of year, the couple will want to make sure that they are not planning their wedding on a date that will clash with another event, so that as many guests as they would like can attend.
If the couple wants to have an outdoor wedding in Autumn, it can be beautiful and certainly doable but there are a few things that should be expressed to them. A crisp Fall day can turn into a brisk Fall night very quickly, and those who are sensitive to the cold such as older relatives may find themselves too cold to be comfortable. For this reason and for weather related reasons, it may be prudent for the couple to invest in both tents and industrial heaters to keep cold guests comfortable. In addition to this, if the bride and groom choose to use natural fire pits as a way for guests to stay warm and enjoy the Autumn night, they must be mindful of the fact that burning wood and leaves can trigger an allergic reaction for some and that anti allergen eye drops and over the counter antihistamines should be kept on the premises for any guest who has an allergy issue.
Each season comes with its own set of considerations. Don’t compromise the vision of the bride and groom – their ideas can still be used even as the weather gets less agreeable with some forethought and planning.