The wedding ceremony is one of the best parts of your wedding day. It is the moment you & your significant other say “I do” to spending forever together! You may be considering a religious ceremony, or something short & sweet, and Rich & Kitch fell somewhere in between with what we wanted for our destination wedding ceremony in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. We wanted to add a special element to our wedding ceremony, and when we met with our officiant, he suggested a wine box & love letter ceremony. We thought this unique wedding trend was a great fit for us to incorporate into our special day! If you're like us & didn’t know that a wine box & love letter ceremony even existed, everything you need to know is explained below!
When we met with our officiant during our wedding planning trip to Cabo, he provided us with different options for wording our ceremony, readings we could incorporate, and special ceremony options like a sand ceremony. Another option our officiant Diego, from Los Cabos Minister explained to us was a wine box & love letter ceremony, and Richie & I were sold on it! We liked the idea of a wine box & love letter ceremony because 1) it involves drinking which we are fans of (as you can tell by our cocktail recipes haha) and 2) it gives you a chance to write meaningful letters to each other! In your love letters to each other, you write about the good qualities you find in one another, as well as reasons you fell in love & are choosing to get married.
If you are writing your own wedding vows to each other like we did (if you need wedding vow inspiration, read this post), you may not be a fan of writing a meaningful love letter, too. However, if you like the idea of a wine box & love letter ceremony, but aren’t sure what to write in your love letter, here are some Rich & Kitch tips!
Incorporate some of your wedding vows into your love letter, since your significant other won’t be reading this letter for five years, or
If you are writing your wedding vows, and they are getting too long, you can take parts out of your wedding vows and put them into your love letter so nothing is left unsaid!
The point of the wine box & love letter wedding ceremony tradition is that you don’t let one another read these letters before your wedding, and during the ceremony, they are sealed in your wine box. The wine & letters are intended to be opened on your 5th wedding anniversary. However, if your marriage is enduring hardships, you can open your wine box & read your love letters before your 5th year of marriage (we don’t plan on opening it early!) So, on your 5th wedding anniversary, you sit & drink the wine together, then separate & read the love letters you wrote to each other 5 years ago. I am really looking forward to reading our love letters to each other on our 5th wedding anniversary. We’ve already grown so much during our first year of marriage (thanks COVID) and it will be amazing to see how far we’ve come when we get to year 5!
Our wine box is extra meaningful to me, too! I designed our wedding monogram and the wine box designer was able to use my monogram design on our wine box! How cool is that?! I’ve linked similar wine boxes from Etsy here & in the image below. Also, if you are interested in my custom wedding stationary design offerings, here is my Etsy shop
or you can find the wedding stationary templates & custom design packages we offer here!
As we reflect on our wedding day & attend weddings of family/friends, the wedding ceremony is one of our favorite parts. It’s what makes you & your significant other officially married (unless you had to have 2 weddings like we did, which you can read about here), so we recommend incorporating a special moment into your wedding ceremony to make it more meaningful. However, we think traditions in religious wedding ceremonies are amazing, too! Whether your wedding ceremony is short or long, we know it will be part of your best day ever!
You can watch our wedding movie by Lands End Films if you’re looking for more wedding day inspiration, too!
READY FOR THE SPOILER?!
Since we did this wine box & love letter ceremony during our destination wedding in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, our custom designed wine box was one of the MANY things we had to pack for Mexico. Our luggage was already overweight so we were worried about having to bring back a bottle of wine, too. When we arrived in Cabo, we were gifted a bottle of wine by our resort, Villa del Arco. Since we didn't pay for the bottle, we decided to use it during our wine box ceremony, so we didn’t have to worry about bringing it home lol! When it gets closer to our 5th wedding anniversary, we are going to splurge on a nice bottle of champagne to enjoy while we read our letters. I don’t think this defeats the purpose of the wine box ceremony either, because our letters are sealed & we get to admire our wine box in our home! So, if you like the idea of a wine box & love letter ceremony, but you’re traveling for a destination wedding, we say go for it! Don’t worry about having to bring a bottle of wine back & just get a nice bottle of whatever wine you choose once you get home! We also opted for a wine box without wine glasses included to save space/weight while traveling to Cabo!
If you are looking for more wedding planning advice, check out the kitchensinkit wedding blog & follow on Rich & Kitch on instagram @kitchensinkit!
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