Happy 5th Anniversary, Contessa & Travis!!!

HAPPY 5TH ANNIVERSARY, CONTESSA & TRAVIS!!!

5 years ago today, I had the great honor and pleasure of officiating Travis and Contessa's wedding ceremony!:)   It was a beautiful backyard wedding with all the trimmings! :)  At sunset, everyone in attendance lit candles to symbolize our coming together and celebrating Travis and Contessa becoming husband and wife!:)

Travis and Contessa, may all that you are always be in love and may love always be in you!  May life's situations continue to strengthen the bond of friendship, love, and spirit that exists so strongly between you!  May you always see and encourage the best in each other! And may you always be each other's best friend and greatest love!!

The bride being escorted by the aisle!:)

 "Contessa and Travis, will you love, comfort, honor and respect each other?"

 Lighting the celebration candle! :)

 The Marriage Candle...

 ...uniting Contessa and Travis as husband and wife! :)

Mr. & Mrs. Travis Ramsey! :)

CONTESSA BREDHAUER & TRAVIS RAMSEY

WEDDING CEREMONY

AUGUST 8, 2008

LIGHTING OF SEPARATE CANDLES

Contessa’s mother and Travis’s mother come forward to light the two separate candles.

WELCOME

Friends and family members, on behalf of Contessa and Travis, thank you for being here tonight!!

I am Rev. Annie Benjamin.  Before I begin, I would like to thank this wonderful couple standing before me for granting me the honor and privilege of joining them in holy matrimony.

We are gathered here on this beautiful evening in this place where the horizons are our only walls, the sky our only ceiling and the earth our only floor to share with Contessa Breann Bredhauer  & Travis Glen Ramsey a very important moment in their lives.  In the years Contessa & Travis have been together, first as a couple then as a small family with the birth of their son Teagon, their love and understanding of each other has grown and matured, and now they have decided to live their lives together as husband and wife.

MEANING OF MARRIAGE

Marriage is an ordained institution.  We have a sacred relationship that should never be entered into with carelessness nor insincerity, but a relationship entered into with great love, devotion, and tenderness.

Contessa and Travis, real love is something beyond the warmth and glow, beyond the excitement and romance of being deeply in love.  It is caring as much about the welfare and happiness of your marriage partner as about your own happiness alone.  Real love is not total absorption in each other.  It is looking outward in the same direction.  Love makes burdens lighter because you divide them.  It makes joys more intense because you share them.  It makes you stronger so you can reach out and become involved...with love…in ways you dared not risk alone.  Contessa and Travis, this is the kind of love that you embody.

INVOCATION

In acknowledgement of the purpose and power of this occasion, please join me in prayer.

“Father God, open us and fill us with your presence.  Elevate our spirits, lift our hearts and minds to an awareness of this Sacred and Eternal moment as we joyfully celebrate the marriage of Contessa Breann Bredhauer and Travis Glen Ramsey.  Bless them, and bless all who are gathered here. Amen.”

In 1Corthians 13, we find this description of love:

 “Love is patient; love is kind and envies no one.  Love is never boastful, nor conceited, nor rude; never selfish, nor quick to give offense.  Love keeps no score of wrongs; does not gloat over other people’s mistakes.  But delights in the truth.  There is nothing love cannot face.  There is no limit to its faith, its hope, and its endurance.  Love will never end.”

QUESTIONS

Contessa and Travis, if you now freely choose to be joined in holy matrimony, with all its rights and potential, please indicate this by facing each other and joining hands.

Travis, do you take Contessa to be your lawfully wedded wife?  Do you take her to be your partner, your lover, and your best friend?  Will you love her, comfort her, honor and nurture her in sickness and in health, in sorrow and in joy?  Will you change with her and grow old with her?  Will you give her your deepest friendship and love from this day forward as long as you both shall live?

I do!

Contessa, do you take Travis to be your lawfully wedded husband?  Do you take him to be your partner, your lover, and your best friend?  Will you love him, comfort him, honor and nurture him in sickness and in health, in sorrow and in joy?  Will you change with him and grow old with him?  Will you give him your deepest friendship and love from this day forward as long as you both shall live?

I do!

CHARGE TO GUESTS

Dear friends and family, I now turn to you. Contessa and Travis have a relationship that is woven into the fabric of the community that you all represent.  The ideals, the understanding, and the mutual respect that they bring to their union have their roots in the love, friendship and guidance which you have given them.  The love and support you give this couple will be indispensable in helping them to nurture their togetherness as a husband and wife and as parents to Teagan.  It will also help them to meet the challenges that may lie ahead.  I therefore charge you to do all in your power to aid and sustain and encourage their union.  Will you who are here today witness their pledges and do your utmost to uphold this union?  If so please answer now,

“We will.”

                                                                             VOWS

Contessa and Travis, now it is time to repeat your vows to each other.

Travis, please repeat after me:  Contessa, I take you to be my wife, my partner in life.  I promise to walk by your side forever and to love, help, and encourage you in all that you do.  I will take time to talk with you, to listen to you, and to care for you.  I will share your laughter and your tears as your partner, lover, and best friend.  Everything I am and everything I have is yours now and forevermore.

Contessa, please repeat after me:  Travis, I take you to be my husband, my partner in life.  I promise to walk by your side forever and to love, help, and encourage you in all that you do.  I will take time to talk with you, to listen to you, and to care for you.  I will share your laughter and your tears as your partner, lover, and best friend.  Everything I amd and everything I have is yours now and forevermore.

RINGS

May I have the rings please?  (I raise them up to bless them)

These rings are circles, symbols that remind us of the sun, and the earth, and the universe.  Symbols of holiness, of perfections and peace.  Symbols of God and His love for us, that which has no beginning and no end.

May these rings be blessed as a symbol of this affectionate unity.  Your lives are being joined today in one unbroken circle.  Wherever you go, may you always return to one another in your togetherness.  May you find in one another the love for which all men and women yearn.

May you grow in understanding and compassion.  May the home which you have established together as a family be a sanctuary that all who are here today and others through the years.  There, may they find true friends.  May these rings, soon to be on your fingers, symbolize the touch of the spirit of love that is in both your hearts.

Travis, please take Contessa’s  rings, put them on her finger one at a time, and repeat after me: Contessa, These rings symbolize our past, our present, and our future. Today, I give you these rings, my gift to you, as a symbol of my promise.  With all that I am and all that I have, I pledge my unending love to you.

Contessa, please take Travis’s ring, put it on his finger, and repeat after me: Travis, I give you this ring, my gift to you, as a symbol of my promise.  With all that I am and all that I have, I pledge my unending love to you.

Contessa and Travis, may you both wear your rings forever as a sign of your commitment and the desire in your hearts.

 BLESSING

Contessa and Travis, may all that you are, always be in love.  May all that is love, always be in you.  May your love be as beautiful on each day you share as it is on this day of celebration, and may each day you share be as precious as the day you first fell in love.  May you always see and encourage the best in each other.  May the challenges life brings your way make your marriage even stronger.  And may you always be each other’s best friend and greatest love.

UNITY CANDLE

Lighting the Unity Candle is a symbol of the union created by a man and a woman who enter into marriage. They are no longer two but one.  The bible says, “For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife and the two shall become one flesh.”  Today we see Contessa and Travis uniting themselves as one..as one in the flesh and as one in the spirit.  These candles symbolize that union.  The two outer candles represent the individual lives of Contessa and Travis and the families from which they came.  Each of you has been given a candle that represents your continuing importance in each other’s lives.  Soon all of this candles will lit by one small light to create a much bigger brighter light that represents the unity of friends and family supporting this couple in their marriage.
(Attendants light the first candle of each row.  When all candles are lit, Contessa and Travis light the unity candle.)

                                                                 PRONOUNCEMENT

Contessa and Travis, we have heard your promise to share life in marriage.  We recognize and respect the covenant you have made by the giving and receiving of rings.  It is not a minister standing before you that makes your marriage real.  It is the honest love, and sincerity of what you have said and done here before your friends and family.

According to the ordinances of God and the laws governing the state of Utah, it is now my honor and privilege to announce in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit that you are now husband and wife!

You may now kiss as Mr. and Mrs. Travis Ramsey.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you for the first time,  Mr. and Mrs. Travis Ramsey.

BENEDICTION

May the Lord bless you and keep you.  And may the Lord make His face to shine up you, and be gracious unto you.  May God give you His peace in your going out and in your coming in, in your lying down and in your rising up, in your labor and in your leisure, in your laughter and in your tears, until that day when you come to stand before Jesus in that day which there is now sunset and now dawning.  Amen.