The Ultimate Guide to Writing Romantic Wedding Vows
Your wedding day is one of the most important days of your life and all eyes are on you. Telling the love of your life that you love them and are dedicating your life to them in front of a crowd is extremely intimidating to most people. You are about to tell the story of your relationship and why you want to marry them in just a few words — and finding the right words to express your emotions is something that nearly everyone struggles with.
There is no playbook for writing romantic wedding vows, so we thought we would write one for all of those who struggle to put their loving thoughts into words. We help clients write romantic wedding vows for their big day, so we know a thing or two about what you should have in your wedding vows. We are going to share some of our deep insights about wedding vow construction, that way you can create the most romantic wedding vows for your partner.
What To Include In Your Romantic Wedding Vows
It can be nearly impossible to distill your entire relationship into a speech that lasts just a few minutes. However, there are a few things that you should consider including in your wedding vows.
Tell Your Love Story
Family and friends have traveled hundreds, maybe even thousands of miles just to see you get married. Some of your faraway wedding guests may not know the intimate details of your relationship, so there is no better moment to share your love story than at your wedding.
We’re positive that there are so many stories and memories that you want to share with your wedding guests. But, there are only so many hours in a day and so many minutes in a wedding ceremony. Because of that, you will have to pick what moments in your relationship are worth sharing with the world. The stories you decide to include could vary from anything from the first time you baked a cake together to your special proposal. Here are a few other memories in your relationship that wedding guests like to hear about:
- The First Time That You Met
- How You Fell In Love
- Your First Date
Those are just a couple of moments that you may want to include in your romantic wedding vows. A good way to decide what stories you should include in your wedding vows is by thinking about your audience.
Know Your Audience
Your closest family and friends are going to be at your wedding, and you should have an idea of what your family and friends would like to hear in your wedding vows. There may be some parts of your relationship that you would like to leave out because of guests present. However, you should not feel the need to censor yourself. This is your wedding day and if you want to talk about your crazy sex life, then you have every right to do so. Just make sure that your love and feelings are present in the wedding vows — which may not be easy for everyone.
Show Emotion
Some people are rather closed off from their emotions. If that’s the case with you and your emotions, you should prepare to open your heart and soul in order to write the best possible wedding vows. Think about all of the amazing characteristics that make your partner who they are. Picture your favorite memories that you have shared together and how they made you feel in that moment. Use your feelings as the basis of your romantic wedding vows.
Weddings are all about love and a celebration of your relationship with the person that you have chosen to marry. Show the full range of your emotions in your wedding vows. From laughter to tears, you can lean into as many emotions as you want. You’re marrying the person you are going to be with for the rest of your life. Feel all of the feelings and put them into your wedding vows. Your emotions will help you write vows that are different from any other person’s vows.
Write Unique Vows
Do not use vow templates or vows that you found online! That is one of the biggest mistakes you can make when it comes to wedding vows. There is nothing more awkward than someone in the audience who has heard those exact words before, or even worse your significant other may have read the vows you copied from online.
Writing romantic unique wedding vows is a daunting task, but it can be accomplished if you are willing to put some time into creating them. The best words may take some time to come to you. As long as you start the vow writing process early, you can create many sections of your vows and choose the best ones to include in the final product. Write vows that are true to you and your relationship — including the tough parts.
Talk About the Lows
There is nothing more romantic than a couple overcoming great adversity! All of the greatest romantic movies have strife in them. The Notebook, Dirty Dancing, and Titanic are all incredible love stories where the main characters have to overcome immense obstacles in order to be together. You may not have to overcome a sinking ship in the middle of the Atlantic to be with your significant other, but we can guarantee that you have had issues in your relationship.
Think about the times where you were struggling with a problem and how you overcame the obstacle together. For example, your partner may have been dealing with a problematic boss at work; adding in a short story about how you both worked together to overcome their workplace issues will showcase your love to your wedding guests. Your wedding guests will be inspired to hear about the struggles that you experienced. They will know that your love will be able to handle both the highs and lows of marriage and life together.
Start Writing Your Vows Early
The biggest mistake that anyone can make when writing wedding vows is writing them at the very last minute. It’s human nature to procrastinate, but you really should start working on your vows months before the wedding. You can even start them more than a year before your wedding if you’d like. There is no time too early in the wedding planning process to start writing your wedding vows.
The creative process takes time. You need to give yourself ample time to really sit down and write your wedding vows. There will be vow ideas that pop into your head in the time leading up to your wedding. You may even experience new memories that you want to include in your vows in the months leading up to the wedding. Just give yourself enough time and the words will come to you eventually. (And if you do end up under the wire, we can help you.)
What Not To Do When Writing Romantic Wedding Vows
Now that we went through what you should include, let’s dive into some of the most common pitfalls that we see people make during their wedding ceremony. Make sure that you take these tips into consideration when crafting your romantic wedding vows.
Embarrassing Moments
Embarrassing moments in your relationship can be a lovely memory to add into your wedding vows. These silly moments will help your wedding guests see into your relationship and how genuine your love is. However, there is a line between sharing minor embarrassing moments about your relationship and moments that should be just between you and your soon-to-be spouse.
For example, talking about your partner’s strange eating habits is appropriate for your wedding vows. However, talking about how your partner had violent diarrhea on the first big romantic trip of your relationship may rub your partner the wrong way. If you are having trouble deciding if you should keep an embarrassing story in your vows, try to put yourself in your partner’s shoes. Would you be mortified if your partner shared a similar story in front of your wedding guests? Also, keep in mind that you should not include too many stories or your wedding vows may start to drone on for too long.
Appropriate Length
You may have no idea how long your romantic wedding vows should be. There are no specific rules set in stone, but there are some guidelines that you should follow. After all, there is nothing more awkward than when one partner’s vows are significantly longer than the others. In fact, it could lead to some tension during the ceremony when one partner expresses their love for 10 minutes, while the other is done in less than 30 seconds. Talk to your partner about how long their wedding vows are going to be. Getting on the same page — literally — will be important for the ceremony and your marriage.
Generally, you should aim for 3-5 minutes in speaking length, which equates to about 400-600 written words. However, you will probably be nervous on your big day and people tend to read much faster when they are nervous. You can push up the length of your wedding vows to 700 words in order to accommodate your nervousness if you’d like. But be aware that if your wedding vows are any longer than that, your wedding guests may start to lose interest. Plus, the longer your vows are the more difficult they will be to remember, which brings us to our next tip.
Write Your Vows Down
We cannot stress the importance of this enough. Please, please, please, please write your wedding vows down on paper. You are going to be incredibly nervous on your wedding day and the ceremony is one of the most nerve wrecking parts of your big day. You could easily forget key parts of your romantic wedding vows. Putting your romantic wedding vows on paper will ensure that you will not forget any part of your love story.
Also, please don’t read your wedding vows from your iPhone, because technology will take everyone out of your big moment. No one wants to be reminded of their smartphones; they want to unplug, enjoy your ceremony, and witness your love. Pulling out a piece of paper instead of a smartphone brings a completely different aura to your ceremony. Love letters are incredibly romantic and there is something special about writing your own words down on paper. There are even some services that will put your wedding vows on beautiful stationary to compliment the elegance of your wedding. Just make sure that you practice!
Not Enough Practice
You still have to practice your wedding vows — even though you have them written down. It may be tempting to solely rely on that piece of paper, but everyone needs practice. The greatest speakers in the world have to practice their speeches, and none of us are an exception. Start practicing early, right after you have written your romantic vows. When you think you have it down 100%, practice ten more times. There is no limit to the number of times you can practice, after all.
If you have someone you are comfortable with, you could even practice in front of them. If not, practicing in front of the mirror is a great alternative. Make sure that you maintain as much eye contact as possible. You want to be staring into your significant other’s eyes as you tell them your feelings. It will make your ceremony that much more special.
But… how do you actually sit down and write wedding vows? We’ve got you covered there as well.
What To Do When You Sit Down And Write
Woohoo! We’ve got all the basics down about what you need to consider and what to avoid when writing your romantic wedding vows. Now comes the tough part: sitting down and actually putting all of your thoughts and feelings together in one cohesive piece of work.
Make sure that you are in a quiet and relaxed environment. You need to give 100% of your heart and attention to these words. Picture yourself in front of all your family and friends, ready to marry the love of your life. What do you want to tell your partner? Let the words flow through your mind and make sure to write them down before they escape. Everyone’s creative writing process is different. Try writing and creating in different ways and different places. Maybe even having a couple glasses of wine will get your creative juices flowing. We’re certainly not judging; embrace your creativity and create wedding vows that tell your unique love story.
If you are struggling to write your wedding vows on your computer or phone, try going old school with a pen and paper. There is even some evidence that we are able to express ourselves better when we put the pen to the paper. Some of your best romantic wedding vow ideas may come when you are on a walk through the park or in the shower. Make sure that you have your phone or notebook on you to catch those perfect ideas. If you are still struggling, looking up a few romantic quotes and incorporating quotes into your vows could ignite a spark and provide inspiration.
How To Use Quotes In Romantic Wedding Vows
Quotes are perfectly acceptable to use in your wedding vows. There may be a perfect quote that matches your relationship and the love that you share with your partner. Adding a romantic quote to your romantic wedding vows can help you express your love in a meaningful way, however, there are a few guidelines that you should follow.
Quote Length And Number of Quotes
Make sure you choose a quote that is not too long. You do not want to end up with a quote that takes up half of your romantic wedding vows. The majority of your wedding vows need to be your own words. Another great guideline to follow is keep the number of quotes to just two or fewer. Adding too many quotes to your wedding vows will make the flow of your vows too choppy. You do not want to go from talking about your first date to a quote from your favorite song. Make sure that the quote naturally flows with the rest of your romantic wedding vows. If you do not have a romantic quote that you love, it could be difficult to find one that fits your relationship.
Finding Romantic Quotes
There are millions of quotes that you can easily find from a simple Google search. Try to envision the most meaningful parts of your relationship and create a Google search based on that to find a quote that resonates with you. For example, if you compare your relationship to one of Hollywood’s most famous couples, Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively, you can easily find adorable quotes from them everywhere. Here is one of our favorites:
“She always responds with empathy. She meets anger with empathy. She meets hate with empathy. She’ll take the time to imagine what happened to a person when they were five or six years old. And she’s made me a more empathetic person.” – Ryan Reynolds
Our Favorite Romantic Quotes
If you are still struggling to find a romantic quote that fits your relationship, don’t fret. We rounded up some of the most romantic quotes that may fit perfectly in the context of your relationship. Here some of our favorites:
“If people were rain, I’d be a drizzle and she’d be a hurricane.” – Looking for Alaska
“Don’t ever think that I fell for you or fell over you. I didn’t fall in love, I rose in it.” – Toni Morrison
“We loved with a love that was more than love.” – Edgar Allen Poe
Are you still not finding inspiration for your wedding vows? Well here is a real set of romantic wedding vows that we crafted to showcase a client’s love for their significant other.
Romantic Vows Example
This is a real-life example of wedding vows that we wrote for a client. The vows completely encapsulated their relationship and the love that they shared. Their names have been changed for privacy purposes.
Tina,
If there’s one thing that’s true about our relationship, it’s that I’ve always been certain of my love for you. Ever since that afternoon 10 years ago where I picked you up in my mom’s blue van for our first date, I’ve known that I love you more than I’ve known anything else in the world. [pause for impact]
I knew you were the one after you were willing to hang out with me at my job…. where I cleaned a church… as my version of a first date. [turn to guests] Side note: what was I thinking? [pause for giggles and turn back to guests] I had no idea what to expect, but as I’d quickly learn, you are one of the most wonderfully complex humans that I’ve ever met. I am in awe of your immense talent, and incredibly proud of how you manage to surprise people around every corner. I feel grateful to even know you, and completely in awe that I get to wake up to you every morning.
Finding a soulmate is one thing, but finding a soulmate who is unwaveringly kind, conscientious, and forgiving? [turn to guests] It sounds too good to be true, right? But hey, I’m not going to complain. [pause for giggles and turn back to Tina]
But in all seriousness, you are the love of my life. I feel bonded to you on a cosmic level. There’s an Emery Allen quote that puts this feeling into words: “Do you think the universe fights for souls to be together? Some things are too strange and strong to be coincidences…. I feel like a part of my soul has loved you since the beginning of everything. Maybe we’re from the same star.” [pause for effect]
Amidst life’s stressors, you’re the person who keeps me grounded. I’ve learned to share more love with the world thanks to the endless love you share with the world around us. You are an inspiration to me, and I truly feel blessed to experience the love that I have with you. I cherish every moment spent together… not only today, but forever. [pause for impact]
As I commit to being your partner, I want to make these promises in front of our loved ones who’ve traveled from both near and far.
I promise to, even on my roughest days, take time to acknowledge my overwhelming love for you.
I promise to always express my appreciation for your calming presence in this crazy world.
I promise to support your every endeavor, whether art, medicine, or somewhere in between.
I promise to love you intentionally and eternally…
And I promise to always express my gratitude for your unconditional love, patience, and devotion.
Nothing in life feels unrealistic or unachievable with you by my side. I look forward to where life takes us next, together as husband and wife.
Sit Down And Write!
You now have all of the tools and knowledge you need to write the greatest romantic wedding vows anyone has ever heard! If you still need some extra help with your wedding vows we are here to make your life much easier. We would be more than happy to help you create romantic wedding vows for your big day.