How to deliver your own written vows in style!

One of the most nerve wracking parts of your wedding day will be the part where you have to not only publicly speak in front of everyone in a ceremony, but where you must profess your love and promises for your lives together as a married couple to the person you’re marrying! Whew!

Your vows are something to prepare for, especially if you’re writing your own. Do not wing it. If I could give one bit of advice for this, it would be PREPARE AND PRACTICE. People who publicly speak regularly will find this easier than most, but that doesn't mean you can't nail it too.

Some of the most obvious (and thus overlooked) parts of vow writing you probably learned in school when you had to give speeches. Let's jump in to how you can deliver a confident and charming set of vows!

Before you start, agree on the tonality and duration of your vows with your fiancee. You don't want to deliver a 10 minute speech while your S/O speaks for 2 minutes. Try to keep on the same page and stick to it when you plan.

Watch vows on Youtube and listen to self-written vows for inspiration. You'll quickly see what works so well about winning vows that get all the views on that platform.

1: Write down everything about your fiancee that you love, think of in-jokes you might have, poignant experiences you've shared and your story together, the things that define you as a couple.

2: Don't be afraid to use a template as the skeleton of your vows. This isn't cheating. It's working smart. Your vows will engage your soon to be wife or husband and your witnesses best if you can build a rhythm that's just a little predictable but not completely so, in their flow.

Work with a structure like an essay, with an introduction, body and conclusion.

The introduction should look something like recounting a couple of main points of who you are as a couple, and something about the story of where you came from, and possibly even who you were beforehand. It should probably be much shorter than an essay, because you don't want to bore everyone, but the structure will help to build on.

The body might include some serious bits about what you value about your partner and your relationship, a couple of funny anecdotes at yours or their expense (judge this based on their sense of humor - When it works the payoff is amazing, but don't humiliate them!) and make sure to include some compliments to remind them why you value them in your life so much.
You should mention your promises to your partner, in earnest before your conclusion

Your conclusion should affirm the direction of your relationship as a married couple, what you promise to do for your partner if you didn’t mention this in your body, and can take a slightly more serious approach than the rest of your vows. At this point after you've made everyone laugh and smile and awe at your expert word-smithing, you will probably feel very confident to deliver the emotional punch of sharing your love and your plans for the future with everyone. Deliver it right and you'll be guaranteed to get people weeping and laughing.


3: Consider that you can make it funny! This is a personal preference and you might want it to be totally serious, but I love a good laugh from well delivered vows. a "serious line, serious line, punch-line" pattern is an oldie but a goodie, and builds serious tension before entertaining your spouse and your families and friends with the punchline of a charismatic joke.

4: Writing your vows: Write it down on computer first so you can clearly see everything and make changes easily as you build on it from the start. Once you build the speech into a well rounded set of vows, time yourself reading them several times at a comfortable, natural pace to be sure your duration is right. Consider cutting or adding bits as needed.

Once you have this done, get a pen and paper and write it down on a notepad. You remember much more of what you write with pen and paper than what you type,and you should be able to recite your vows in practice without any cue cards.

Once you're happy with your vows and your ability to remember them, make cue cards with small, tidy, concise notes to remind you of the topics and jokes you have prepared and keep you on track. Number them and practice again with the cards. It'll be an emotionally heavy moment on the day and you want to be as prepared as you can be.

You may even wish to make a copy to give your groomsmen or bridesmaids to hang onto just in case.

Once you feel absolutely confident, and you've done this, you're ready! Go forth and deliver the best vows you can to wow your husband or wife to be!