EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT HAVING A RING WARMING CEREMONY

Incorporating a ring warming ceremony into your wedding is a special way to involve all your guests in your ceremony, and get them to participate in your wedding day. It will also add even more meaning to the rings that you and your partner will wear every day.

What is a ring warming ceremony?

A ring warming ceremony gives your wedding guests an opportunity to hold your wedding rings in their hands for just a moment, and warm them with their love, together with making a silent wish for the future for you to share as a couple, before passing them on to the next person.

By the time your rings make it back to you for you to wear on your fingers, they will be saturated with the love and support of your friends and family. Depending on the type of wedding ceremony you are having, here are a couple of options for you to consider:

The most common option couples choose before the rings are exchanged, is to have them passed around your guests throughout the ceremony and have someone as a ‘ring chaperone’ to keep an eye on things to make sure the rings are moving along, and that they are ready for when it is that time in the wedding ceremony to exchange your rings as a couple.

Now this is fine when you have a small group of up to 50 or 60 guests for example. Alternatively, if you have a larger guest list, it could be a good idea for you to have everyone ‘warm’ your rings as they arrive at the ceremony venue, before they take their seat. You could set up a table of sorts at the entrance of the ceremony venue giving your guests an opportunity to ‘warm’ the rings as they walk in. Again, you would need someone nearby as a ‘ring chaperone’ to keep an eye on your wedding rings!

If all of this just sounds like too much trouble, but you still like the idea of a ring warming ceremony, you can always just do this with your parents and closest friends before they take their seats.

When your rings come back back to you, they will contain in their precious metal that which is more precious, that which is priceless – It will contain all the love, the hopes and pledges of support for you and your partner in this marriage.

Don’t forget to Allocate a ring chaperone!

It is important to allocate a ring chaperone to keep an eye on the rings, whether you have decided to keep them at the entrance of the wedding ceremony, or you really would love to have them passed around!

A ring chaperone will also help to make sure everything runs smoothly during the ceremony, including picking them up if dropped on the floor by a guest, and once the rings have been ‘warmed’ they need to make sure it makes it to the top of the aisle in one piece!

If you decide to invite all of your guests to warm your rings, here are some great ways to keep the rings safe and together:

Other options would be to simply tie the rings together as illustrated, or to use a little dish.

We need to remember that many of your guests will not know of, or understand what a ring warming ceremony is, so we will need to make sure that they are informed! You might want to include a slip of paper in with your wedding invitations explaining the process. I will be able to help you write this out if required!

I really do love the sentiment behind a ring warming and aside from this being a unique addition to your ceremony, it’s also kind of the perfect way to show off your wedding rings that you have for each other to all of your guests! However, that being said, we should remember that your wedding ceremony is one that should be respected!

What would you like your ring warming to look like?

As a wedding celebrant, I encourage each couple to be involved with ideas on how they would like their ring warming to take place! I have read of a Gothic wedding which saw the couple come up with the idea of passing their rings around to each guest with the rings in a resin coffin, which fitted in perfectly with their lifestyle and wedding theme!

At a Harry Potter themed wedding, the couple decided that they would have the wedding rings flown in by an owl, and the rings were inside a replica golden snitch which were then passed around the guests. The rings were then put onto replica wands before presented to the couple.

Are you thinking about doing a ring warming? If you have read this and you actually did have a ring warming ceremony on your wedding day, I would love to find out how you enjoyed it and what it meant to you on the day in the comments below.

If this sounds like something you would like to have for your ceremony, or you wish to know more, then please give me a call on 07557 803814 or fill out the contact form below and i will get back to you.