Unity Ceremony Alternatives

I know you said something other than the sand ceremony, but they make cute shadow boxes with engraved glass that you can use for a sand ceremony. Then you can hang it or display it in your home!

I also saw instructions for a tree planting ceremony.

Tree Planting Ceremony: Plant a tree together with a little dirt from your childhood home. An option is to have the parents water it to symbolize the way they have been an influence in teaching and encouraging love. After the ceremony, take the potted tree, and transplant it at the newlywed’s home to symbolize putting down roots, longevity, and strength within this marriage.

We are doing a Unity Cross!

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We're doing a handfasting ceremony instead of a unity candle. I don't know what I'll do with the ribbons yet, but I'll think of something . . .

Our JP told us about a couple who used their favorite drinks for their unity ceremony (I think they were orange soda and pepsi); they got a special glass bowl which they were planning to display in their home afterwards.

We do a lot of glass sharings, with the added bonus; on your anniversary you go together and make the combined glass shards into an art object; either a blown glass orb or a fused glass plate. It's really cool. I love it.

You could do it with paint and a canvas. My friend is doing it that way.

For a recent beach wedding, we used a sand dollar and the couple will keep the pieces in a shadowbox frame.

My couples have done the salt covenant, watered a potted plant or tree, planted wildflower seeds, filled a bowl with colored beads, unity cross, and handfasting.

We are older so no sand or unity candles for us. We are handfasting and doing a wine ceremony along with other traditional things.

We are doing a tree planting ceremony. Soil from each of our parent's houses that we will pour on our baby tree at the ceremony and then plant at our house once it grows a little.

We're doing a wine box/love letter ceremony. Basically to be opened on your 10 year anniversary. We plan to display the box somewhere. Plus we love wine so when I saw the idea it was a must-do for us!

We are doing a wine box ceremony as well.

Um.

The wedding is the unity ceremony.

We are planning the wine box/love letter ceremony, and then making it a tradition to open the wine/letters on our 1st, 5th, 10th, etc. anniversaries and replace them with new wine and letters each time.

Is this a new thing? I don't remember seeing any kind of unity ceremonies with sand or candles or anything and suddenly they seem to be everywhere.

We wrote love letters to each other to be opened on our 5th wedding anniversary. During the ceremony we put them in a box and nailed the box shut. It was super fun to use a hammer during our wedding ceremony . Please ignore my resting bitch face.

Agree with M. The wedding vows are your unity ceremony...

Unity candles and all of their knock offs came from a 1981 episode of General Hospital and people ran with it, much like people have done with mason jars on Pinterest. Were mason jars used before Pinterest? Yes. Were they as prolific as they are now as wedding paraphernalia prior to Pinterest? No. Did someone light candles prior to 1981, yes. Was it as prolific as it is now, prior to that episode? No. These unity ceremonies aren't even allowed in the Catholic Church so I don't know where everyone is coming up with the title "traditional" for this thing.

We're doing a wine box as well

Let me rephrase:

They are not necessary so I would not stress over finding something specific, because I feel if the ceremony means something to you already you do not have to go searching for another option, and doing it just to do it is weird to me.

At least my comment was on topic.

Doing a glass ceremony.

We're doing a 4-cord handfasting, and we will display the cords in a wooden bowl in our house after the wedding. Offbeat Bride has a cool list of unity ceremony alternatives you could check out. @Rachel, two things - just because something isn't catholic doesn't mean it isn't tradition. Also, handfastings originated in medieval celtic betrothal ceremonies, so they are absolutely traditional.