What does marriage mean to you?

Awww, your day is almost here!

To me, marriage is the ULTIMATE commitment. We are making it legal, moral, and right. I can't wait to call Jonathan (my FH) my hubby either!

We are having a church wedding so marriage to me means standing before God and family and vowing to love protect and honor each other for eternity. The vows will will say will be a legally binding contract in my eyes. I will mean every word that I say.

We also got married in the church, so it was a religious commitment for us as well. Plus, to me, it signals that we're committing to each other for life, no matter what.

So marriage to me...

We have known since the beginning that this relationship would be different. We have always wanted to be married but honestly I don't think I knew why until I met Shawn. For us, marriage is a promise, we know we would be together forever with or without it, but I want the everyone else to know how serious we are about each other. But we also want to make this life long commitment, not only in our church in a religious way, but also in a legal way and to our family and friends.

We also very much want to have kids, and both coming from broken home ourselves, we want to have those kids in a committed marriage. (We are so happy for everyone having wanted kids in any way! We just feel as if it's best for us and our family to have them after marriage).

Having this ceremony is not about the party, even though the party will be fun! It's about making a commitment. Every time I start to stress about something wedding related I remind myself that at the end of the day, all we really need is an officiant, each other, two witnesses and our marriage license. I think that keeping all of this in mind is what has allowed my wedding planning to be largely stress free and enjoyable.

What are your thoughts?

I come from a family where EVERYONE has gotten divorced. And I don't want that for myself. Marriage is the ultimate commitment to me. And we are making our commitment with God when we accept the sacrament in his church as well. To me it means accepting all their flaws as they accept yours. Trust. He's my best friend. Marriage is vey serious to me. It means financial commitment. So many more things I just can't put into words!! LOL. It's everything to me.

We want to share our lives completely and we trust each other more to make the legal decisions we don't think our family would make for us. Having a legal document binding us gives us security and it feels great to be able to trust someone that much. A domestic partnership wasn't enough for us mainly because of that. He's my person and I can't wait to make it legal lol

I will say I never wanted to get married until FH. I didn't understand why people thought a piece of paper made a difference. Then I realized it was more then a piece of paper. It was vowing to love someone for life. Before FH I didn't think I would be capable of loving someone else that way. Wedding planning has been stress free for me. It's an important day but in the grand scheme of things the color of linens isn't going to make or break our marriage.

Marriage means a lot to me, first, it's a lifelong commitment before God to each other. It's a commitment to work through anything together and become one in the process. Most importantly I believe it's about the love we have for each other and developing that love into something very beautiful- our story. My FH and I are so excited to start a new life together.

We already know that it's forever, but getting married means not just a commitment, but that we're family. It solidifies our future someday as parents and lets us know that we'll always have each other. I can't wait until I have that with FH. We are truly in love and so happy about it!

Oh my goodness I love love this post! I have been so sentimental all throughout planning. I didn't think I would be... but I have balled my eyes out over almost everything.

For me marriage is making a promise to one an other that no matter how dark it gets you will be there to light each others way. It's making one another stronger and better and creating a family unit. It's not the wedding, or the paper work or the rings it's the commitment it is the vows that we will love and support one another.

There is something to be said when you find your "one" the one that is an extension of you.

It is the little things. When we go grocery shopping and team up with bagging and carrying them in. I just look at him all goofy and think is my forever! He looks at me like I am crazy!

Now that I've been married for 2 years...

Marriage for me is about creating our own family, the two of us together and then anyone else who may come along in the future. I feel that the legal and social recognition of a relationship as a marriage instead of just a long-term relationship is also really important!

Like a PP said, we're also getting married in church, so to us is a way to commit to each other AND before God and our families, it's our way of saying we'll always be there for each other, to be a team, to face whatever comes our way together. Our grandparents (both sets from each side) were married "till death part them", heck... my grandma had Alzheimer's and even though she couldn't remember even her kids, she still remembered his husband (my grandpa). FH's parents were married for almost 40 years before his mom passed. So in our minds, marriage IS forever, and we've known from the beginning that it'll mean that for us too. Just the other night we were both seating on the couch, he was making a list of what he needed for the next day and I was just reading a book, and we said that it felt so effortless, and it truly was, I could see myself just hanging out with him, even if we're not talking or even doing the same thing, just feeling his company, knowing he's there

I love that I am not the only one who is sentimental and mooshy! I started crying yesterday at the thought of writing my vows, not actually writing just thinking about it. lol

My FW and I come from homes where our parents have been married for 35+ years and still going strong. We have been so blessed to have beautiful examples on how to work through the hard stuff and love one another. Marriage is the ultimate commitment to love and support your spouse for the rest of forever. It is a public profession that you have made the decision to choose only your partner day in and day out. Marriage is saying that you have found the one that you want to navigate this thing called life along side and build a home together. For me, it is saying I have found my safe place, my soulmate and the one made just for me. She just makes me better. We are in it for the long haul, come what may.

To me, marriage is a commitment for life. It's saying to each other and before god that we are going to stand by each other through the good and the bad. Marriage is a lot of work and getting married to me, is saying you're ready to take on that challenge, along with all the excitement it brings. It means becoming a family and forever choosing to think of not just you, but of your partner

Me and my man have been together for 8.5 years and have a child together and I'm so excited to finally be husband and wife!! I've waited far too long! Lol! He doesn't care about getting married, his opinion is that he doesn't need to be married to be committed and to love and take care of me. (Which is true!) He's really getting married to make me happy. I want to be married so we can legally be a family and if anything happens to either one of us, we will be the "next of kin." But also I'm excited to make a commitment in front of everybody to be together and take care of each other for the rest of our lives.

Personally, marriage means that I get to spend my life with the best person for me :-) I met my husband when I was 19 (he was 17), we recently got married (I'm 32 and he's 30) so I already feel like I grew up with him. We've gone through a handful of phases and I'm happy to continue learning with him.

I think marriage is a legal and moral contract where you agree to try your hardest and give 100% to make the relationship last. It means not quitting when the going gets tough, when life throws curve balls. It means being a unit or a team.

I didn't have a strong feeling about getting married again after my divorce. I see the reasons to both wanting to get married and not wanting to get married. I told FH that I didn't need to be married to know that we will always be together. For him marriage is really important and he told me that divorce isn't an option. That was when I changed my mind. We will go through bad times, but we will do it together. As a family. He is also adopting my son, so our family will be whole and legal. If anything happens to me, he will be there for our son. I guess to me marriage is about family.

Marriage, to me, is the physical form of what love resembles in all of it's purity. It's plucking love and everything that encompasses it right out of thin air and having something to actually point to and look at and celebrate and show others and be able to say, "This is my ring and my wedding and my certificate that has been WITNESSED by God (church wedding) and those closest to me. You've seen our love together. This marriage is what our love is."