marriage vs. wedding

[ecce 20]

Hi there,

I am new to this part of the forum (fiance just got his visa) so sorry if this has been asked before. We plan to get married probably next week at city hall. I will bring my parents and grandma. Then our wedding, which will just be led by a friend, will have all our friends an family and will be in mid-august (about 3 weeks later). We want to have the city hall marriage asap to start the aos process and start getting employment authorization. But will it be a problem at the green card interview if we have pics from city hall, and then pics from a big wedding 3 weeks apart? (And the submit date on the aos forms is before the big wedding even though we are technically married?)

Thanks

[Messybrownhair 251]

Totally not a problem. Congrats!

Try to check how long your state takes to get the certified marriage certificate back.. In Vermont, I was able to get it the same day. Some take a few days/weeks.

Edited July 12, 2011 by Messybrownhair

[Anh map 2,098]

You will be legally married at city hall. What you do at the party a few weeks later is up to you. It won't be a negative for the AOS process.

[Harsh_77 716]

To keep it simple and clean, the marriage at the City hall is your Marriage or Wedding.

The celebration party later in August is the party to celebrate the occasion. That should keep it simple and clean, don’t use the term marriage and wedding that could throw off if they don’t understand it correctly.

[Harpa Timsah 13,258]

Congrats on the visa! What you suggest is not a problem at all. Good luck!

[TBoneTX 43,058]

The above advice is good, si man.

Important: Ask the Justice of the Peace if you can hand-carry the signed marriage LICENSE to the appropriate office in the courthouse yourself, so that you can order marriage CERTIFICATES (note the plural) for immigration requirements. The JP will almost certainly agree. This can save you considerable time.

After our JP wedding, we hightailed it to the courthouse and made it an hour before closing. I ordered 7 marriage certificates. The clerkette had never had a request for so many, but she dutifully created them for us. After using them for AOS, banking purposes, souvenirs for mothers-in-law, and other things, we have one left.

There's everything right about ordering multiple copies of official documents. Please consider doing so, si man.