couples were exchanging rings in ancient Egypt over 3,000 years ago and today couples are exchanging rings in wedding ceremonies all over the world it's a thing but there are so many questions around the exchanging of the Rings in the wedding ceremony who brings the ring in once the ring comes in what happens to the person who keeps the ring is there somebody who holds the rings during the ceremony what does that person do when it's time to exchange the ring and give it to the bride or groom how does the bride or groom put the ring on the other person's hand did they say something did they repeat what's the best I'm mark Alyn grello I'm a book solid full time professional wedding officiant there are a lot of moving parts around the exchanging of the Rings and if we overlook any of those parts it can lead to everything from the person who's supposed 10 of the Rings not having them to the bride or the groom stumbling all over their words when they're asking when we're asking them to repeat after us in the ceremony itself and so without further ado here are eight tips for exchanging the Rings really well to prevent any of those mishaps from happening let's get right to it number one is decide who will be holding the Rings in the ceremony now as the wedding officiant the person in charge of putting together the whole ceremony we need to talk with our couple about many of the decisions around what's gonna happen in the ceremony I like to have a ceremony planning workshop about four to six weeks before the day in that wedding planning ceremony session called the wedding workshop I asked my couple one of the many questions is who will be holding the ring in the wedding ceremony now sometimes it's important to remember the person who's gonna bring the Rings in and the person is going to keep the Rings during the ceremony that's not the same person a lot of couples will opt for a ring bearer to come in usually a young boy to walk down the aisle with the Rings in a box or on the pillow and hand them to somebody and that person will hold the Rings during the ceremony traditionally that is the best man so the ring bear we'll walk-in down the aisle open the box could go up to the best man open the box the best man will remove the Rings put them in his pocket now some couples opt to have the best man hold one and the maid of honor hold another if that's what's happening in this ceremony I've seen it all sometimes the ring bearer goes to Grandpa in the front row and he holds onto them and brings them up in the ceremony when it's time sometimes it's a dog who walks down the aisle with the Rings attached to a collar yes I've seen that I've even heard one of my coaching clients talk about a horse that brought in the ring so somebody's gonna bring the rings into the ceremony space and somebody else perhaps is going to hold on to the Rings during the ceremony it's important to find out in the weeks leading up to the wedding itself who will be holding the Rings in the ceremony so when it's time to do the exchange you can call on that person or animal that brings us to the second thing to consider now it is time to choose where to put the ring exchange in your ceremony script now in my opinion the ring exchange almost always goes best after the wedding vows I like to do the vows then I like to put on the Rings as a physical concrete symbol kind of nailing in that promises that the couple made earlier with their words now it becomes concrete in the form of a ring now that is not to say you can't put anything between the vows and the exchange of the Rings a lot of the time if there's some sort of wedding ritual I like to do that right after the vows so whether it's jumping over a broom whether it's a unity candle lighting maybe it's a sand mixing a whiskey mixing you know lighting something on fire smoke all the things I know sometimes all the elements they sound like a magic show and you say them all together but coming out of the vows you might want to do a ritual of some sort right there let's say I say in mixing and then move into the Rings now again the one thing to consider is a handfasting ceremony that one involves the hands and the Rings involve hands as well so if you're gonna do a handfasting ceremony that's the one case or you might want to do rings before the hand fasting because of course you're gonna tie up their hands and that's a logistical problem when it's time to put rings on so in that case I often do vows then rings then a hand fasting after the Rings are on but usually you're gonna want to put a ritual between the two so in a nutshell almost always wedding vows then wedding rings then getting ready to pronounce the couple as married okay that brings us to consideration number three which is check that the ring keeper does have the Rings before starting the ceremony so we've decided with our couple who is going to have the Rings in the ceremony we've decided we're in our wedding script the ring exchange goes best now we can skip right to the wedding day now about five minutes before the ceremony when everyone is lined up at the back everyone who's gonna come into the ceremony down the aisle at a certain point of course the couple their parents perhaps stepparents their bridesmaids their groomsmen the ring bearers the junior flower bridesmaids flower girls animals whatever it is everyone and everything that's gonna come down the aisle everyone's lined up it's we're just a couple of minutes of forth start time and as I discuss in my video five last things to check right before we kick off I always make a point of finding the person who is supposed to have the Rings as we said maybe it's a ring bearer maybe it's the best man but find that person go up to them and ask them directly do you have the Rings you would be surprised how often the answer is oh my goodness no and then of course they have to get the Rings and retrieve them that's happened actually so often that I generally ask that person half an hour before the ceremony when I show up early so you might want to get into that practice just to make sure they're not in the tell room we're back in the car and you don't want to find that out two minutes of for ceremonies start time but at the very least do it again just as a last double check to make sure before we go out there say to the person who's supposed to have the rings do you have the Rings when the answer is yes then you are ready to kick off that wedding ceremony which leads us to point number four which is introduce the ring exchange section of the wedding ceremony with a reflection so when you move into the ring exchange part of the wedding ceremony you want to explicitly state almost give a marker for everyone listening that we are moving from one part of the ceremony into this next part they don't have the advantage of reading the way you might read a blog or an article where our eye page breaks paragraph breaks that helps us so it's good to say in a wedding ceremony when you're moving from one part into another what's happening next so I will say something very explicit like Morgan and Julian will now exchanged rings as a symbol of the promises they've made here today and of their ongoing commitment to each other now that's what I say this is where I recommend signal that we're entering the ring exchange time and then also now it's time for you to go into some sort of reflection it can be as long or as short as you want about why we exchanged wedding rings and what makes this so significant and important to this day and to the couple so if you want to talk about how the ring is round and round and it goes round and round it'll never end just like the love of this couple do that you'll hear that in a lot of ceremonies do you want to talk about how the rings are made of precious metal and forged in fire and that's like life and commitment and all the things that are gonna happen forge this bond that will never be broken between this couple do that too so just think of a reflection maybe you scour the religious tradition of the couple or your tradition if it's the same as the couple to think about something that might go well in this section or just reflect on the ring itself and come up with something entirely new but you're gonna want to say something about the Rings here we're going into the Rings you tell everyone then make a little reflection about why we do it we won't on everyone to sit there and go like what's the point of this just walk them through why it's significant and then we go into the logistical part of actually exchanging the wedding rings now as for me I keep it short and simple the focus of my ceremonies is telling the couple's story and so I just focus on their story and the commitment basically how they got together I have a formula boat on the couples story and then I say when we get to this part again like I said earlier Morgan and Julian will now Exchange rings as a symbol of the promises they've made here to get today because remember we just did the vows and of their ongoing lifelong commitment to each other and then it's time for the keeper the Rings to bring the Rings forward and now it gets a little bit logistical so we got to talk this through which brings us to number five which is make sure the ring keeper knows the cue for when to come forward with the Rings now traditionally when it's time for the groom to put the ring on the bride's finger say this is where the wedding officiant again has traditionally said who has the Rings this is part of a rich tradition where the officiant asks questions in the wedding ceremony that make it seem like he doesn't know where he is or what he's doing like when you know the father gets to the end of the aisle with the bride and the officiant says who gives this woman to be married to this man today does it use any names doesn't seem to really know who the person is standing before him that kind of thing so weddings are a lot more personal now we can get away from acting like we don't it's just we do so many weddings every day because this is our parish we don't even know what's going on now we can use first names we can address people like we know what's going on because we've had meetings with them presumably they know us and we know why they're here today so as I was saying earlier for newer officience I advise that we be as explicit as possible in a wedding ceremony there are a lot of moving parts and it just helps so for example like we said when it's time to exchange rings you tell everyone it's going on they will now Exchange rings when it's time to say vows would say to your couple Julian I'm going to ants ask you a question and you can please reply with I do or you can say please repeat after me the same goes here you're gonna want to say to whoever has the keeper the rings use use the person's name so you can say Chris would you please now come forward and give Morgan's ring to Julian now for me because I have a rehearsal for every single wedding I do I basically insist on it I don't use an explicit prompt like that basically in the rehearsal that's where I mean I'm pretty I'm pretty excruciating about practicing the Rings for the rehearsal as we'll discuss in the next few moments but I give say the best man if the best man is the one with the Rings in the rehearsal I will say here's what I'm gonna say and this is where you spring into action I'll give you a nod but I'm going to say Morgan and Julian will now Exchange rings as a symbol of the promises they've made here today and of their ongoing commitment to each other and I'm going to turn to you and I'm going to nod at that point that's when you come forward okay so whether you explicitly give the prompt or whether you practice it in the rehearsal either way we're achieving that goal of saying to the keeper of the Rings here is your cue and when this happens it's time to come forward with the Rings which leads us to point number six which is the ring keeper gives the ring to the groom or to partner one now I say partner one because I try not to be heteronormative it's the same-sex wedding then it doesn't really groove to groom bride to bride but this is the part where the person who keeps the Rings gives the ring to the person who is about to take their turn putting the ring on their fiancees finger now this seems pretty self-explanatory and straightforward it's surprisingly not there are three tips three hacks I want to give you to help you go smoothly here and avoid any disasters first I tell the ring keeper not to keep the Rings in a box this seems counterintuitive right because aren't the Rings really safe in a box nestled inside your coat nice and cozy so they're ready no absolutely not I have had several mishaps with best men who have not listened to me and have had the rings in a box so the most notable was an outdoor wedding on a deck the poor best man stepped forward just like we practiced in the rehearsal of course he didn't have the box and I advised him not to have a box but he steps forward with the box pops it open and of course because the Rings shifted when he was walking and when he pulled it out of his pocket they weren't nestled in their nice tight little slots he opened the box they popped out like jacks in the Box actually hit the deck and started rolling there were big cracks in the wood and we all just kind of stood frozen helplessly watching the Rings roll towards a crack and mercifully just kind of go and not actually roll between the cracks and it was just you know made it at a moment of levity like I've talked about in other videos be ready to make a joke I said something like great just like we practiced and everybody laughed so it was great but my goodness what if the Rings had fallen through the cracks there so because Rings bounce and shift in a box you don't actually know how they're placed when you crack that thing open I always say to the best man if he's carrying the Rings or whoever has the Rings don't put them in anything have them in your pocket reach in your pocket pull them out so that you're handling them directly and there's no unpleasant surprises now the second thing is a bit of stagecraft a lot of the time the groomsmen and the bridesmaids will be lined up cut more behind the couple because the couple's kind of popped out towards the guests in the seat and so it is kind of instinct for the best best man if he has the Rings to just kind of take one little step towards the groom and the groom will turn like this or like this to get the Rings what happened there is when the groom turns see what I've done there is I've turned my back to you now if you're the wedding guests you you've had you just see the back of the groom if you're the photographer you just see the back of the groom as well so like I say a bit of stagecraft here I always tell the best man go the long take a couple of steps to the other side of the grow so that the groom has to open his body up and turn forward instead of back that way all the guests can see what's going on the photographer can get a great shot and everything is unimpeded lastly I tell the brides and grooms in the rehearsal I say how do you accept the ring and groomsmen if he is the ring keeper how do you put the ring in the groom's hand and I always tell them none of this none of this pincer to pincer we're so bad at this I say let's practice this put your hand out flat your palm and the breast man whoever has the Rings is going to place the ring flat in the palm and you close your hand around it let's not have rings falling not on our watch and that is just a really simple logistical thing let's let me demonstrate that again palm up bride or groom ring keeper puts it in the palm boom you know it's a fail-safe method none of this pin sort of pincer thing we haven't evolved well enough to do that yet in a wedding ceremony for whatever reason well now with the Rings passed safely off it is time to move to the next part which is and this is for you wedding officiants wait number seven wait while partner one places the ring on partner twos finger wait I contemplated calling this next point avoid this major rookie mistake but in fact I've seen some experienced professionals do this as well basically what we don't want to do here is ruin the moment by making the brides and grooms do two things at once which essentially in this example is don't make them try to put the ring on the finger and repeat or say any words at the same time it'll ruin the moment and here's how and here's why in the wedding ring exchange essentially two things are happening they're putting the ring on the finger as I just said and they're saying words well when we collapse these two things we ruin the moment let me give you an example so here's one scenario the groom takes the ring starts putting it on the bride's finger but it sticks it doesn't go on easily this happens almost all the time by the way trying to get the ring on it's not going on over the knuckle they giggle a little bit there's some blushing some embarrassment and then the officiant starts pulls out their verbal six-shooter and starts saying to the groom okay now please repeat after me Sandra I give you this ring and then so he's still trying to put the ring on it's not going on they're focused on this am I ever gonna get the ring on and then the officiant starts saying words add the groom and the poor guys trying to do two things at once usually it leads to him going I can't can you please repeat that I'm sorry I was trying to and it just kind of ruins the moment now let me walk you through scenario number two groom is putting the ring on Brides finger and it's not going on it's sticking it's not going over the knuckle all that good stuff officiant just waits and smiles and the groom is sweating a little bit he'll make a little comment like who this is tough work the bride will make a little crack like it's sometime today is this gonna are you gonna be able to do this people are giggling they're laughing the guests are laughing a little bit and the officiant you can just join into that moment don't be afraid of the silence don't be afraid of what's gonna happen it's a little bit awkward but it's also funny give it some air let it breathe he will get the ring on eventually I've never had to call for dish soap yet so the ring goes on everybody giggles and then kind of recomposes themselves and then the officiant says and now Morgan please repeat after me and he starts the repeating part and that part is moving and beautiful so see what happened there when you make them put the ring on and talk at the same time you're actually ruining both moments you're ruining how funny the awkward thing can be and you're ruining how moving and beautiful the repeating of the commitment words can be whereas if you give it space and let it breathe the funny awkward part is quite humorous and memorable and then the repeating of the words is actually quite moving and beautiful and you're accomplishing to both wonderful things so if you're doing a wedding rehearsal which is what i always recommend and i have a video on that how to run a fun and successful wedding rehearsal in the wedding rehearsal I always tell the couple I'm not make you walk and chew gum at the same time so to speak I'm not gonna make you put the ring on and talk at the same time they're each gonna take their turns put the ring groom puts the ring on you wait then ask the groom to repeat a few words oh and then repeat the process the best man ring keeper gives the ring to the bride bride puts the ring on the finger and then she repeats the words do those things very separately and distinctly and this part will always be a smash success so basically we've already covered this but it has to be said the final distinct part of the ring exchange is point number eight prompt partner one to consummate his or her ring exchange with a few words so when the ring is on we want to help partner one seal the deal with saying a few words sometimes that's repeat after me and so I recommend getting them they've already said their vows but here like I say this is kind of nailing at home a concrete physical symbol of those promises and so this is the part afterwards when the ring is on you just say very explicitly Morgan please repeat after me now here if you're part of a religious tradition certain places certain faiths something very specific and traditional is said here make sure you ask the couple typically when I share the script with them my couples are usually secular so I just have a wonderful little kind of consummation here about why they're giving the rings to each other what it means and actually this is exactly what I tell them most couples love and you can use it for yourself I say I say please repeat after me and then he'll start he'll say Morgan I give you this ring as a reminder that I will love and honor you please wear it as a daily sign of my commitment to you that's it that's what I asked a couple of say it's not too long it's not too short it drives the point home you can get that scripting at the blog posts that I wrote about this on how to officiate a wedding CA the link will be in the description below some couples they do not want to repeat they're just too nervous they want to say almost enough in the ceremony in that case you can rephrase that to a question again you'll find that as well in the same blog post and that's yours to keep when you ask the question you just ask it in the form of dude do you and then they answer I do remember the steps walk them out in a wedding rehearsal with your couple and all their friends and family and there you go bingo you'll have a wedding ring exchange that even an ancient Egyptian would absolutely love like I said don't forget to grab the scripting for this in the companion blog post you'll find it in the description below if you haven't grabbed my guide yet my 10-part wedding ceremony guide how to put a ceremony together please grab that how to officiate a wedding dot CA / guide if you like this video if it was helpful like the video leave me a comment below I always read and reply to any comments you leave me I love hearing from you subscribe to this channel so you don't miss any videos that I'm putting out all the time about how to officiate a wedding see you the next one