Marriage: The Civillian Process

     Congratulations, he popped the question and you're about to walk down the aisle and come away with your "Mrs." Degree! Wedding planning can be fun, stressful and expensive, but what about all the official stuff?

• Where do you get a marriage license?
• What do you need to bring to the courthouse/ceremony?
• What information does your husband need to update on base?
• How do you change your name?
• What paperwork do I need for all this?
•  Do my fiancee and I have to do all this together?

There's a million questions to ask and then there's a few variables like: What are the state specific laws? What branch specific things does your husband have to change?

     You're going to need documentation for almost everything listed above. I decided to get a giant folder to keep it all in, it seems like a lot at first but if you have all this in one place it makes things a TON easier. (Just don't lose it!!)

• Yours & your fiancees birth certificates
• Yours & your fiancees social security cards
• Yours & your fiancees Photo I.D. (Passport, Drivers License, Military I.D)
• Patience
• Rings
• Probably a large cup of coffee , I know I needed one

 

      In order to make your marriage a legal union, you need a marriage license. Now every state is different on how to obtain one and how long they're valid for. Hubby and I are from Washington State but we decided to be married in California so everything I knew about marriage licenses was basically useless.  Most states have it on their Department of Licensing website which you can find through google.com. The one thing I found that they don't always put on the website is whether or not you need an appointment. CALL AHEAD! You may spend 40 minutes on hold but if that saves you time in the long run, you're better off.
      For Example, Hubby and I wanted to get married in San Diego County but when I called they said that they couldn't get us in for almost two weeks and would be almost $200. We put our names down just in case but we were running out of time (because he was deploying) and we wanted to make sure we had enough time to get all the paperwork on base settled. I called Los Angeles County, which is just 30 minutes north and lo and behold they don't have wait times, its first come first serve and altogether would cost less than $80. So just by a simple phone call we save $120 and a week and a half of waiting. DO YOUR RESEARCH! We drove up on a Tuesday after noon with all our paperwork, a witness, and some cash and Tah-dah, I'm now a Marine Wifey!

        But unfortunately the paperwork doesn't stop there...

     So you're officially a Mrs. but with your maiden name. Now again every state may be different, in California when we applied and received our Marriage License I had to tell them I wanted to take on my Hubby's last name. Then I had to go to the Social Security Administration AFTER I had an official copy of our Marriage License (which took 7 business days) this part was fairly painless other than a mix up with my birth certificate, but hopefully you don't have to deal with that.

    Now you've finished everything that you can off base, once you get your new Social Security Card and change your Drivers License or I.D. you can start changing your Credit and Debit cards, loans, and any other financial or consumer memberships you have.

To Skip to part 2 of this post "The Base Process" Click Here!

Part 2 - All about Base will be posted sometime this week to help you with all the base changes you and your husband will need to make.


**DISCLAIMER** Please remember that everything I post is based off of my experiences, research and opinions. The information is liable to change at anytime, as is this policy. If you have anything you would like to add or if you have had a different experience that you think should be added to a post please feel free to contact me at wifeyofamarine@gmail.com or through my contact page.