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The Filipino Yugal Ceremony, or Cord Ceremony, is a ritual traditionally done in Catholic church weddings. Recently, a couple reached out to me to perform their vow renewal. After reading their enquiry, with the wife being terminally ill and their wish to spend each moment of her life with meaning, and the proposed date being on my birthday, I offered to do it for free. There was nothing more that I wanted than to help them to focus on time well spent, than time left. However

Queue Hilary Duff Sometimes things go wrong as a celebrant and that is perfectly okay. Having started back at my day job after the school holidays, I have been riding on the highs and lows of the six ceremonies I did over the summer break. Essentially a ceremony a week, though it may not sound too much to more seasoned celebrants, was a lot for me as a part-time teacher, part-time celebrant and full-time mum. On the days of ceremonies, I was rushing out of my house after chan

Photo credit: my mum ♡ When people asked me what I was doing Christmas, I proudly said that I was working. Having received an urgent enquiry from a couple to do their wedding due to an illness in the family, I felt so much empathy. Bec, a young girl whose father was unwell, wanted nothing more than her father to give her away on one of the most important days of her life. Obviously when I say young girl, she was in her twenties (but everyone younger than me is a young person)

Thinking I would specialise in legal-only weddings, I initially planned to dedicate minimal time and effort to writing scripts. Most couples I meet express a desire for a no-frills ceremony, and I willingly oblige. But oh, how the journey has unfolded! When Structure Met Meaning For my first wedding at St Andrew’s Ukrainian Catholic Church , I dove into researching various Ukrainian wedding traditions. That’s when I stumbled upon the rushnyk wedding tradition. A rushnyk is an

I’m sitting here trying to process the fact that I actually officiated my first wedding. It still feels surreal - like I’m replaying someone else’s memory but feeling all the feelings as my own. But no, it was me. AB Celebrancy finally stepped into the real world, sandal strap slightly crooked, clipboard in hand (more on that later), under a giant oak tree on the grounds of St Andrew’s Ukrainian Catholic Church. And the couple? Matt and Dani. A decade of love. Two beautiful l

Meg and her Croc I had a meeting at another location for my day job as a Diverse Learning Teacher that went over time. Because it went over time, I missed out my usual lunch time and I could feel my hangry levels rising so before going home, I decided to go to the local sushi train.  Feeling a little delirious, I checked my emails as I was walking through the shopping centre and saw an inquiry for a wedding in Parramatta in November. I contacted the inquirer but they did not

Mistakes are meant to happen! It's not about beating yourself over them, it's about making them, acknowledging them, amending them then...

If I haven’t already told you (which is impossible as I’ve told everybody, including the neighbour’s cat), I have finally caught my first...

Analog Collage Art by ADB An old Japanese proverb says that you have three faces. One that you show the world, the second that you show...

Image: Ancient South American rock art on the Nuevo Tolima cliff face, Guaviare, Colombia (c. 20,000 years old) I recently received an...

My full name is Angela Buenaventura. Both my first and last name have interesting stories behind them, which I will get to after I...

It all started during a COVID lockdown - a time when many of us found ourselves re-evaluating our lives. For me, it was mid-existential...