Officiant hosts mass wedding in Decatur to honor loved one

An Atlanta wedding officiant is turning a deeply personal story of loss into one of love and giving back. So she is hosting her third annual mass wedding event and also launching a foundation to support families who are grieving the loss of a newborn. Let's get out live right now to our Chris Rosenthal, who is standing by with more. Chris, good to see you. What's going on? Yeah, you know, good morning, Paul, you know, so I've already attended a few weddings today. Pretty, pretty cool here at the 716 West in Decatur. They got the food all set and they've got the wedding venue here all set and already had a few couples come out here this morning and get married and it was really great watching them and it was free for them as well. First 10 couples or so get their weddings for free. So if you've got your marriage license, Come on out, you can do it really quick, really easy. And I've got Falun Jones here. She is the officiant here. And tell me about this. How'd you get this idea to do this? So I've been doing it for three years. This is the third annual Simply I Do event. The idea of doing this was more so in remembrance of my son. I wanted to not be sad on that day because I lost him in 2021 on 11-11. That was the last day I spent with him. So instead of being sad, I said, well, let's come up with an event and make it happy. So I've been doing it for three years now. It's the third one. And bringing joy to people. I mean, what's it like when people come in here and get married? It's pure joy. It's a feeling that... It doesn't get old. I never, I don't get tired. I've been doing this for eight years almost now. So I never get tired of feeling or getting the feelings that they feel. Let's just put it like this. It's my wedding day too, when it comes down to it. Oh, and over and over and over. You've married a lot of couples. You've had some unique experiences. Yeah, I've married over 5,000 couples in the state of Georgia. A lot of them, different experiences. I've married people in labor and delivery, Kroger, airport, wherever. You got a marriage license, I can marry you. Yeah, sometimes you just want to get married. So people want to come out today. How can they take advantage of it? Come down 716 West in Decatur. You just need your marriage license. And I'm here up until about 5 o'clock today. Up until 5 o'clock. You don't need to, you know. Don't need to reserve or anything like that. No, just walk on in. And honestly, I will marry people for free today because I'm just feeling the love. So come on down, get married. Why not? Yeah, absolutely. Just if you've got that license, come on out. It's a beautiful venue here, too. I actually witnessed a few weddings, like I said earlier today, and I spoke with one couple, and they had a really nice story. They were a really cute couple of high school sweethearts here getting married. And let's take a listen. So actually we are doing this like as a like secret to our family and stuff and in 2028 we're gonna do a ceremony and like you know like then we'll spend it with our family but we just kind of wanted to elope and... have an intimate wedding and 11-11 just the numbers has always meant like a lot to both of us and I'm in the military myself so just you know Veterans Day the angel numbers and everything coming together is just we thought it was perfect. Yeah. Perfect, perfect experience for them. And I think we're expecting some more coming in this afternoon. Again, just come on out to 716 West, your marriage certificate. Anybody from all counties, right? All counties, all state of Georgia counties can come on down with their marriage license and get married. I'm here until about five. Falun Jones. I'm excited. Yeah. So there you go. So marriages today for free. Yeah. Chris Rosenthal. Love that. Love that you've gotten to attend some weddings today, too. That's very cool. Hopefully you can jump in and be like ring bearer or something a little bit later. I will check in and find out if you get to join in the fun. All right. Chris Rosenthal. Great to see you.