My clientele are destination wedding couples coming to Vegas to get married.
- katzdan3
- Mar 26
- 17 min read
Dawn Angela Mickens
Wedding Officiant | Timeless Connection
I’m in Vegas by way of Atlanta, Georgia. We moved here in 2014, through my husband — a job brought him here. That’s kind of been my world and my journey, following his career and his plans, which started way back when we were married in 1986. He was in the military, the navy, and he’s a navy vet now. We’ve been many places, starting off getting married in San Francisco, to San Diego where he was stationed. That’s where he was for the longest period of time. Then he got out and started contracting so then we moved to Virginia Beach, Virginia; Charlotte, North Carolina; Atlanta, Georgia; and now here.
Through that time, for the most part, I was working in real estate in one way or another and I found my place in foreclosures. That’s what I did for twenty-something years. The last position I had in Atlanta was running a title company. That was wonderful, loved it. But I think it was 2011 when the real estate boom — everything dropped, everything just went upside down and I was laid off. When I was laid off from that position, I was like, “Ok, now what, what am I going to do?” My husband was nice about it, he was like, “Don’t rush back, don’t even worry about it right now, just take your time, and do whatever you want to do.” Great! Why not, ok! But that’s not me. I like to keep busy and I found myself, after maybe a month, like, “Ok, this is for the birds. This is not doing it for me, enough of The Young and The Restless.”
My daughter was a model and pursuing acting at the time. I get this call and she’s like, “Mom, I got you a gig.” I don’t even know what “gig” means, but she’s like, “I got you a gig and you’re going to be doing this tomorrow. You’re going to be playing a role, it’s a family and you have your play husband and play two kids and you just go to set,” — not knowing what “set” means — “you’re going to go to set at this location and it’s a stock photo shoot.” I went to the shoot and it was the best time. She was like, “Just pretend like you know!” and I was like, “Ok, I know how to do that.” So they had no idea that I didn’t know what I was doing, but I did it right, apparently. And got paid for it, got good money for two hours of time. I was like, “That’s great, I can do this!”
From that point, she signed me up to these various agencies. I started doing background work, commercials, whatever the case may be, in Atlanta. I really enjoyed that, had a really good time, met some fabulous superstars and worked with them hand-in-hand. Then I ended up getting lines, and it was a great thing for me. I did that for the next four years until we moved from Atlanta to Las Vegas. Not only that, I started modelling as well. Real Housewives of Atlanta I’ve been on; Las Vegas, the movie with Morgan Freeman; I worked with Dinero, he was in the same movie. There’s a list of people. It’s a little mini-Hollywood. Tyler Perry, that’s who I work with a lot. I was in all the Madea movies, I was in all his TV shows, someplace or another I can point out, “There I am!” It was just a great experience. I would go in there to see what’s my role today; they would always pick me to be in the forefront, to have that mouthing line, or whatever the case may be, so I was always placed with the major player in the movie, always. They always said, “There’s just something about you.” I still don’t know what that means to this day! But I found my niche in both the modeling and the acting, which brought about the book.
My book is “Timeless Rebel” — that’s my nickname, I was known as the Timeless Rebel — so that’s the title of my book, “Timeless Rebel: Empowered to Become a Model at 43.” It was a time when “40 is the new 20” was a new saying. It was also a time when a lot of women, including myself when I was laid off, were feeling like, “What am I going to do now? I live for my kids, I live for my husband, I worked this job to get by…” It’s about my journey; however, hopefully motivational for other women, because my thing was age is nothing but a number. I did a tour as well, on the east coast with the book, speaking at various conferences just to help to be an inspiration.
Transitioning into the wedding world, that was something else. With big things in my life, the Lord always just placed the words in my mind and my heart for what the next steps are. That’s literally what happened with the book. Who thought I’d be writing a book? That’s not me. But that’s what he wanted me to do. I had no idea what I was going to do when I moved here, and the same thing happened. I was awakened in the night and the Lord was like, “You’re going to marry couples.” What does that mean? I woke up and started researching what it was, and I was like, “Vegas is the wedding capital of the world. Ok, how does this happen, how do these couples get married?” Then a word popped up: wedding officiant. I’d never heard of a wedding officiant. I started reading more, found out what it was, and found myself taking a course to be a wedding officiant. I went down to the courthouse and got my license. I did everything without saying a word to my family. I didn’t want to hear it, like, “She became a model, background work, she wrote a book… there’s no telling what she’s going to do.” I didn’t want to hear, “Oh Lord, now what?” I waited for all the paperwork and my license to come in the mail and put it all on the table and waited for everyone to come home from whatever they were doing, and I was like, “Ta-da! This is my new step. I’m going to be a wedding officiant and I’m going to marry couples all over Vegas.” That’s how it started.
When I first started out as a wedding officiant, it was basically word-of-mouth. Then I did get a website and put myself on google. The next thing that happened was I joined the Vegas Wedding Chamber, and that was really a stepping stone, connecting with other vendors, planners, florists, the whole nine. One of the chamber members worked at the wedding salons at Wynn Las Vegas, she was the manager. She was like, “We have this part-time position, two or three days a week, whenever we need you to pop in, would you be interested?” Sure, why not? I’m still new in Vegas and in the industry. I started working part-time at the wedding salons at the Wynn Las Vegas as the administrator and then I was one of their wedding planners.
I worked there for three years and I learned a lot from being there, which has since enhanced my business tremendously because not only now do I officiate the ceremonies, but I plan for the specific locations that I love. I love the outdoor weddings. I love Valley of Fire, Nelson’s Ghost Town, Red Rock Canyon, here at The Wine Garden. So the specific locations that I love, those are the ones I do the full planning for, from head to toe. I have a team of florists, photographers, videographers, I have musicians, whatever you want, I have the whole nine.
I don’t think there are any other officiants here that are doing what I do, or that want to do that. I’m just surprised more aren’t doing this, because it makes sense that I can do it all myself. If I could do bigger, I would, but I don’t want to. My niche is elopements and microweddings, so that’s up to 50 guests, that’s where I max it out. The typical client for me, surprisingly, is not Vegas. My clientele are destination wedding couples coming to Vegas to get married.
A major part about my beginning: my husband and I were married in 1986, and my father was a pastor and he married us. Everything aligns, in my opinion, because as a little girl, I’m always tagging along with my dad and went to those weddings that he did. I attribute my wedding business to him — I watched him do his thing.
Another part, too, was that I moved here in 2015 and the law was just passed for same-sex marriage. That was major for me, I have my two best friends and family members who are LGBTQ+. So when I moved here, the law was passed and I was excited, just like a lot of people. But some people were not, and unfortunately there were chapels and officiants at that time — even though we are sworn to uphold and marry all — there were some that were not, and turning couples down left and right. That bothered me, that was a big, big, big reason for me to do what I do and the way that I did — that I was welcoming for the LGBTQ+ community. I’ll never forget the phone calls, “Do you do same-sex weddings?” Of course, why not? “Well, I’ve been calling around and they’ve been turning me down.” To this day, I love when I get the call. I’m very visible and you can see it on my website.
Just background on the seasons: everywhere else, the wedding months are June, July, August, the summer months. That is not the case here. We are very seasonal, the best times are spring and fall. Right now, we’re heading into our spring season. Our “dead” season is end of November through February, early March. So we have to manage our time, manage finances. And this is every aspect of the wedding industry, except maybe the chapels because they’re always going to have someone popping up. But it gets really, really slow so any new person coming in needs to understand that. Case in point: the pandemic. We had a surge of wedding officiants, it went from I forgot what it was to three thousand plus during the pandemic, who got their license. It’s a good and a bad thing. It was bad for us because you had officiants coming in with the $50 ceremony and this and that, so it kind of hurt for a minute.
Everyone just thought the wheel is going to keep spinning, well, the wheel stopped spinning. It was great for a while, 2022, 2023 were our best years, but 2024 was a bad season for weddings here in Vegas. It’s always slow at this time but it just seemed worse. The clerk of court had said there was a surge of couples wanting their friends or a family member to officiate and not hire an officiant. They can go to the court’s office and that person does have to take a course and get a one-day license. But it really hurt us last year. You get in your head and you think it’s just you but then all the other officiants start saying the same thing. One of my close competitors, she’s a friend, I finally asked her “How are you doing?” She’s like, “I thought you were getting them!” I was like, “I’m not getting them, I thought you were getting them!” I have three partnerships with venues and I’m their wedding officiant and I was like, “Hello, I’m not getting any weddings,” and they’re like, “Dawn, I don’t know what to tell you, it’s friend after friend and family after family.” They tried to push [using an officiant], because it’s a big deal and they sit back and watch and it’s like, they fumble, they don’t know what they’re doing or the process of the whole thing. But we’re looking to a better 2025, and it’s getting there.
You have to book in advance. So, specifically, Valley of Fire and Red Rock Canyon, for those two you have to have a permit. Any of our national parks, even those smallest of parks that are just down the street, you have to book. You have to go through these channels to get a permit and get a time and they have these designated areas within these parks where you can have the wedding — someone’s paying attention. That’s a hard time explaining to couples coming into town like, “It’s Vegas, you can do anything!” You can, but you really cannot. The Bellagio fountains, for instance. You see all the pictures of wedding couples in front of the Bellagio fountains, taking pictures and whatnot. However, all those properties, even in the front on the street, it’s private property. So unless you’re booking your wedding through the actual hotel/casino, we’re technically not supposed to be marrying these couples on the property. You’ll see it done — it is what it is, you get a five-minute ceremony and then you’re done. So that does happen, but technically, you’re not supposed to. Every little nook and cranny around Vegas, you cannot just pop up. You would think so, but no. They’re looking! Because they know. We’re the wedding capital of the world! There are rules, just like everywhere else. So just follow the rules and you can pretty much go anywhere. I have a chapel I work with that I’ve actually partnered with. I met her through the wedding chamber as well and we became friends. She’ll let me book it out for a period of time and then step out the way; it gives my clients the ability to come in and have a ceremony and it’s just me, I’m running the show. It’s a great thing, it’s like I have a space without having a space and without the overhead of having a space. So that’s a blessing for me to have the opportunity to offer it to our couples.
There’s this location called Desert Love Land, and it’s just land with the mountains behind, you can see the Red Rock Mountains behind it as well. We go out there and set up the arch and the chairs, whatever the couple wants, and it’s just a beautiful location every single time. That’s one I’m like, “Come on!” I’m waiting for someone to book it — it’s the one! It’s hard to explain to couples since mine are all destination. They know Valley of Fire and they know Red Rock. All the other ones, it’s like, “Ehhh…” That’s why I try on my website to put as many pictures as possible so you can get the idea of it all because they’re all very beautiful locations, even the dry lake beds. But it looks like we’re not going to have any dry lake beds, anymore — one location has been overrun by the solar panels; the other location, I just heard that’s apparently where one of the movie studios is going to be, so they’re going to tear it all up.
So the biggest, most exciting two weddings I did. A couple reached out to me from California and they were going to the Ronda Rousey fight and they wanted to do the ceremony inside, at the event. Ok, how are we going to make this happen? It was just going to be the two of them, so we were talking about booking, and they were like, “Well, we see your husband, do you want to bring him, too? Then maybe he can take the pictures.” So they booked it, got us the tickets, got us great seats. I did call the facility before that and let them know we’re going to be in the stands, is it ok? And they were fine, they didn’t care. It was perfect seats, the jumbo cam was up there, so in between the matches we did it and the couple gave the crowd a heads-up that we were going to be doing it. We stood up and did it and it was just a quick ceremony. They were on the jumbo cam — we didn’t expect that, but they caught it. We stayed for the whole event and then they took us out on the strip and we went out to eat with them, so that was just great.
Another big one was at the House of Blues here. Two grooms, and they were so wonderful. Their friends were these rock stars who were playing at the House of Blues and they allowed them to have the ceremony on stage, in between their set. But we’re talking 3,000 people. It was the best thing! That doesn’t bother me. When I’m one-on-one, I’m kind of nervous but the bigger the crowd, it doesn’t bother me at all. So those grooms, we walked out together and the other groom, I kept calling his name and he didn’t want to come out! He was so shy. I was like, “Come on!” and he finally came out there. The whole crowd was yelling, it was just the greatest thing.
I had a bad wedding, it was the craziest thing in the world. The couple and I are up front, the wedding’s just getting started. It was an older couple, both had previous marriages. The groom had daughters that — let’s just say they were very spoiled daughters, older now, they’re in their 30s. And not happy about dad getting remarried. So I’m speaking and one of the daughters is in the back — it’s a backyard ceremony at the house. And I remember the bride saying, “Now, there might be some tension, but I think we’re past it,” before the ceremony started. And the daughters are here; she had mentioned to me that she didn’t think they were coming, but they showed up. And they showed up with ulterior motives in mind because as we’re starting and I’m speaking… they’re standing in the back and yelling just some bad language, cursing out the bride in front of all the guests and family and friends. It was crazy because I’m looking at both of them; she’s not reacting. I didn’t know, but she has a hearing aid, and she wasn’t hearing any of what was happening. She was seeing the reaction but not hearing any of it. She could hear me, and she was reading my lips as well. But they were too far back for her to hear anything, then of course she saw his reaction, so it was just a mess. I paused for a moment because at this point, it’s my job, there’s something going on so I have to take off the mic and ask her, “Do you want to go forward with this ceremony?” They both agreed that they did, and they did. But then the other sister started. So we pause for a moment, everyone got collected… it was bad. At the end, the bride was like, “You can’t file the paperwork,” and I was like, “I have to file the paperwork. We have 10 days as the officiant to file the paperwork and I will give you that time to think about whatever before I turn it in, but I do have to turn it in, I can’t not do it.” We ended up turning it in and they ended up being ok. I always think about them to this day — did they last? Because those daughters really had control. So that was the bad one.
With all of our packages, I offer a 30-minute consultation, along with assisting them with their marriage license, providing that information to them. All of our ceremonies are customized, so there’s no cookie-cutter, I'm not pulling it off the computer and doing it over and over again. We really personalize each and every one. Basically, I’m asking them, “What type of ceremony do you want? Christian, traditional, modern or contemporary…” and then I’ll customize it that way. With that said, depending on the package, we do have a full package were we will assist with vow writing. With the vow writing, I have created a ceremony guide, and I give the couples who need that assistance a ceremony guide on the do’s and don’ts for doing a ceremony and writing your own vows.
Which brings me to this, which happened last year. It was funny and cute at the same time… however! They did their own vows — beautiful. We were at a golf course and they wanted the sunset hour. Everything needs to be timely when you’re doing the sunset hour because after the ceremony, they’re going into couple’s photos. You have to be very aware because the sun’s going down and we gotta be on time. The groom always goes first… his vows were 15 minutes long. Everyone was looking, and there was nothing you could do or say, he was so into it and the bride was just like getting into the smile and giving the look like, wanna cut but you can’t cut… he was so into it! It was the sweetest thing. He had a lot to say, it was great. But one of the bridesmaids that I was standing next to got faint, and I was like, “Oh my gosh, we need to call this…” She needed to step back and move because it was just taking too long. And then she said her vows very quickly because it was getting dark at this point. That was the first time that happened. Even though I say this — and I said it to them — no longer than two minutes: very short, sweet, and to the point, keep it personalized, intimate and personal to your person, and just speak from the heart.
Also, I do love stories, which is a whole other questionnaire and a whole other package. Where did you first meet, what did your proposal look like, when was your first date, your first kiss, what do you see in your future — those types of questions. When I do those, I say if you do want to also share your own vows in that moment, please make sure that you know what you’ve sent me, and then don’t say the same thing. We don’t want back-to-back we’re saying the same words. Or else just repeat after the officiant and let me do the rest and share your story.
They have their choice of the type of script and the tone of the script. My first thing with the couples, they’re like, “What type of ceremony…?” and I’m like, “No, you tell me. That’s how it works. It’s your ceremony, not mine. I’ve been there done that! You tell me every aspect of what you want in the ceremony and there’s no right or wrong.” I try and get everyone out of their head and when they relax, they realize, “I can really do it the way I want.” There’s tradition, but you don’t have to stick to that. It’s your wedding.
If they want they can add a unity ritual like a sand ceremony, a unity candle, jumping the broom, any type of cultural aspect that they may bring. I had a wedding here at The Wine Garden last year and they did the whole thing from the shawl to the exchanging of the rings — there were four different rituals and it was beautiful. I love learning new rituals or adding any type of cultural element to the ceremony.
What’s popular with couple coming into Vegas, of course we have all the chapels all around, but the murals — we’ll do pop-up weddings. The murals are a big thing, especially Fremont Street. The Las Vegas sign, you can do the pop-up weddings over there. Everyone wants in on it. Allegiant Stadium is trying to do weddings now, so we’re trying to get in there. I just spoke to someone at wherever the A’s are going to be playing — the baseball field — talked to their events manager there, “Are you guys doing weddings yet?” “No, but we can!” So yes, everybody wants in on it.
My husband is an officiant with the business, too, because there was a moment there right before the pandemic where I was turning down weddings, and I was like, “Well, this makes no sense.” So we’re doing this full-time together at this time. I did bring on some other officiants that contract under us. I might get into training other officiants, too, I don’t know. There’s always room to grow.
We’re trying to build a legacy to leave to our kids. Alongside Timeless Connection, we’ve now started travel, and my husband is working on that side of things. I’m waiting to add that to the Timeless Connection website. It’s called Twelve Three Travel, and it goes hand-in-hand with the weddings. Now we’re able to put ourselves on TripAdvisor and all those different entities out there for destination weddings, so we can offer the whole nine now.
Nine times out of ten, wedding officiants are the ones who make it official — and I’m very passionate about this, I’m always posting it on Instagram — we’re the ones who make it official but we’re always the last to be hired. We’re forgotten, and we get the calls, “Oh my god, we’re getting married in a few weeks and we totally forgot about the officiant…” All the time. Isn’t that funny? As soon as you have your venue, then next thing should be the wedding officiant because we book up just as quickly as the venues or the photographer. And we’re always last and I think that’s so hilarious. I can get your hotel, your flights, the venue, the whole thing. This is opening up a whole other avenue for us, so we are going to take full advantage of it and see where it goes.
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