License to wed!

Y'all know Mr. C and I are doing a bit of a destination wedding in Austin.  This has definitely been the right decision for us, and in general it's all gone pretty smoothly, planning-wise.  Where it has caused a little consternation, though, is with regard to the marriage license.

The state of Texas requires a marriage license to be obtained no more than 30 days in advance, and also imposes a 72-hour waiting period once you have the license.  When we found this out back in January, we scratched our heads a little bit about how we could manage that time window.

We did some research and discovered the following things:

• In Texas you can get your license in any county, not just the one you're getting married in.  However, that didn't really make much of a difference, as we weren't planning to be in Texas together within 30 days of the wedding for anything but the wedding!   
• If you take a marriage preparation class sponsored by the state, the 72-hour wait period would be waived and we'd get a discount on the fee.  But again, we had no plans to be in Texas in 2012 at all, so paying for flights, hotel, car, and attending a prep course just so we could pick up our license the day before the wedding seemed a bit expensive and maybe not the best option.  Hmmm.  
• The last thing we found out is that you can appeal the waiting period by going to a judge's office and asking for a waiver.  That seemed a bit risky if we decided to do that the day before our wedding - what if they decided our reasons for waiting until the day before to pick up the license weren't good enough?!

We ultimately decided that in order to meet the 72-hour waiting period requirement, I will go down to Texas on the Wednesday before the wedding to get the marriage license on my own.  I can pick it up on my own by bringing an "Affidavit of Absent Applicant" to the County Clerk's office, which is basically a notarized form saying Mr. Cauldron is who he says he is, and that he wishes to marry me.  Mr. C will join me in Texas later that week, as he's wisely saving every day of vacation he can for our honeymoon.  (Yay honeymoon!)

Though I'm a little sad Mr. C won't be there with me to pick up this very important piece of paper, I am also just glad we were able to make it work!  Whew!

Did any of you have scheduling challenges for picking up your marriage license?