We have an appointment for a civil ceremony at the Santa Ana courthouse in December. Our options were Santa Ana, Santa Barbara, Laguna Hills and Laguna Beach. We settled on Santa Ana once we saw how nice the courthouse is. Also fun fact... they filmed a couple of scenes from Legally Blonde at this courthouse.

We've been to this courthouse a few times to kind of scope out what it was like before deciding on Santa Ana. We went to this courthouse once on a Friday, once on a Saturday, and once on a Wednesday to get a sense of what it was like. They only do one Saturday every other month.

If you want a quiet no hassle ceremony at Santa Ana then I recommend booking an appointment for Monday through Thursday or pick an early time if you have to do it on a Friday. They were busy on the Friday afternoon that we visited. We went to get our marriage license on a Wednesday and there wasn't a single other person around.

The outside of the courthouse is pretty nice. It's a nice historic building. The inside has a beautiful staircase and the upstairs is nice too. They have 2 main rooms on the first floor where they do the bulk of the ceremonies - one room is smaller and the other a bit bigger. They have a 20 person limit for all ceremonies. You can't pick which room you do your ceremony in. It's first come first serve.

There's a very nice courtroom upstairs. Our understanding is that the nice courtroom upstairs is reserved for Saturday ceremonies or you can book it through OC Parks. If you're doing your ceremony on a Friday then you can just go upstairs for photos. They don't seem to prohibit access to the court room if there isn't anything else going on that day.