Irish/Italian/Polish Wedding

NicTom1211

Hi Everyone,
Ok I need some help. My husband to be is very Irish (first born here) so we have a a few irish traditions for our wedding already incorporated. We have bag pipes, he is having tartan added to his boutonniere, I will have the braid in my hair, the horseshoe in my flowers and we will have ribbons over our hands for the handfasting during our vows. We even are going to have his best friend (also first born here) recite the Irish wedding blessing before dinner. Which is all very awesome, but my family is Italian and Polish and besides the jordan almonds as favors I really have nothing to represent my heritage. I know there is a tradition where we eat bread and salt to represent the polish heritage but past that I have no clue. Ive have done a lot of web searches and have come up empty.
I appreciate any and all help on this matter.

zitiqueen

A few Polka songs at the reception?

LetsHikeToday

What about serving some type of polish food? We had a Pittsburgh station at our wedding and it had a few polish choices.

NicTom1211

I don't know if I could get away with Polka music at the reception.

Im going to call the hall and see if I can have a polish station, even if they just serve pieroges.
That's a great idea about the food, Thank you!!

LetsHikeToday

How come you can't get away with Polkas? We played two or three and they were a HIT at my wedding. 

SCogs18

One of my best friends is Polish, but even she wasn't much help with this question...I guess she isn't traditional enough!

But I did google Polish wedding traditions and came up with this website:
http://www.udonet.com/laura/wedding/polish.html

Looks like your hair braid will kind of play cultural double duty!

Cynthia1207

Why not just do traditions that are important to you?  If no one in your family is helping out than maybe it really isn't that important to them.  The easiest way would be through food so maybe a special dessert or a station would be good?

PaoPao820

The Handkerchief song is popular at polish weddings... there's a specific song that older people always sing along to that you make a circle with handkerchief and then when someone in the middle puts the handkerchief in front of someone else, they have to kiss, it's cute. 

Also, it's popular for polish people to say "goszko" which means sour... when they say that it's the equivalent of others who clink glasses to get the bride and groom to kiss.  They says sour so you can kiss and make it sweet.  It's cute.... idk if anyone at your wedding will be polish but I'm polish and will have a lot of polish people so i was warned of this. 

NicTom1211

Thank you all for your input.

Unfortunately the people in my family who I would be able to ask about these have passed away. I wanted to do some traditions for my heritage not only as a way to honor them but just to feel like they are there with me.

Thank you for finding the info on the braid, seems like im covered on that one.

I said I didn't think I could get away with polka because I gave him a hard time about playing irish music at the reception.

I was able to get perogies at the cocktail hour thankfully,

Again, thank you all for your help. I really appreciate it

funandfreckles

I'm wearing two small braids in my hair - as wearing two braids is a Polish tradition. We are also playing a few polkas at the wedding, and my dance with my dad will be a polka (hopefully my dress will bustle to allow that!!)

Melissa603

A few Italian traditions

- wearing green the night before the wedding is good luck,

- smashing a glass at the reception (the number of pieces of it breaks into symbolizes the years of happiness for the couple)

You can find more http://www.worldweddingcustoms.com/wedding_customs/wedding_traditions/italian_wedding_customs.html