What are your ceremony traditions?!

julyxoxo

Sooo I'm starting to outline my program, and I'm thinking about the little traditions that my FI and I want to incorporate/possibly explain in the program. For instance, my grandmother and my mother had their fathers take their rings off, and they got married in those rings, and I am going to get married in my dad's ring too. Then later, I'll put my real wedding band on. I think the tradition started because in Jewish weddings, you are supposed to get married in a solid metal with no adornments.

What kind of traditions (religious or not!) are you guys incorporating into your ceremony that is special or maybe a tradition that's passed down in your family? I think it really makes the ceremony unique to any other wedding! And it would be fun to share!

ginadog

I thought of bringing an Irish and Norwegian wedding tradition to represent our heritages. 

Someone said the handfasting was Irish (probably a lot of cultures did this though),

The only Norwegian thing found for the ceremony is the B&G are lead in by a fiddler and at the end everyone is lead to the reception with a fiddler or accordian.  This would be perfect becasse it is a 200-300 foot walk.  Kind of post ceremony however.  We are not religious so pulling from our ancestry is all I can think of to personalize it, along with our own vows.

I don't want to hire a fiddler but I will have a cello player friend doing the music.  I can have her play the classic Norwegian "Come to the Wedding" tune though as people leave the area.

Rebis58

We're not really having any family traditions that I can think of (besides the usual dad walking me down the aisle, etc.)

Some of our own "traditions" or special things we are adding are:

-walking down the aisle to my mom's favourite song, Somewhere Over the Rainbow (Hawaiian version)

-very close family friend (an "uncle" or "second father" figure to me growing up) will be performing most of the ceremony, with an officiant stepping in for the legal parts

-love letter and wine box ceremony (we write a love letter to each other the evening before, saying how we feel, why we are marrying each other, hopes for the future, then during the ceremony we put the letters into a box with a bottle of wine, and the box is sealed to be opened on our 10th wedding anniversary)

-writing our own vows (FI's request - this makes me nervous but I think it's very sweet that he wants to do it)

Also, during the reception, a good friend of FI's is going to sing a song for us (she has an amazing voice). I've asked her to sing "Love me Tender" by Elvis because this was my parent's first dance song at their wedding (their friend sung it for them, as well). My parents don't know yet, so excited to surprise them!

I don't know if those really count as answers to your question, but that's the closest we'll be getting to traditions!

BmoreBride311

Our church is pretty strict, so we can't stray too far from the traditional ceremony.

My FI is Peruvian, so we will have at least one reading in Spanish by one of his relatives. We want to do the wine box letters / capsule, but we may just do it privately, IDK yet. We are also doing a special Croatian pre-wedding ceremony at our RD, b/c we can't do it at our church.

Madisonpenny

Although not a tradition in our families, we're doing a handfasting ceremony since we are both part Irish.
I'd love to incorporate an Hungarian tradition somewhere during the day as well, although not necessarily in the ceremony.

Elinetrouwt

We don't have any particular wedding traditions in our families. We will say pretty traditional vows, and have our sisters each do a reading.

michelle11988

I think my wedding will be pretty traditional, we are having it at a church so not much room to do anything really different.  I will be carrying a handkerchief that my great-great-grandma made for her daughter for her wedding day around my bouquet.  I think we are also doing the unity candle that I know my two cousins did in their weddings as well.

YuMMMy721

I wanted to include my mom, as my dad is walking my down the aisle and then of course the father daughter dance, so I sorta felt like she was being left out. So we will be doing a mother ceremony. Before our vows our mothers will come up, a nice verse is read that discusses how mothers are who bring you into this world and how your first kiss is from your mother, and then they will give us a kiss while the priest says something about the last kiss as a single person comes from the person who gave you your first kiss. They then join our hands together and the vows begin. It's a really sweet and nice way for the moms to get to send us off! 

Besides that we are having a fairly traditional wedding! 

k8888

We're doing a traditional Catholic wedding ceremony with a full mass so that's a tradition in itself for us.

I really love the love notes sealed in a wine box idea... maybe I'll do that privately the night of/before the wedding with FI....

BeachLover2885

We are having an interfaith ceremony as FI is Jewish and I was raised Catholic. We are doing the unity candle, FI is stepping on the glass, and our officiant is going to recite a Hebrew wedding blessing. I want to include a little explanation of each in the program so people understand the meaning of the different traditions.