Full Tilt's Wedding Ideas

For a unique and strikingly elegant alternative to the ring bearer and his pillow, ask a young girl to convey the rings carefully within one perfect calla lily, as brides did in the early 1900s. Note: don't trust this role to a child younger than ten or so, as smaller hands may not be able to keep the rings safely within the blossom.

A romantic gesture made popular by Queen Victoria is to include ivy in the bridal bouquet. Afterwards, the ivy can be rooted and planted as a beautiful, living reminder of your bouquet. Green thumbs in Victoria's day would nurture the ivy, with plans to include cuttings from it in their daughters' wedding bouquets.

Medieval brides believed that knots symbolized good luck, hope, and steadfastness, so their bouquets were tied with numerous knots. Continue the tradition by giving your ushers tie clips or cuff links adorned with sculpted knots, or adorn a ring pillow or kneeling pillows with silken curtain cording knotted at each corner and finished with tassels.

The "ties that bind" are potent symbols in many cultures around the world. Some African tribes tie the hands of the bride and groom together with braided grasses to represent their union. Mexican couples are "bound" by a ceremonial rope looped loosely around their necks. In a Hindu Vedic wedding ceremony, a delicate twine is used to symbolically bind one of the bride's hands to one of her groom's. You can symbolize your commitment to each other as you walk down the aisle together simply by holding hands.

The French and Finnish traditionally place laurel branches, the Germans evergreens, along the path of the bride and groom after the ceremony, to symbolize luck and fertility. For a garden ceremony, have ushers hand out bags of herbs, sprigs of greenery, and flower petals, to sprinkle over the path of the couple as they make their joyous walk back down the outdoor aisle.

A delightful and ecologically-correct alternative to throwing confetti is blowing bubbles. Hand out bottles and blowers to children of all ages before the ceremony starts.

Make inexpensive, original place cards out of home-made cookies, each iced with a guest's name. Consider gingerbread men and women, or heart and bell shapes iced in your wedding colors.

For a regal touch at each place setting for your dinner reception, make napkin-rings from lengths of ribbon, looped and then sealed with a daub of wax impressed with your initials. Stamps and sealing wax are available at most stationery stores.

Specialty rubber stamps depicting charming Victorian illustrations, often available at arts and crafts supply or toy stores, are great for decorating place cards, menu cards, or table-assignment cards.

Place a colorful square of cloth at each reception table place-setting and a few fabric pens on each table. Ask guests to sign the squares, then use them to create a one-of-a-kind wedding wish quilt.

An update on table assignments: instead of using numbers, identify each table with the title of a love song or a line from a poem.

Make the gift table look special by setting a display of family wedding portraits at one end. Include portraits of both sets of your parents and grandparents, if you can. Place small folded cards in front of each portrait, calligraphed with the names of each couple and their wedding date.

A touching way to honor your parents is to serve them the first slices of your wedding cake yourselves, before having the cake cut up by the caterer to serve to guests.

Miniature evergreens (either fake or real) make inexpensive yet dramatic reception table decorations for a winter wedding. String each with its own set of fairy lights, powered with a battery pack hidden under the branches.

Another inexpensive idea for a winter wedding is to paint pomegranates, pine cones, and plastic bells with gold spray paint. Arrange them in the center of each table, or wire them to styrofoam cones for elegant versions of Christmas trees.

For an early spring or winter wedding, spray bare branches (curly willow is particularly shapely) with silver spray paint. For each table arrangement, decorate a grouping of branches with a white toy dove, white ribbon bows, and a few white orange blossoms or snowflakes made from craft tissue paper.

For a Valentine's Day wedding, hot-glue sweetheart candies and cinnamon hearts to clean juice cans for flower vases that will have everyone talking.

For a summer wedding, try brightly painted metal buckets filled with white sand in which white candles, shells, and daisies are nestled, or an ice bucket filled with ice, two bottles of flavored spring water, and bright pinwheels.

For a fall wedding, fill hollowed-out pumpkins with sprays of tiger lilies.

For added visual drama at your reception tables, secure a colorful bouquet of helium-filled balloons to the centerpiece. Make sure there are as many balloons as chairs for each table. Insert a trinket into one of the balloons in each bouquet. At the end of the evening, your guests can give you a loud send-off by breaking the balloons. Whoever finds the trinket gets to take home the centerpiece.

In Britain it's considered good luck if a charwoman (bag lady or street person) appears and begs a coin from the couple on their way to their reception. Celebrate your joy with a donation to your favorite charity. Have your best man or maid of honor mail it on the day of your wedding.

Before cars and limousines, male guests at Irish, Scottish, and German village weddings would kick off the celebrations with a wild foot-race from the ceremony to the reception. Entertain your guests with a treasure hunt or car rally, a great way to occupy them during a long break in the day.

If there is a considerable time-lag between ceremony and reception, don't forget about your guests. Take a cue from Elizabethan weddings, at which pageants, masques, sporting events, pranks, and other sources of merriment were the order of the day. For an outdoor reception, set up areas for croquet and badminton, complete with equipment and cool drinks.

The best man will have a lot of responsibility throughout the day, even more so if he is also the M. C. at the reception. Help him remember the schedule of events with a specially written timetable. One bride we know chose a beautiful piece of Florentine stationery, cut to fit his inside breast pocket. She wrote out the notes in her best hand in gold ink. It cost pennies, and made the best man feel like a million bucks.

An easy trick to enhance a punch bowl is to float ice cubes with a rosebud or other edible flower frozen in the center of each. The '90s host always offers enticing alternatives to alcoholic beverages. Sophisticated options include the new non-alcoholic wines and beers, as well as flavored sparkling waters.

Have a wandering violinist play love ballads during the receiving line.

Have a hilarious slide show of your and your fiancee's family histories running in a dark corner throughout the receiving line segment of the reception.

Pamper your guests while they wait in the receiving line. Have a prettily decorated bowl of punch set up nearby. Instruct your catering manager to have the wait staff serve tiny hors d'oeuvres to those standing in line, along with cocktail napkins printed with your names.

Make your entrance into the reception grand:

Have a bagpiper pipe you in, or... enter to a trumpet fanfare (live or recorded), or... have the best man announce your entrance and lead a round of applause. Use pyrotechnics to really get their attention.

Add a personal touch to the place settings of the bride and groom with monogrammed goblets, or share a two-handled loving cup as the French do (for toasts only!)

Make the bride's chair special with a garland of greenery and flowers or a swag of tulle and ribbons.

Research local party rental and display suppliers for striking reception decoration ideas. Lattice arches, chair covers, live trees, and giant silk floral arrangements are a few of the exciting options available to rent, at surprisingly affordable prices.

A thoughtful touch for thirsty guests is to place two or three bottles of water at each table. Provide a selection of sparkling and still types. Tie a ribbon around the neck of each bottle.

Ask your catering manager about adding specialty dishes or wines that reflect the bounty of the region. Long-distance guests may appreciate having a taste of the local cuisine or favored libation. Alternatively, consider adding a dish to honor your heritage.

To add color to reception tables, place a large square of pretty floral gift wrap in the center of each. Choose candles in coordinating colors.

For an outdoor reception, flank the main entrance to the tent with two bird-baths (you might be able to borrow or rent them from a local nursery). Fill them with water and float wide, flat blossoms, such as lilies or camellias, in the water. Add floating candles, to be lit when the sun starts to set.

For an evening reception in a garden tent, string hundreds of tiny white lights all across the ceiling for a starry effect.

Couples wanting to give their guests an unusual wedding keepsake that helps others, as well, might consider donating the money allotted for wedding favors to a favorite charity, and placing certificates at each place-setting, rolled up and tied in a pretty ribbon, that declare the donation made in the name of each guest.

Animal lovers might place origami animals at each setting instead of wedding favors, with a declaration that a donation was made to the local animal shelter or a wild animal "adopted."

Unique wedding favor ideas include

keepsake eggcups, complete with mouthwatering chocolate eggs
miniature heart-shaped vine wreaths, hand-decorated by the bride, complete with tiny plaster busts of Cupid
plastic sunglasses with tiny plastic brides and grooms glued to the frames (great for the official photograph of all the guests).

When you're planning a warm-weather wedding and a sweet table seems too much, opt for plates of chocolate-dipped strawberries presented at each table.

Do-it-yourself cassette tape recordings of the reception speeches and toasts will make inexpensive mementos your parents will cherish. Add some of your own thoughts, thank-you's, and observations. Other versions could be custom-taped for elderly or out-of-town loved ones that could not attend the wedding. Or even a web site with pictures and such.

Long ago, wedding days began with loud merrymaking and a festive parade to the place of worship in order to scare demons away and ensure a glitch-free ceremony. Your wedding day can have a roaring start with music and good fun: send a singing telegram to your betrothed with the message that you can't wait to meet at the wedding.

Make sure out-of-town guests arrive at the ceremony on time and relaxed. Assign a few close friends or relatives, who'd like to help you on your wedding day, to pick them up from their hotels and drive them to the ceremony and reception. You might want to extend the same thoughtful offer to elderly guests.

Follow the Victorian tradition of giving each guest a white ribbon favor before the ceremony. A modern-day option is to have the ushers present each guest with a white ribbon rose, either as a stem or a corsage/boutonniere, easily made with ribbon and a glue gun.

If your officiator will allow it, ask a special family representative to begin the ceremony by welcoming your guests and explaining the meaning of what will follow.

Make a customized ring pillow out of plain cotton, with a sprinkling of your favorite potpourri or a few sprigs of lavender or fragrant herbs added to the stuffing. Make the pillow slip from two antique handkerchiefs or a patchwork of charming children's hankies. Add ribbon ties at the open end. Stitch another ribbon in the center of the top side to secure the rings.

More brides and grooms are opting to make their wedding truly a family affair by inviting their parents, siblings, offspring, and even their grandparents, to take part in the processional.

Rather than having the groom simply appear at the top of the aisle just prior to the ceremony, as is common in most Christian weddings, consider having him escort the bride's mother up the aisle in a quiet salute to the joining of the two families.

Welsh brides used to give their attendants myrtle to plant; tradition held that if the plant grew, the grower would be married. Consider giving your bridal party gifts that grow. Perennials that will bloom each spring are particularly appropriate, accompanied by cards asking the recipients to remember you whenever the flowers bloom.

A touching way to honor your parents is to serve them the first slices of your wedding cake yourselves, before having the cake cut up by the caterer to serve to guests.

Miniature evergreens (either fake or real) make inexpensive yet dramatic reception table decorations for a winter wedding. String each with its own set of fairy lights, powered with a battery pack hidden under the branches.

Another inexpensive idea for a winter wedding is to paint pomegranates, pine cones, and plastic bells with gold spray paint. Arrange them in the center of each table, or wire them to styrofoam cones for elegant versions of Christmas trees.

For an early spring or winter wedding, spray bare branches (curly willow is particularly shapely) with silver spray paint. For each table arrangement, decorate a grouping of branches with a white toy dove, white ribbon bows, and a few white orange blossoms or snowflakes made from craft tissue paper.

For a Valentine's Day wedding, hot-glue sweetheart candies and cinnamon hearts to clean juice cans for flower vases that will have everyone talking.

For a summer wedding, try brightly painted metal buckets filled with white sand in which white candles, shells, and daisies are nestled, or an ice bucket filled with ice, two bottles of flavored spring water, and bright pinwheels.

For a fall wedding, fill hollowed-out pumpkins with sprays of tiger lilies.

For added visual drama at your reception tables, secure a colorful bouquet of helium-filled balloons to the centerpiece. Make sure there are as many balloons as chairs for each table. Insert a trinket into one of the balloons in each bouquet. At the end of the evening, your guests can give you a loud send-off by breaking the balloons. Whoever finds the trinket gets to take home the centerpiece.

Add ribbon streamers to each bridesmaid's bouquet for a romantic look. Tie each ribbon into several love knots, or tie miniature silver or gold bells to the ends of each ribbon for tiny peals of joy heralding your entrance.

Take advantage of an early spring wedding by filling tall urns with long branches covered in buds - an effect that's very modern and simple yet very dramatic for both ceremony and reception. A few toy birds, available at most craft stores, added to the branches lend another charming touch of spring.

New ways to decorate pew ends:

hang painted baskets filled with flowers and trailing ivy
hang vine wreaths sprigged with dried flowers and fragrant herbs
hang styrofoam heart shapes completely covered in dried rosebuds
hang evergreen wreaths with twinkling fairy lights (wreaths are individually wired up to small batteries)
place rented topiary trees at every other pew end
place pots of tulips or daffodils at every pew end

Preserved flowers are prettier than ever. Ask your florist about freeze-dried and specially preserved flowers - beautiful options for unwiltable bouquets and centerpiece arrangements. Some brides are choosing a mixture of fresh and preserved flowers in their bouquets.

Make your own aisle runner with hemmed strips of heavy sheeting decorated with a stenciled border of leaves and roses.

A very sophisticated bouquet consists of simply a few calla lilies, spray-painted gold and tied with a gold ribbon - a sensational look for a second-time wedding.

Ecology and safety-minded couples are offering group transportation for guests. An enclosure in your invitation could notify guests of this option. Mention a pick-up point or points. Consider offbeat options such as a double-decker bus, a chartered trolley, or hay wagons.

For an indoor reception, consider having a professional mime amuse guests while they enjoy drinks and appetizers.

We would like to thank Weddingbells Inc for the use of their article.

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