Western Wedding Ideas For Your Ceremony

How To Add The Flavor of the West To Your Wedding Day

Add some old west country touches to the spirit of the day with these great western wedding ideas. A little fun and excitement always makes for a memorable celebration!

Most ceremonies will follow the basic pattern of a traditional ceremony... the prelude, the processional, the ceremony and the recessional, but you can spice them up with a bit of country flair.

A Country Prelude

The prelude is when your guests are being seated or directed to the ceremonial area (depending on where and how your ceremony is being conducted). Music is often provided as entertainment until the ceremony begins, traditionally by an organist, harpist, flutist or some other low key instrumental.

For a western style wedding, a variation on traditional music is in order. Below are some western wedding ideas that you may want to incorporate into your program:

• A nice touch would be a fiddler or someone playing a harmonica near the entrance to the ceremony location to entertain guests as they enter the building.
• If you are having an outdoor wedding use fiddlers, accordion players, guitarists and harmonica players to entertain guests as they are being seating and while they wait for the ceremony to begin.
• Hire some local actors to dress as cowboys and cowgirls/saloon girls and have them act the part while seating guests.

The Processional

The Processional begins with the groom and his best man taking their places at the altar followed by the attendants proceeding to the altar and finally the bride herself. Consider using some of these ideas during the processional:

• Once the guests are seated and the ceremony is about to begin, signal the start of the processional with a bugle call.
• If you can afford it, hire actors to dress as a sheriff and deputy to "escort" the groom to the altar, "shotguns" ready in case he tries to run. This would definitely add a little fun and excitement to the proceedings that guests will appreciate and enjoy.
• Let the bride's father escort her up the aisle carrying a shotgun, for the "shotgun" wedding.
• Have your flower girl carry a basket of rose petals, orange blossoms or apple blossoms and scatter them as she walks.