Wedding Responsibilities Of The Maid Of Honor
July 29, 2009 by weddings
Filed under wedding planning
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The Maid of Honor is a very important part of a traditional wedding. The bride chooses her Maid of Honor very carefully, considering best friends and close relatives. Once chosen, her duties are sweeping and continue after the couple has left the reception and started on their honeymoon.
The main responsibility for you, as a Maid of Honor, is to stay ahead of the wedding details and make the bride’s wedding day as stress-free as possible. There are ways to keep yourself and the bride on track.
One of the best ways is to make checklists for each step of the entire wedding progression, which could cover several months to a year. If you start out being organized from the first day, you will be the producer of a very smooth and trouble-free wedding for your friend.
Your checklists could be monthly, with all the preliminary needs organized in a step-by-step, orderly progression through the entire process. It is easy to get lost in the details of normal wedding extravaganzas, without considering the family’s schedule changes and the bride’s stresses.
When the wedding date is set by the couple, you can help her select the announcements and invitations, if she needs it. Her mother might play a big part in this, so it would be a good idea to coordinate preliminary activities with her. The two of you can work together and help each other with all the details that need to be taken care of to create a perfect wedding ceremony. Assisting both the bride and her mother with addressing the announcements and the invitations is one of your Maid of Honor duties.
You will be expected to attend all the prenuptial parties, including showers, the bachelorette parties, the wedding rehearsal and the dinner afterwards. In some traditions, you are expected to hold a party for the couple. It could be a couple’s shower or a simple celebration of the couple’s union.
One important responsibility is keeping the bridesmaids aware of fitting appointments for their gowns and necessary rehearsals. Some you might have to remind every day or so. This is where a checklist will come in very handy.
Most wedding arrangements need to be booked as early as the dates and needs are identified. Chapels are booked for weddings months in advance, as are florists. Do not overlook reception sites. Banquet rooms or halls get booked just as rapidly as the other arrangements do. While these bookings are not your specific duty, you will need to be alert to details the stressed bride is overlooking and make suggestions to keep her, or her mother, on track.
You will be expected to help the bride and the bridesmaids with dressing, starting about 2 hours before the ceremony. During the ceremony and in the receiving line at the reception, you will assist the bride with her train.
At the wedding ceremony, your responsibilities will be critical and all about making the entire production successful. You are essentially the spare caretaker for the couple’s wedding. It would be a good idea to arrive at the chapel early to make sure the flowers for the ceremony are delivered on time, including those needed by the wedding party.
If there is a flower girl, make sure the supply of petals is included in the flower delivery. You will need to go over what she is supposed to do once again to make sure she doesn’t toss all the flowers in the first few steps.
One critical responsibility is holding the groom’s ring until the appropriate time during the ceremony, if it is a double-ring ceremony. During that ceremonial exchange of rings, you will hold the bride’s bouquet and hand it back for the recessional.
If you are making a speech at the reception, have a copy with you so you don’t bumble around trying to remember something you remembered perfectly yesterday. It happens.
Depending on the bride and her plans and expectations, there will surely be other needs you can fulfill. But these will get you started.