{"id":23664,"date":"2017-12-22T06:00:40","date_gmt":"2017-12-22T12:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/?p=23664"},"modified":"2018-01-02T13:04:00","modified_gmt":"2018-01-02T19:04:00","slug":"dos-donts-for-the-rehearsal-dinner-speech-or-wedding-toast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/dos-donts-for-the-rehearsal-dinner-speech-or-wedding-toast\/","title":{"rendered":"Do&#8217;s &amp; Don&#8217;ts for the Rehearsal Dinner Speech or Wedding Toast"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_23665\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-23665\" style=\"width: 660px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-23665\" src=\"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/J-Cogliandro-Photography_660px_229.jpg\" alt=\"Maid of honor giving rehearsal dinner speech\" width=\"660\" height=\"440\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/J-Cogliandro-Photography_660px_229.jpg 660w, https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/12\/J-Cogliandro-Photography_660px_229-300x200.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 660px) 100vw, 660px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-23665\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo: J Cogliandro Photography<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>As the maid of honor or best man, one of your tasks is to give\u00a0a toast or speech to the bride and groom at the rehearsal dinner,\u00a0and\/or\u00a0at the wedding reception. If you&#8217;re not used to speaking in front of crowds, it may be a bit nerve-wracking, especially given the formality of the setting&#8230;and the emotionally charged expectations of the crowd of loved ones (no biggie, right?). But don&#8217;t worry, darling.<!--more--> Follow\u00a0these simple guidelines and your rehearsal dinner speech or wedding reception toast will go off without a hitch!<\/p>\n<h3>Do:<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Write down your wedding speech or toast and have a note card with you. Although you shouldn&#8217;t read directly from the card while giving the speech, it&#8217;ll help to have in case you lose your train of thought.<\/li>\n<li>Practice, practice, practice. This may include reciting your speech in front of the mirror, or recording yourself, and making adjustments based on what you hear.<\/li>\n<li>Share anecdotes of experiences you have\u00a0shared with either the bride or groom.\u00a0These real-life stories\u00a0make the toast way more personal and engaging for other wedding guests.<\/li>\n<li>Be original, and avoid cliches. Sentimental cliches\u00a0make for a boring speech; avoiding them will show the couple how much effort you\u00a0have put into your rehearsal dinner speech or wedding toast, and how much you care.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Don&#8217;t:<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Don&#8217;t go for the liquid courage. No matter how nervous you may be, excessive alcohol is not the answer. Avoid drinking too much to\u00a0prevent embarrassing yourself, or, worse, the wedding couple.<\/li>\n<li>Don&#8217;t go over five minutes. Keep it short or you&#8217;ll risk guests losing interest and reaching for their phones.<\/li>\n<li>When making jokes, don&#8217;t be\u00a0crass or use inside jokes only you and the couple would be familiar with. Guests will enjoy neither.<\/li>\n<li>Don&#8217;t try too hard to be funny. It&#8217;s\u00a0OK to go for one or two laughs, but let it happen naturally, and pay attention to your audience&#8217;s response. Sometimes what they find funny is different from what you might have anticipated would get a laugh.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As the maid of honor or best man, one of your tasks is to give\u00a0a toast or speech to the bride and groom at the rehearsal dinner,\u00a0and\/or\u00a0at the wedding reception. If you&#8217;re not used to speaking in front of crowds, it may be a bit nerve-wracking, especially given the formality of the setting&#8230;and the emotionally<a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/dos-donts-for-the-rehearsal-dinner-speech-or-wedding-toast\/\"> Click here to read the rest of this post \u00bb<\/a> [&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"btn btn-secondary understrap-read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/dos-donts-for-the-rehearsal-dinner-speech-or-wedding-toast\/\">Read More&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n<div style='clear: both'><\/div><div style=\"float: right\" class='the_champ_sharing_container the_champ_horizontal_sharing' super-socializer-data-href='https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/dos-donts-for-the-rehearsal-dinner-speech-or-wedding-toast\/'><div class='the_champ_sharing_title' style=\"font-weight:bold\" >Share this post<\/div><ul  class=\"the_champ_sharing_ul\"><li class=\"theChampSharingRound\"><i style=\"width:30px;height:30px;border-radius:999px;\" alt=\"Facebook\" Title=\"Facebook\" class=\"theChampSharing theChampFacebookBackground\" onclick='theChampPopup(\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.weddingsinhouston.com%2Fblog%2Fdos-donts-for-the-rehearsal-dinner-speech-or-wedding-toast%2F\")'><ss style=\"display:block;border-radius:999px;\" class=\"theChampSharingSvg theChampFacebookSvg\"><\/ss><\/i><\/li><li class=\"theChampSharingRound\"><i style=\"width:30px;height:30px;border-radius:999px;\" alt=\"Instagram\" Title=\"Instagram\" class=\"theChampSharing theChampInstagramBackground\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/\" target=\"_blank\"><ss style=\"display:block;border-radius:999px;\" class=\"theChampSharingSvg theChampInstagramSvg\"><\/ss><\/a><\/i><\/li><li class=\"theChampSharingRound\"><i style=\"width:30px;height:30px;border-radius:999px;\" alt=\"Pinterest\" Title=\"Pinterest\" class=\"theChampSharing theChampPinterestBackground\" onclick=\"javascript:void((function() {var e=document.createElement('script' );e.setAttribute('type','text\/javascript' );e.setAttribute('charset','UTF-8' );e.setAttribute('src','\/\/assets.pinterest.com\/js\/pinmarklet.js?r='+Math.random()*99999999);document.body.appendChild(e)})());\"><ss style=\"display:block;border-radius:999px;\" class=\"theChampSharingSvg theChampPinterestSvg\"><\/ss><\/i><\/li><li class=\"theChampSharingRound\"><i style=\"width:30px;height:30px;border-radius:999px;\" alt=\"Email\" Title=\"Email\" class=\"theChampSharing theChampEmailBackground\" onclick=\"window.location.href = 'mailto:?subject=' + decodeURIComponent('Do%27s%20%26%20Don%27ts%20for%20the%20Rehearsal%20Dinner%20Speech%20or%20Wedding%20Toast' ).replace('&', '%26') + '&body=' + decodeURIComponent('https%3A%2F%2Fwww.weddingsinhouston.com%2Fblog%2Fdos-donts-for-the-rehearsal-dinner-speech-or-wedding-toast%2F' )\"><ss style=\"display:block\" class=\"theChampSharingSvg theChampEmailSvg\"><\/ss><\/i><\/li><\/ul><div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/div><div style='clear: both'><\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[14,249],"tags":[2776,2774,503,2767,2782],"yst_prominent_words":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23664"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23664\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23664"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weddingsinhouston.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=23664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}