I've been thinking about weddings a lot lately...I guess it's because my cousin just got married, my brother's engaged to be married and he and his fiance are throwing around ideas for the wedding and reception, a bunch of other people I know are engaged/just got engaged, and I'm watching Gilmore girls season 7 on dvd right now and Lorelai is engaged to Luke, but then breaks up with him, and then runs off and marries Christopher in Paris. Too much info? Sorry.
But seriously. I've got wedding bells on the mind lately, and I don't know why! I mean, I really, truly hope that I get married some day, because I really, truly want to. I'm dreaming about my wedding day, and how it's going to unfold, and what things I'm going to plan, and what sort of details I want at the wedding, the reception, etc., etc., etc. I actually Googled some German wedding traditions, because I'm all about my German heritage, and I love learning about that kind of stuff.
There are two German traditions (besides the ones that we've already adapted into today's society) that I think are pretty cool and I want to incorporate. They are:
1) Kidnapping of the bride - in some areas (mostly in small villages) friends (or the best man and groomsmen) kidnap the bride and the groom has to find her. Normally, he has to search in a lot of pubs and invite all people in there (or pay the whole bill). Sometimes this ritual ends badly.
Seriously, I want the men of my bridal party to "kidnap" me and then my fiance has to come find me! Some websites suggest that you make it kind of easy for the groom to find the bride because he could potentially pay a really large bar tab, and the whole bridal party would become insanely drunk. But how cool a tradition is that? I love that Germans had it in their right minds to go out and get drunk until someone found you!
The other tradition I'd like is:
2) Polterabend - this is an informal (informal dress and food) party at the evening before the wedding where plates and dishes are smashed (the broken pieces are thought to bring good luck to the bride). The bride and groom have to clean up everything.
Now, I'm not one for cleaning that much, but I think this tradition is great. And what's even more great is that my Oma was telling me that this happened at her wedding, and she basically made Opa clean it up, which then symbolized she would be the woman of the house and she would be in charge. I really wouldn't mind cleaning it up with my future husband, as long as we were happy working as a team. :)
And I also want to play some traditional German music at the reception....usually traditional German music played at the wedding reception includes polkas and waltzes. I like waltzes, but they'd be hard to dance to. People can barely dance in 4/4 time as it is, so throwing a 3/4 waltz at them would be asking too much. POLKA IT IS!
German wedding traditions were found at:
http://www.germanculture.com.ua/library/weekly/aa030601a.htm
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2 comments:
Hmm I should look up some Polish traditions...haha. Actually, some Irish ones might be nice.
And I'm def guilty of looking at engagement rings.
Thats interesting. I think I'd have fun with the 2nd on except I'd hate to clean up afterwards :P
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