Mother of the Bride Speeches and Toasts

More and more the mother of the bride is being asked to deliver a speech at her daughters wedding. If this is you then what should you say and how can you be sure to deliver a confident speech on the day that reflects well on you and your daughter?

Consider why you have been asked to speak at your daughters wedding. It may be you are speaking in place of the father of the bride. If this is the case then you will need to cover this traditional role and incorporate traditional father of the bride content in your speech. If you are speaking as well as the father then you should make your speech additional to and flow from the fathers speech but as the mother you can let your more feminine side and the special relationship a mother has with her daughter show through.

You should start off your mother of the bride speech by introducing yourself then you can perhaps tell a humorous story about the bride. Be very careful around this point though, do not make jokes at the expense of the bride. This is her day. Although you are a very important part of the day and your daughters life you need to do enough to make her proud but nothing to detract from the bride on her special day.

Talk about how your daughter first met her husband or when she first told you about him or first introduced him to you.

Thank the grooms parents for having such a wonderful son and also welcome them, especially if they have had to travel.

There are always many special guests and people who will have helped make the day special by supplying flowers, catering, dresses or transport for instance that should be thanked and of course a mention of the brides father may also be appropriate.

Of course you should close with a toast. Take some time to think about a beautiful statement for the toast, even a short poem, as this will sum up and end your speech on a high note and trigger a rapturous applause.

How do you ensure that you will be on form on the day and make your daughter proud? The fact is that there are may tips and tricks to help with public speaking but the only good and sure way is to practice. It doesn't matter even if your mother of the bride speech has not made it's final draft. Still practice. Start by reading the speech out loud from the paper. After a time you will find that whole thing can be broken down into small sections. Don't try and read the speech from paper on the day, this never comes over well. Instead write the headers and the first few words of each 'small section' on small prompt cards. Then you will have a prompt for each short section. Keep practising using the prompt cards. You will not get it right first time, don't worry this is perfectly normal and you may need to tweak the prompt cards as you get better.

One good trick is to record the speech and replay is when you in the car or out walking but ensure you talk along with it – out loud. Also make sure you practice in front of someone as this will always bring out the bugs in your speech and give you some positive feedback.

Ensure you start this process at least some weeks before the wedding, earlier if possible, so that you have plenty of practice time. By the time the big day comes around you will have the speech firmly burned into your mind. Do not ever try to wing it on the day as that will always show through.

The truth is that as the mother of the bride you will already likely have many weeks or months of wedding planning to take care of and will have little time to spare and you will very likely benefit from some help with your mother of the bride speech.