One of the greatest pieces of news that you can ever receive as a sister or a best friend is that you are going to be the maid of honor at a wedding. You should feel very honored and valued to know that you are going to be alongside the bride during the most celebrated day of her life.

Being a maid of honor means that you are the main assistant to the bride from the very start of the wedding preparations until the moment she walks down the aisle. You have to be with the bride every step of the way to ensure that the wedding goes according to plan and is exactly how the bride has always dreamt of it.

You will have to deliver the maid of honor toast, which is a speech that you compose and recite during the wedding reception. Some people worry about doing this, but what you can do is research on the Internet for templates and samples on this subject matter. You can also ask for advice from your family and friends to have a better idea of how these speeches are done.

To give you a head-start on your maid of honor toast, here are some things you have to remember:

- The speech is going to give honor and recognition to the woman of the hour, so it is important to spend a good amount of time making sure that it is absolutely perfect.

- Choose a language tone; if the bride and groom appreciate a comical tone, you can make use of it. If the occasion is formal and reserved, a more serious tone should be expressed.

- Introduce yourself as half of the people attending the wedding reception will probably not know who you are. Keep the information that you give relevant though, by only talking about who you are in relation to the bride and groom.

- Talk about a memorable event or two, such as how the bride and groom met, or the first time that you realized that they were in love.

- Incorporate the good values of the bride in your maid of honor toast; how well a wife she is going to be and how you foresee her happy married life.

- Express your gratitude to everyone who came to witness an eventful day and invite all the guests to make a toast for the groom and bride.

- Put an end to your speech by giving out your wedding wish. Say your prayers for the couple; wish them a bountiful life ahead and your hopes for them to have a big blissful family.

The above tips are just a few helpful pointers, but stick to them and your maid of honor toast will be one that you will be proud of. As a final point, try and keep yourself relaxed. Have a drink (just one though!) beforehand to calm your nerves if you need to.
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Learn more about writing a maid of honor toast by visiting http://maidofhonortoastblog.org

Take Your Best Man Or Maid of Honor Toast Speech to That Next Level With These Tips
By Matthew Miller

We all get stressed out when we learn we have to give a speech. No matter the magnitude of the occasion, any form of public speaking is downright intimidating.

Weddings, however, tend to cause some serious heartburn. Think about it. During a wedding toast, you will be expected to give a heart-felt talk about the bride and/or groom, mixing in a funny story to two, before concluding with a classy toast. During a business speech, you’re usually standing before people you do not know, talking about facts and statistics and bottom lines. It’s far more impersonal.

But the wedding toast doesn’t have to be so scary. With a deep breath and a plan for action, you can be on your way to delivering a successful speech in no time.

Start with these key steps:

1. Brainstorm. Figure out what you want to say. Think of a short story or two that you’d like to tell about the couple. It is considered perfectly fine for these to be funny but they should never, under any circumstances, embarrass anyone. Just jot down any notes you can think of.

2. Decide how long do you want you speech to last. If you are delivering a best man toast or maid of honor toast speech, proper toast etiquette dictates you speak between 3-5 minutes. For groomsmen and bridesmaid toasts they should be anywhere from 1-2 minutes. Now, with this time frame you’ve settled on in mind, go back over your previous notes and cut (or add) stories, anecdotes, offerings of advice, etc to make your general toast fit in the time frame you’ve settled on.

3. Begin structuring the speech. With your notes of what you will be saying in hand, look and see how you want to start the toast. Many professionals recommend starting with either a joke or funny story as it lightens the mood and in many cases settles down the speaker. Try and figure out what the “meat” of you toast will be. How will you end it?

These can certainly be difficult things to figure out, especially if you’ve never delivered a wedding toast before.

Fortunately, there is a free website that can help you. At http://www.ToastEtiquette.com, you will find tips, resources, and a list of the internet’s best websites that devote themselves to the wedding toast speech. No matter your role in the wedding – maid of honor, best man, bridesmaid, groomsman, Father of the Bride, master of ceremonies – you will be able to find a great site that can help you structure, complete, and ultimately deliver a fantastic wedding toast that the bride and groom will never forget!

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Concerned Over Maid of Honor Toasts Or Toast Etiquette? We’re Here to Help
By Matthew Miller

When you’re the maid (or matron) of honor, you’ve certainly got a lot on your plate.

You’ve got to plan the bachelorette party and the bridal shower. You’ve got to make sure everything runs smoothly for the bride during the anxious hours before the big ceremony. You’ve got to make sure the other bridesmaids are in the right place at the right times and they’re wearing the proper attire for each occasion and function. And if that’s not enough, you have to stand in front of everyone and deliver a heart-felt toast that lets everyone know just what you think of the bride and the man she is marrying!

But how do you construct and ultimately deliver such a speech? Merely asking advice won’t get you very far. Sure others have done it before, but you’ll inevitably get the common “you’ll be fine” and “just relax and go slow” tips that, well, don’t really help.

The good news is the local bookstore will surely have books on public speaking and giving a proper wedding toast will surely be covered in etiquette books. The bad news is such books will cost in excess of $50, as hardcover book prices continue to climb.

The best bet is the internet. You have thousands of resources at your fingertips. But how do you sift through the countless e-books, manuals and other programs that are out there? Where can you find hundreds of maid of honor toast templates that will help you to structure a successful toast? Where will you find the right advice on what to say, where to stand, who to thank?

If you are committed to delivering a successful wedding toast then check out http://www.ToastEtiquette.com – where you will find great resources that will help get you on your way to constructing that successful maid of honor toast.

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Delivering the Maid of Honor Toast Just Became Easier With These Tips
By Matthew Miller

You were surprised and honored when asked to serve as the maid of honor!

And now, months later, you have:

* meticulously planned and successfully thrown the bridal shower and bachelorette party;
* helped the bridesmaids nail down their pre- and post- wedding attire, and all their ceremony and reception duties;
* decorated the bridal suite;
* headed off problems for the bride (and groom) over the final weeks leading up to the wedding.

Think it’s time to kick back and enjoy a cocktail or two before hitting the dance floor? Sorry kiddo, you’ve got one thing left to do. It’s time to deliver the maid (or matron) of honor toast!

Unfortunately, many people would consider delivering the toast as the worst part of all things listed above. Everyone’s eyes are on you. You’ve got to:

* deal with a microphone (which you’re probably not used to);
* learn to speak slowly and clearly for the elderly in attendance;
* stand in just the right place;
* be prepared to speak for a few minutes (notice how that word is plural);
* thank all the right people publicly;
* be eloquent, classy and sweet.

It’s too much!

If you’re delivering the maid of honor toast you’ll need to stay focused on the “girlie stuff”. Humor is always a nice ingredient to spice up any speech, but unlike the best man toast, you’ll be expected to keep things more serious. While the best man is reminiscing about beer runs and nights of drunkenness, you’ll be expected to talk about why the bride’s such a great friend and why they make such a perfect match. It’s just the way it is.

But where do you look for help in constructing this type of toast?

Bookstores will surely have a book or two that can be of use. But at what cost? Hardcover etiquette books now cost as little as $50. Some even contain hundreds of pages and sell for over $100. And the library? Will it have the books you need? Will they be remotely updated? Do you know where your library card even is?

Most of us probably head right to the internet when researching a topic. But before you become inundated with search results, check out the web’s best resource when searching for bridesmaid toast examples and templates, rehearsal dinner toasts, wedding reception toasts, best man toasts, father of the bride speeches, etc.

At http://www.ToastEtiquette.com you will find the necessary resources to get you on your way to delivering that great wedding toast! The Top 5 list will put you in immediate contact with the right help you’re looking for.

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Maid of Honor Toasts – Preparation is Everything
By Andrew West

The name of the role gives it away: being asked to be a maid of honor really is an honor. It would normally be your best friend or your sister who asks you, and you are excited and proud to be able to do this small thing for them. But it isn’t a small thing — and one part of this role is often to give a toast at the wedding reception. So: what are the components of Maid of Honor toasts? How can you make it an easy and pleasurable thing to do when you really want to bite your nails off because standing up in front of all those people scares you to pieces?

Just make note of these five simple tips:

Tip 1: Relax. The first thing to remember is that you as the Maid of Honor already have an inside track — you know the bride-to-be pretty well. This will give you an insight into the tone of your speech, and perhaps even help to provide some part of the speech itself. Secondly, when you are giving your speech, you should relax — take it easy, slow down, and breathe deeply just before you start.

Tip 2: Know when your speech will be — you must understand the schedule, and most important who is giving their speech just before you give yours.

Tip 3: Write your speech down on paper or a small set of cards. Practise many times, reading out loud. When you give your speech, you should notes in your hand, but most of the time you want to be looking at your audience, especially maintaining eye contact with the newly-weds, so you do not want to read out your speech word by word while looking down at your notes.

Tip 4: Include words of hope for the couple’s future, use plenty of positive phrases full of encouragement, and write it using your normal speaking voice as if it were just a handful of friends you were going to speaking to. When writing your speech, you might want to use some of the free speech samples available on the internet, but your best bet would be to take advantage of one of the low-cost professional services that will not only provide sample speeches, but will also give you expert guidance how to tailor it for the bride and groom.

Tip 5: Keep it relatively short — two or three minutes as an absolute maximum. It is a big mistake to think that your speech has to be “meaty” and wide-ranging. Keep it simple and to the point: you don’t want your audience to start thinking of something else or — much worse — to start feeling embarrassed for you. Keep it light, with periods of solemnity, starting with a quick one-liner to break the ice and set the tone.

Keep these tips in mind and you will be able to deliver Maid of Honor toasts that will delight the newly-weds and keep all of the wedding guests in a good mood for the rest of the day!

Need help FAST with a wedding reception speech? You need to visit my blog at http://speeches-at-the-wedding.blogspot.com/

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