Theme Weddings
Weddings today are almost always personalized in someway. Planning a Theme Wedding just takes this a little further. A Theme Wedding can reproduce many things, but basically a theme wedding is when all the aspects of your wedding are influenced and represent a specific topic. Usually a theme is chosen because the couple is are fond of a particular period in time, season of the year, holiday, place in the world, hobby or even a time in history and they want their wedding to reflect this. Everything about the wedding including the invitations, attire and decorations are usually chosen to reflect their theme. Themes are a great way to help you choose aspects of your wedding. Having a theme gives you a vision and helps you choose options for your wedding so things come together in a way that makes visual harmony.

Green Weddings
The current trend of helping our planet has moved into the wedding industry. There are many wedding companies that offer green choices to brides and grooms. It's not only gaining in popularity, it's also getting much easier with many green options becoming available. Some couples are opting for even just a few green options for their wedding to do their part and feel good about their wedding planning decisions. Going green can cost more in some situations, but there are many green ideas that can actually save you money. Everything from using organic wine for your wedding reception to having a website to help reduce the use of paper. The goal of a green wedding is to follow the 3 R's, Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. Visit our Green Wedding Chapter for lots of great Green Wedding ideas.

Wedding Flowers
Some of the more well-liked flowers being used in bouquets and boutonnieres are Orchards, Calla Lilies and of course the classic rose. The trend is using boldly coloured flowers, hand tired with large ribbons. Flowers are being used with lots of foliage, faux pearls, crystals, feathers, and beading in bouquets to add a lot of interest to the flower bouquets. Also wedding bouquets with long flower stems or just a few large flowers tied together are also very popular.
For destination weddings, many Brides are choosing to carry one or three long stem exotic flowers like the Bird of Paradise flower. Remember flowers always look best if they are used in odd numbers and using flowers in season with help with the cost.

Wedding Colours
The most current colour combinations being used in weddings today are brown tones with light pink or light blue. These colours are very beautiful together being a little bold, yet still very elegant. Browns are also being used with creams and tones of green and copper. You will find these colours are available throughout wedding vender's products including decorating and wedding attire. The monochromatic look is also very popular in resent years. Using white, silver, gold, creams, and tans to decorate with, making most of the surfaces that same or close to the same colour.

Wedding Gowns
Many of the trendy wedding gowns are strapless with tie backs and have less embellishment on them. This is a very elegant look. Wedding gowns are also available in cream, and very pale pink and blue to compliment the men's brown tuxedos. Some wedding gowns have eye-catching crystal beading draped over the back. Sometimes beading can be added to gowns to enhance it after it has been bought.
An unique alternative to having something blue, is to have the inside of your wedding gown monogrammed with your name at the bottom, near the hem. Then if the gown is passed down through the generations, the other Brides' names can be added. Of course this would only be practical if the gowns style and fabrics allows it to be done properly and so it doesn't show from the outside. We suggest that you always use professionals when doing anything to alter your wedding gown.

Women's Attire
Long sleek and simple gowns remain to be the most popular for the bridesmaids' gowns. Many of the fabrics include dupioni silk, silk chiffon and satin, velvet and crepe. The women's attire has always been colourful offering many choices, but the latest trends in colour for women's gowns are rich jewel tones. Purples, deep reds, greens, and coppers are all popular, but light pink, blue, yellow and taupe are still a common choice usually complimented with brown tones as their wedding colours. Many of the jewel tones also compliment brown. As with the bridal gowns, many of the Bridesmaids dresses are strapless and very formal. Wraps are often used to give a little arm cover for the women. Some brides like to move away from the current trends and choose have bolder taste, for them there is a vast variety of gowns with elaborate details. Bright coloured dresses with everything from fur to feather embellishments are available.

Jewellery
Sparkling crystals are everywhere, especially with bridal jewellery and there is something for everyone's taste in jewellery. The crystals come in clear or coloured to complement your wedding colours. Often crystals are used in the women's hair and crystal jewellery completes the look. Some tiaras can be made into jewellery to wear after the wedding. How special is that?

Make up and Hair
Make up continues to be applied naturally with a lot of earth tones.
Hair Extensions are become more popular and are easier to use, be sure to ensure that they blend perfectly with your natural hair colour. These are great for those people that don't want to have to grow their hair for months before the wedding day. They also allow for a lot of style flexibility.
Brides are choosing to use a lot of crystals in their hair to match their jewellery Many Brides Maids are also using dazzling crystals in the hair to add sparkle. Crystals hair pieces come in the form of tiaras, hair pins and even jewellery pieces can be used in the hair.

Men's Attire
As mentioned above, brown is one of the most newly used colours in weddings and tuxedos are no exception. Tuxedos are available in many shades of brown, but deep chocolate brown seems to be the most popular choice. Of course, the classic black tux will never go out of date and many couples are still choosing it.

Wedding Transportation
If you want to ride in an old classic car for your wedding some limousine companies have beautiful antique cars for rent. Many couples are also choosing to rent large SUV's or buses for the entire wedding party and family to ride together on the wedding day. This way the party isn't interrupted and everyone stays together.

Wedding Food
Having a chocolate fountain at your wedding is becoming a common practice. They're a great way to add interest to your food table. The wedding guests absolutely love these as the smell of chocolate fills the room. They come in several flavours of chocolate including milk, dark and white chocolate. The number of fountains and their size depends on the number of wedding guests you are expecting and when you are planning on serving the fountains. One note, chocolate fountains can be a little messy and do need some supervision. So if you hire a company that rents fountains, ask if they also offer their catering services while it's being served. It will ensure that it is used right (no little fingers in it), that it doesn't run out of the food that is being dipped and everything stays fairly clean, we all know how messy dripping chocolate can be. Chocolate fountains can be served with everything from fruit, marshmallows, rice crispy squares to cookies. You may wish to have it set up and running for your wedding reception dinner's dessert, as an appetizer before the main meal, at night during your buffet at the dance, or served while your wedding guests wait for the wedding party to arrive to the wedding reception.

Wedding Cakes
Wedding cakes have come a long way and the variety of cake and filing flavours will thrill any palate. The options in cake decorating and cake toppers have also expanded including personalized Bride and Groom cake toppers that are made to look like the couple getting married. Many couples are choosing to replace their wedding cake with mini wedding cakes or cupcakes. The trend today for set up of wedding cakes is to place the wedding cake table in front of the head table and decorated to complement the head table decor.

Wedding Photography and Video
Wedding photography has come a long way with technology. With digital photography photographers are able to do so much more with your wedding pictures. Wedding photos have become great pieces of art for you to admire and treasure for the years to come. One of the most popular things available is the coffee table book. It is a wonderful way of keeping a record of your wonder day. Your house guests can browse through it when they visit you in your new home.

Some couples are choosing to have their photos taken before the ceremony is another new trend in wedding photography. Yes, you won't first see each other at the wedding ceremony, but there are great benefits and it can be very romantic to first meet on your wedding day in a beautiful photo setting like a park. One of the first benefits is your appearance will be much fresher for the photos. Normally if there are tears flowing at the wedding ceremony, it's hard to take the time to refresh makeup before pictures. Also, if it's a hot day and people are perspiring during the ceremony, it will affect how they look in your pictures. Another big benefit is you are able to go directly to the wedding reception after the ceremony without making all your wedding guests wait while you travel to the location for the photo shoot and have all the photos taken.

Wedding Guests Favours
One of the newest wedding favour ideas that is catching on is charitable donations. Make A Wish Foundation, and many other charities offer wedding favour donations on behave of the wedding guests. Each wedding guest receives a card at the wedding reception to let them know about the donation and how it will help others. Sometimes the charities include thank you cards as well. You may just want to give a total sum to an organization that has meaning or has helped your family in the past. If this is the case, you can make up your own cards to place on your guests tables and maybe even have your Master of Ceremony announce the donation so everyone understands what you have done.
Personalized favours are also becoming very popular and the amount of choices is on the rise. Edible photo favours can be made out of cookies and chocolate in all sorts of shapes including boxes with a photo of the Bride and Groom on them. The options in personalized labels are also endless, but chocolate bars and small wine bottles continue to be some of the most popular choices. Calling cards are another interesting favour that we are seeing in recent months. Brides and Grooms can give personalized calling cards which they choose the number of minutes on the cards they would like to give their wedding guests as a thank you.

Wedding Invitations and Stationery
Technology is starting to take the place of paper stationery. Email Invitations are an option for couples, especially if most of their family and friends are online. Beautifully graphic email invitations are available and they can save you a lot of money and time. The wedding guests can then easily and quickly reply to the Bride and Groom online. There's no fear of the wedding guests loosing their wedding invitation in the mountain of papers that always seem to pile up. Usually the companies that offer this product also offer printed invitations as well for those wedding guests that do not have email.
Personalized Stationery is also very popular. The Bride and Groom are able to customize the invitations by choosing the paper type, colour, embellishes and of course the print style and colour. There are so many choices of striking papers and embellishments available for weddings, surely something for everyone and every wedding.

Wedding Decorations
Wedding decorations can be absolutely breath taking for your wedding guests when they walk into your place of wedding ceremony and wedding reception. Lighting has become a very important aspect of wedding decorating and can be used in many ways. Usually spot lighting is used for features like the wedding cake and mini lights are used under tooling and other sheer material to add sparkle. Chair covers are also use very commonly and are available in many different colours and fabrics to match your wedding colours perfectly and are a great way to dress up a room. Centerpieces are also one of the more important items and also one of the easiest to make a statement with. In the last few years centerpieces have become very grand. Tall vases with large flowers and other items like big coloured feathers and crystals are being used in centerpieces.

Wedding Planning Extras
Wedding Insurance is available for the "just incase circumstances". The insurance will cover you incase of cancellation or if a vender doesn't provide their services. These companies usually also offer insurance for the place of reception which is usually required in Ontario.
Personalized Bobble Heads of the Bride and Groom are a fun way of topping your cake. These are special order and they need a photo of the couple.
Ice sculptures are also very popular at weddings. They can be made in many different shapes and can be used for different things.

Wedding Websites
Wedding websites are becoming a must for couples. There are so many things that can be done through a website including guests replies, the couple can post special thanks to family and friends that are helping with their wedding, guests can sign the online guest book, maps to the wedding ceremony and reception can be posted for guests to review and print off before the wedding, written introductions with pictures of the wedding party can be posted, and my favourite, posting engagement, bridal shower and wedding photos on the website for guests to view and enjoy. Wedding websites don't have to cost a lot. Most people have free web space available through their internet provider and don't even know it. There are many templates available online and you may even know someone that has website building experience that can do it for you as a wedding gift.

Wedding Web Cams can broadcast your wedding around the world. This is an option for couples that are getting married a long distance from where their family and friends live so everyone can share and experience their special day.

Wedding Ceremonies
Many couples today prefer to write their own wedding vows, or at least part of them. If this is something you are interested in, talk it over with your officiant.
Butterfly releasing is a very romantic occurrence. Butterflies are usually released right after the wedding ceremony. The couple or wedding party releases the butterflies outside the place of ceremony. When handling butterflies there are important instructions that need to be followed, so make sure the directions are clear to everyone involved.
Destination weddings are also become more accepted. The Bride and Groom usually invite a small number of people to go on vacation with them, where they are married and usually continue their honeymoon. Some will have a wedding reception upon their return to include more of their family and friends. Some local photographers will even go to your destination wedding.

Wedding Receptions
Many wedding reception venues are offering packages to choose from. Each package includes a different level of their products and services. Often everything is included right down to the taxes and tips, making it easier to budget your wedding reception. Always be sure that all the details are clear and in a contract.

Making It Social - One of the newest trends is to set up a conversational area for the wedding guests. Many couples rent modern or leather furniture and set it up in an area away from the main wedding reception.

Entertainment for Your Guests
Slide shows are a great way to make your wedding special and tell the life story of the bride and groom. What better way to celebrate the union of your lives together than celebrate the steps in life that brought you to your wedding day. With today's technology this is very easily achieved. You can either have a pre-recorded script or have someone follow along with a script and microphone You can either have it playing as your wedding guests arrived to the wedding reception to entertain them while they wait for you to finish with your photo shot or have it played as part of your wedding speeches.

Dancing
Another growing trend in weddings is to hire cultural dancers or musicians to perform at your wedding reception. This could be Irish dances to African drummers. Most cultures have distinctive music and/or dance. This is a wonderful way to bring your heritage into your wedding day to celebrate and show your family your pride in your culture.

Another fun trend is performing a dance routine yourself for your guests. Many couples are going to the lengths of learning a dance routine to perform for their first dance. Some couples incorporate their best man and maid of honour also. The more radical the dance is the better. This can be a great way to breath life into the party and shock your wedding guests. The room will literally come to life as you dazzle your wedding guests through dance. Some couples will have the disc jockey start a traditional slow song and then stop and start the fast song, just to catch the wedding guests off guard. If you want to do this invest in the expertise dance teacher and have them choreograph a dance that's suitable to you and your dance skills and have fun.