Deceased Father

I am very sorry for your loss. My grandpa passed away a few years ago and he was more like a father to me than a grandfather. I will be putting a locket on my bouquet with his picture so that it's as though he is walking down the aisle and standing at the alter with me. I think this a nice way to do something that really only you know about so that's it's not very in everyone's face. You can also do a dance with your FH to honor him. Put a few pictures out. I feel like the empty chair is too much and would make me way to sad.

So sorry for you loss.

My husbands mother passed away 10 months before our wedding. He did a lot of thinking on what he wanted to do to remember her on our day, but also did not want to make it a "memorial".

In the end we did a few things, most nobody even knew were tributes to her because they were small things that meant a lot to us.

1) We used her beautiful peacock figurine on our sweetheart table.

2) We danced our first dance to her favorite song.

3) We did a fun dance to Viva Las Vegas (where she lived)

4) Finally he did decide he wanted to set up a small memorial area as the guests walked in to the reception.

I have attached a picture, both of his parents are deceased.

My mother passed about 6 years ago and my father most recently 10 months ago... It is very hard trying to celebrate something this huge without feeling that something (someone) is missing. I am putting out their wedding photo by our guest book and I have a small button attached to my bouquet with their picture. I also had a heart shaped piece cut from one of my father's blue shirts and sewn into the front of my dress.

My sister passed away on June 7th 2014 I chose her birthday as my wedding day , that's one way I plan to honor her...we will also do a special dance where I dance with my niece(her daughter).Something you can possibly do is during the father daughter dance, dance with your close male relatives (I'm doing dance with my father again by Luther Vandross)and will dance with my brothers and grandfather) My dad has passed away as well so that will give me a chance to honor him as well. I am so very sorry for your loss but I am happy for your gain of a personal angel..

To all of you ladies I'm sorry for your loss as well....I wish heaven had visiting hours :-(

We're having a sign on the first chair of the first row that says "reserved for Carl Green" (my fiancé's deceased father) and a moment of rememberence for him during the ceremony.

My mom passed last APril, it will just be a couple weeks after a year. She was my best friend and this has been beyond hard to plan without her. What I am doing is keeping her seat open (when she was sick she made me promise I would keep a seat for her), and having a 'in memory escort'. WHen she would've been walked in my brother is going to walk in and place the corsage that was ordered for her on her chair. This will start everything.

In the reception we have a small memorial table where I will have a framed poem, a frame pic of me and her on the other side and in front in the middle a glass vase with water with a floating candle (got the vase it's engraved from DB). This vase and floating candle will then tie into the theme on our escort tables of vases and floating candles. That is what I am doing. I didn't want anything read because I don't know if I will be able to handle it, so the memory escort will be before I'm in there, but since it's being video'd I will see it later. I think it's one of those 'actions speak louder than words' things anyways. It will be listed in the program, so everyone will know what is happening.

I also will be wearing either my mom's wedding ring or another ring she had passed down to her that she loves. A stone fell out, so I'm having it fixed, so it all depends if I will get it back in time.

My uncle passed away a number of years ago, and when his daughter got married to a man who had also lost his father, they incorporated a lighting of two candles to symbolize their fathers' presence at the ceremony. It was a nice remembrance without crossing the line into memorialization.

I'm so sorry for you and for everyone else who has posted. It is very hard to lose a parent and I feel like I've had a lot of couples lately who've struggled with this.

Sher Ber nailed it.

Usually, I suggest a candle, with or without photos at the ceremony, a mention in the ceremony that brings a smiling memory, the lockets on the bouquet, which I love. (We want to lift the name of Artie, the bride's father. We know that where ever his spirit lives on, he's sitting at the end of the bar with a giant stinky cigar and a big glass of Chianti, cursing at the Jets)

I'm not a fan of the empty chair or 'substitute' dances. One thing that many couples forget is that they are not the only people experienced a great loss, and there's no way to predict how sitting next to an empty chair,etc, will impact the other people who knew the person. Less is almost always more.

I am so sorry for your loss. I am still trying to decide what we will do to honor my father who passed away 5 years ago. The two things I know so far is that I included him on my wedding website in my family section, and we will have a candle during the ceremony.

I'm planning to release monarchs during our ceremony in memory of my dad. He always found monarch caterpillars with my girls and loved "growing" them into butterflies.

We always ask if there is someone special that can't be there that day. Then we put out a chance with perhaps a rose for a personal item on it to symbolize that person spiritual presents. We hope this hope to see you. We're so sorry for the loss of your father. www.idealidos.com

Sorry for your loss.

In a few weeks it will be a year that my dad passed away. I'm having a piece of his shirt sewn into my dress. We're also doing a memorial table.

I am sorry for your loss, Laura. I lost my father almost three years ago. I still haven't figured out what I'm going to do to honor him, as everything I think of brings me to tears.