Rehearsal Dinner Speech 1
Rehearsal dinners are fun because sage advice can be offered in a safe environment. The following two speeches are meant to deliver meaningful advice but in a humorous way:
Rehearsal Dinner Toast – Marriage #1
Female We are honored to be included among your family and friends tonight. Rehearsal dinners can be very enlightening for a couple, but writing a rehearsal dinner speech is a lot like having a baby – easy to conceive, hard to deliver.
Male Having been friends for so long it occurred to us that we had missed the opportunity to discuss marriage.
Female Tomorrow you get to recite your vows and they will include “for better or for worse, richer or poorer, in sickness or in health, to love and to cherish till death do you part.
Male This beautiful phrase glosses over some cold hard facts.
Female When kids go off to college most parents advise them not to room with friends, if they want to remain friends. Now, on top of the relatively simple act of rooming together add the complications of emotional commitment.
Male Men just think they understand what PMS means before they get married, the fact it happens every 30 days – thank you Adam and Eve!
Female Children, Shared financial responsibilities
Male In other words, trying to spend each other’s money
Female Different likes and dislikes
Male Deciding between hunting and shopping makes for an interesting compromise
Female Sexual drives
Male That probably won’t mesh after the honeymoon
Female and you begin to get the picture that marriage is a very complex sacrament. Tomorrow the Pastor will ask the congregation if we as friends and family will help you navigate through the highs and lows of their life together. Given that, we will all make a commitment tomorrow, we thought we should share some advice tonight.
Male An early warning sign of a troubled marriage is who is the couple getting advice from. We have seen bachelorette parties head to sixth street with the bride to be in a white tee shirt and felt pen. Asking strangers’ advice on marriage can give interesting but not necessarily meaningful advice.
Female Many women are enticed at the checkout counter from the racy articles in Smart Women, Bride and Cosmopolitan – resist this temptation.
Male We felt that this group gathered tonight ought to be able to provide you with solid advice that you will remember for the rest of your lives’ and hopefully make the adjustment to marriage easier.
Female Getting married is easy. When the honeymoon ends you have to live together and there are six areas that might need a little work.
Male #1 Communication
Petty irritants don’t stay petty. Things you use to ignore will begin to grate on you. You will begin to notice imperfections.
Female He sounds like a horse eating corn when he snores
Male How dare she vacuum during the game, and can’t she mute her cell phone
Female He left the toilet seat up again and left the top off the tooth paste
Male Why did she start buying flannel from Talbot’s. When we got married she liked silk from Victoria Secrets?
Female He does not remember our first date anniversary, my birthday, our wedding anniversary or even that Valentines day is February 14th every year!
Male About six months after we got married, I decided it was time to address a few issues. Being the smooth communicator that I am, I started off: Dear, I hope you don’t mind if I point out a few defects that I have noticed. She, having a quick wit – responded: not at all, those defects caused me not to get a better husband. The conversation went down hill from there and I learned an important lesson. The last word in an argument is what a wife says. Anything a husband says after that is the beginning of another argument.
Female Women might have a tendency to over react – do not translate his habit in the morning of wolfing down his food while his face is glued to the sports page while you are trying to have a conversation, to mean he is unbelievable rude, uncouth and an inconsiderate jerk who doesn’t care about your feelings and obviously never did. It is probably just something he learned from watching his father and you just need to retrain him.
Male Speaking of Training: #2 Whose job is it?
Female How many men does it take to change a light bulb? None, they know if they wait eventually a women will do it. With couples, there is an allocation of labor.
Male I predict this is an area you will need to address early on. Opposites attract and one of you has a habit of not taking out the trash, only does laundry when they run out of underwear, thinks you buy new sheets once a year rather than washing, their room has something in common with a mobile homes. It seems to attract tornadoes, what else could cause such a mess.
My grandmother knowing the challenges I was about to face – gave me some advice: When your bride asks you to do something that you do not want to make a habit of doing, do it quickly, happily and so poorly that she will never ask you to do it again.
Female Ladies, you need to nip that attitude in the bud, men are like puppy dogs. It takes six months to train them. When they are good, reward the and when they are bad – have a headache.
Male Well, that is a nice transition to #3 – Sex
Female You have a lifetime to explore each other, the problem is your husband wants to do it all in one night and then retrace his steps again and again and again…
Male There are two kinds of sex: recreational and procreational.
Recreational is what every husband wants and what every wife puts up with to get what she wants. It can be very expensive if your wife is a good negotiator. Begging works about as well after the honeymoon as it did before.Procreational sex is entirely different: When your wife decides it is time to have kids – watch out – its like she actually read all those articles in Cosmopolitan. She is back in Victoria Secret silk. Ovulation leads to copulation. But there is a price to succumbing to her enthusiasm – kids. Negotiating how many children you want is important, but I have to tell you while it may take two to tango, it only takes one to make a decision, so believe her if she says six!
Female #4 Kids
Children are certainly God’s greatest gift to a marriage. Bearing children is the first miracle, raising them is second. What can we say to warn you that the two of you have not already seen in your own families or others?
Male They are loud
Female Loving
Male They break things
Female They are so soft and cuddly
Male Diapers are $10 a package
Female To see their joyful smile in the morning
Male Our food bill compounds monthly.
Female To hear their first words
Male Dear, we’ve had this conversation before – we are not having more, can we move on to the next area, my favorite – #5 Money.
Your vows say richer or poorer. Your credit cards will allow you to feel richer while you become poorer. This will be another area that will need immediate attention. I suggest you do not allow her to transfer all her catalogues to your new address. I always thought catalogues were free but given how many a wife can receive. I can only assume they proactively subscribe. Of course the catalogues are not the problem. The problem is it is so easy to order form them. It is not that your wife has a crush on the UPS man, but she does like seeing him every day because he brings presents.
You will need to prioritize savings vs spending, eating in vs eating out, boy things vs girl things, apartment or that “house.”
Female The issue of money in a marriage can be summed up in a very simple rule – I get to spend twice as a much as he does. The fact is that :
If it is on sale I am saving money
His haircut $20, mine $40
He gets 4 pairs of shoes, I get 8
He gets a watch, I need a watch, earrings, necklace, rings, and bracelets
He needs a suit, I need a wardrobe
He wears a tux, I wear dresses
It is a wonderful rule and makes for a happy relationship once it is understood.
Male So much for my favorite subject. Next #6 in laws
I cannot provide any advice here since I was raised not to be disrespectful to one’s hosts. I only recommend that you enjoy tonight because tomorrow each of you gains a second family and you have to decide where you are going to spend Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, Birthdays, and weekends. Who you will name your children after. Whatever decision you make will hurt someone’s feelings. Get used to it.
Female There is a secret to a successful marriage:
Be lovers
Be Friends,
And Communicate
Even when a marriage is made in heaven, the maintenance work has to be done here on earth. The facts are that you will never have enough money, you can never have enough sex, you can never have to many kids, and while you can have enough of your in laws, there is nothing you can do about them because they are family.
May god bless your marriage and we are here for you.