Wedding Seating

I need seating layout for wedding ceremony. Where do parents, brothers/sisters, grand parents, aunts/uncles and friends sit?

In a Christian wedding, the bride's family and friends are seated on the left side of the church facing the altar. The groom's family and friends will sit on the right side of the church. In a Jewish wedding, this is reversed. Also, all parents remain standing under the Huppah throughout the ceremony.

When bride's parents are divorced, but not remarried, if they are congenial, they might sit together in the left front row at Christian weddings. Otherwise the parent who raised you (and guest or spouse) sits in the left front pew and the other parent (and guest or spouse) sit in the third row on the left side. This is also an individual decision, depending on their relationships and preferences. For groom's parents, simply reverse the seating (using the right side). At Jewish ceremonies, women sit on the left and men on the right.

If one family has many more guests than the other, everyone may sit together without assigned sides of the church. This will even out the seating and fill up the church from the front to back.

Parents of both sides sit in the first or second pew on their respective sides (often times the first pew is left empty in case someone from the bridal party must sit down during the ceremony). Grandparents sit in the next pew on the outside (next to the isle). Siblings can also sit in the grandparents pew. You can reserve additional pews for other honored guests (like family of flower girl and ring bearer, etc.) The reserved pews can be marked with flowers, etc. or the ushers can just seat the guests behind the reserved pews.

Guests who arrive after the bride's mother has been seated should not be seated by the ushers. They may simply slip into an empty pew behind the other seated guests.

Seat Attendants

Do you have a seating chart in EZWeddingPlanner just for attendants, because number of people at those tables vary.

You can use the EZ Wedding Planner seating program to seat anyone, including attendants. You can specify the size and shape of each table as well as the number of people to be seated at each table. You then assign the people to the tables (guests and attendants must be entered in your People list before they will show up in the seating program to be assigned tables). The number of people at each table can vary by table. They can be moved around and reassigned as many times as you like.

Sand Ceremony

Some couples are using a sand ceremony as an alternative to the traditional unity candle ceremony at a wedding. Three nesting glass vases are used. Each side vase is filled with a different color sand, and gently poured simultaneously by the bride and groom to make a lovely blended display in the center vase.

This sand ceremony is also popular with blended families. Children may help the parents pour from their vase, or using some additional mini nesting vases with different colored sand, the children can pour into the larger vase. This is a delightful expression of the unity of the families and works well for any number of children. Colored sand can be found in craft stores or even fish stores and any size/shape of vase may be used.

They are ideal for a beach or outdoor weddings where it is too windy for candles and also a wonderful touch for mixed-racial weddings.

Following the wedding, the outer vases may be used for flowers, while the center vase remains with the unity sand as a lovely display in your home.