Sample speech: Personal and humorous

A wedding speech for you to adapt, for when you want say it from the heart -- and get some laughs

That was a hard act to follow. I hope I’ll be able to look after Felicity as well as you have, Dick.

Thank you for all coming here today, especially everyone who has travelled from the other side of the Atlantic to share this day with us. May I just let you all know we think Guildford is quite a large town around here, so please stop referring to it as  ‘cute’ and ‘quaint’ and saying how nice it would look in the back yard.

Thank you also for your generous gifts. We’re actually a bit upset, as we threw out our old toaster yesterday in anticipation of receiving several more. We’ve opened most of the gifts and no one seems to have given us one.

Of course, none of us would be here today without Felicity’s parents -- Shirley and Dick -- and my parents -- Flora and Johnny. When I met Felicity, I thought she was sincere, kind and caring, and when I met her parents, I knew exactly where she got it from. It’s clearly genetic, and I hope our children will inherit it.

Flora and Johnny have been so supportive to me -- always. I’ve worried sometimes that I’m not good enough for Felicity, but my mum has always assured me I am. And even though I know she’s biased, I am egotistical enough to believe her, and here I am today. So Shirley and Flora, we’d like to give you these little tokens of our love and thanks.

My love and thanks today really have to go to Felicity -- for being here, for being so beautiful and for being my wife. As an investment banker, Felicity deals with mergers and acquisitions. On this occasion, I’m thrilled she’s mixed business with pleasure and merged with my family and acquired me!

You’ve all met Aloysius, my best man. When I asked him to be by best man, I checked with him that he could organize a stag night, make a speech; even get me to church on time. But I forgot to ask the most important thing: could he tie the knot? I’m not talking about marriage here -- I’m talking about the horrendous mess he’s made of my bow tie!

Thank you also to the beautiful bridesmaids. I know they and Oddbins have been a great support to Felicity during the last few months. Felicity, Laura, Sarah, Johanna and Chardonnay met up so often I was confused as to why there are only three bridesmaids here today.

Ladies and gentlemen, Chardonnay could not be with us today, but Champagne has kindly stepped into the breach, so if you would like to raise your glasses, I give you... the bridesmaids!