Go Green

Heather Warlick wrote this great article about how the environmentally conscious can make their wedding greener.

Here are five quick tips you can use to make your nuptials earth friendly. To read the full list of tips, read Heather’s article:

- Food: Buy local, organic food products and don’t be wasteful with leftovers. If you have untouched food consider donating the leftover to a food bank. In my personal experience from my wedding, I wish we had thought about the leftovers ahead of time and brought enough appropriate containers to take home lots of good food (and it was delicious!). In the end, we just got some beef wellington stuffed in a styrofoam container - not exactly environmentally friendly - and we forgot it in the hotel anyway and left it in the mini-bar. Think ahead of time and take containers to either take home or donate food. Don’t just trash it.
- Stationary: Try to buy recycled paper invitations and programs. Or just go paper-free and do all invitations through e-mail.
- The Dress: Consider wearing a relative’s dress if it suits you and means something to you. Or, if like most women on their wedding day, you want something just for you, try to get one made from planet-friendly fabrics.
- The Rings: You can get recycled gold rings or something I’d never heard of before called Canadian Diamonds, which are ethically mined.
- Transportation: Try to help guests travel together to save on vehicle emissions. When I was a little girl, I was a bridesmaid at a wedding where the bride and her father got to the church in a horse and carriage - this can be expensive, but is totally green and memorable. Of course, if you’re far away from the wedding site and need to do some highway traveling, this probably isn’t the answer for you.

And here’s a bonus tip very personal to me - hold your wedding in an unforgettable setting like a non-profit zoo, aquarium or botanical garden where the money for the location goes towards education, conservation and maintenance. My husband and I were married in January at the Oklahoma Aquarium in Jenks and the fee went directly to the aquarium to help maintain its mission of ‘conservation through education‘. Having the beautiful aquariums and shark tank as the back drop for our wedding

was unforgettable and all the guests seemed to enjoy the unusual setting.

The wedding can be one of the most stressful and yet wonderful things in a couple’s life together. Taking some extra time to consider the environmentally responsible things to do for a wedding can make you feel better about all that hard work!

And if caring about the environment is something you and your partner take seriously, why not include this part of your beliefs and personality in your wedding?

- Linds