Speech by chris thornley

Speech Type: Father of the bride/groom
Speech Creator: chris thornley
Speech Date: 13/07/2013 13:19:16

Good afternoon ladies and gentlemen. For those that don't know me, I'm Chris, and I'm the father of the bride. On behalf of my wife Tracy and I, I would like to extend a very warm welcome to James family, and to all the relatives and friends here today from both families plus those not yet here who are coming for the evening. Thank you all for coming today to celebrate the marriage of Bethan and James.

 We are both very proud of Beth and for me walking her down the aisle today is and will always be one of the proudest moments of my life and one I will cherish forever. Tracy and I are both very happy to formally welcome James to the family. When we first saw James 8 years ago Tracy thought Beth had brought a werewolf home, he was so hairy and had a full beard! It was ironic that they met whilst both performing in a school performance of Sweeney Todd, the demon barber of fleet street! Apparently James thought at the time that Beth was a pretty, but dumb blonde! It didn't take long to learn the error of his ways. Beth had recently split from another boyfriend and wrote her number on a program for James to get in touch. True to form James lost the program and they almost didn't get together. However they met up again at the after show party a few weeks later and after a night of flirting with each other James uncharacteristically said to Beth “ You know you'll have to kiss me before the night is out” they both said that kiss was electric, and the rest is history!

Its traditional for the father of the bride to tell a few stories about the bride. Firstly Beth to put your mind at ease, I haven't arranged to show the infamous tunnel of love video today as a backdrop however it couldn't go without mention for those in the know

At around 2 years old Beth had already developed a healthy disrespect of and willingness to challenge authority – although extricating herself from her baby car seat and trying to garrotte granny who was driving at the time with a skipping rope was probably not the brightest idea!

Those of you who have had small children will know what they are like for soaking things up like a sponge, storing them up to use them later when you least expect it. Beth was no exception and at in primary school she was already developing into a bit of an intellectual (or smart arse!) When the teacher asked the class for another word for fairy tale the rest of the class were stumped after coming up with “make believe” – Beth suggested “Propaganda Miss?” having seen the word several weeks earlier on an advertising hoarding and asked what it meant. After getting stories home from school like this we knew we were in for trouble!

Another example of this and Beth had heard us talk about our “cooking fat,” Ferguson, (for the uninitiated swap the first letter of each word) Fergie was a big ginger tom and he had sneaked into our next door neighbours and stolen their chicken dinner from the kitchen side a few weeks earlier. Shortly after this on holiday in Majorca, Beth was around 10 and she and I had collected several union jack cocktail flags over the first week of our holiday for a secret mission we had planned. We went out to the beach at 7am sharp one morning to repossess several sunbeds from the occupying forces by removing their towels and planting a union jack in each. We both giggle all the way back to the hotel and Beth told everyone of our victorious mission and triumph over the “Gucking Fermans”

And finally on holiday in Cyprus one year and going a little stir crazy at around 11 years old with a sister slightly too young to do anything but terrorize and otherwise just us for company that Beth took on the mantle of “Amy Lattenborough” and over several days produced and directed her first anthropological wildlife documentary with us as the subjects in a David Attenborough “Gorillas in the mist” style presentation. I was of course the Alpha male..… or was that Silverback?

After welcoming James to the family I suppose I should at least share with you all a recent shared learning experience of both of theirs with you – shortly after getting her first car, doogle, a little red…… rover 200 we'd all been out for a meal and Beth wanted to drive a little longer to get some “driving experience.” It was around twilight and the car in front of Beth and James slowed down and put on his hazard lights on then sped up to drive normally again. After repeating this strange behaviour a few times our hero's started to worry, thinking the car was trying to signal to them that they had a mad axe murderer in the boot or something similar, or perhaps he was the mad axe murderer trying to get them to stop. As the car in front turned off down another country road, Beth said to James where now, James misheard where did they go to which he answered left. This which meant Beth followed the car in front towards a secluded spot. I got a phone call to ask what this meant and having recently watched a documentary on the subject explained that the car in front was probably inviting them for some dogging action, apparently Beth and James quickly made their excuses and drove off sharpish…..

Just before handing over to my son in law, I was going to say that when children find true love, parents find true joy, so here's to your joy and ours, However I thought that was a little bit like something out of a Christmas cracker. Instead I would just like to say that Tracy and I met when she was 15 and I was 17, after a few years and a daughter together we got married in a haunted castle in Scotland. We celebrated our 20th anniversary earlier this month. It's often said that swans pair for life, Tracy and I were lucky to find in each other our swans, our soul mates. We both believe Beth and James have been lucky too and have found their swans, we know they are soul mates.

I would like to propose a toast to our daughter and her husband, So would you please charge your glasses.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

THE BRIDE AND GROOM.