Polishing the first draft of your wedding speech

Now that you have your first draft of your Father of the Bride speech, it's time to kick it into good shape. The way we're going to do this is simply to read it aloud and make sure that it is comfortable to say. While that may not sound like much sense, there is a big difference between the written word and speaking; what reads well, doesn't necessarily trip off the tongue well and so we need to transition from what we have down on paper to the spoken word now.

Since you're not actually rehearsing the speech you needn't bother standing unless you want to get some early practice in. Just read it aloud, making changes where you stumble or it sounds artificial. One easy thing to change is where we abbreviate things naturally in speech - do not becomes don't cannot becomes can't etc.

Run through your text a few times until you have something that you can read easily in words that feel like they belong to you. Once you've reached this stage your speech is complete. All you have to do now is practice delivery and you're ready for the wedding day.

I'll be back with more advice on the next stage in aday or so.