Friday, 26 October 2012 00:00 | Written by Admin @ The Ring

Pay-it-forward weddings | Giving back as you look forward

More and more couples are finding ways to pay-it-forward as they exchange vows, adding meaning to their union and making their budget truly count at the same time. Here are some of our favourite ways for pay-it-forward couples to give back as they look forward in life...

TIE THE KNOT FOR BREAST CANCER (www.cbcf.org/ontario)

The Canadian Breast Cancer Foundation Ontario Region’s Tie the Knot for Breast Cancer program is offering an incredible alternative to traditional wedding and shower favours. Couples can choose to make donations to CBCF-OR to memorialize lives lost or to honour those living with breast cancer. Couples who participate are provided with materials to display and distribute amongst their guests. 

MAKE-A-WISH FOUNDATION'S "SOMETHING BLUE" WEDDING PROGRAM (www.swo.makeawish.ca)

Brides can help grant the wish of a child with a life-threatening medical condition by making a donation to the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Southwestern Ontario in lieu of traditional wedding favours. Their “Something Blue” wedding program provides favour cards informing guests that a donation has been made to the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Southwestern Ontario in honour of their attendance at your wedding. Couples can choose from the $5/guest package (Sapphire Diamond) and the $10/guest package (Blue Diamond). Each guest will receive a favour card with a personalized inscription and a pin from the foundation. 

WEDDING SAVIOURS (www.weddingsaviours.ca)

Wedding Saviours is a group of wedding professionals and business partners who have come together to provide a free wedding day for couples in need of assistance. They are dedicated to the communities they serve and to the many charities within them also in need of assistance.  Recognizing that in today's economic climate many couples have had to put their wedding day on hold, or cancel it all together, Wedding Saviours set out to help. "We married our first couple live at Canada's Wedding Expo where we announced the first free wedding contest in January 2011. Couples were asked to find ways to pay-it-forward in the community as part of their application process and suddenly it became as much about the power of paying-it-forward as it was a free wedding!" 

{  EDITOR'S FAV  } PLAN CANADA'S GIFTS OF HOPE (www.plancanada.ca)

Plan Canada offers the Gifts of Hope program in which gifts can be purchased to support Plan’s community programs and projects in developing countries. For example, give gifts like a goat or a mango tree, which provide livelihoods and income for families or donate to the Peanut Butter Project, which not only helps to bring protein to growing children in many parts of the world, but also supports women’s co-operatives by providing them with training in peanut processing and business and marketing skills.  Photo, left: Plan Canada.

FIFTY NIFTY | WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHERS HIT THE ROAD TO FIGHT HUMAN TRAFFICKING (www.thefiftynifty.com)

Minneapolis-based husband and wife photography duo, Jonny and Michelle Hoffner, have begun an epic year-long adventure taking them to fifty places in just fifty weeks. The plan is to drive across the United States (with stops in Canada and the Bahamas) photographing one wedding per state, per week, while donating $1,000 per wedding to the anti-human trafficking organization, She Dances, a nonprofit organization, committed to providing holistic restoration for young girls who have been trafficked and sexually-exploited. When plans to open a safe home in Tegucigalpa, Honduras for young girls who have been sexually trafficked were announced, the Hoffners jumped at the chance to help. “This is our effort to not be weighed down by the magnitude of the problem and to do what we can with our lives and with our jobs to make a difference." ■