**2 questions** Receiving line & bubbles

A receiving line: at formal gatherings, the host, hostess, guests of honor, and others, who stand in a row to greet guests (www.yourdictionery.com)

Receiving lines used to be done at the reception as your guests arrive, but nowadays as many couples do their pics between the ceremony and reception, guests typically arrive to the reception before the couple. So now people either do them as guests exit the ceremony (either outside the church/building the ceremony is in or at the back of the aisle) or you can have your cocktail hour in a separate space as the reception and then great your guests as they enter the reception. Receiving lines should at the very least include the bride and groom, but can include the bride and groom, both sets of parents, and the wedding party.

Many brides these days forgo the receiving line altogether and just move from table to table during the reception greeting each guest.

Every wedding I've attended did the bubbles as the couple left the reception.

Bubbles:

Typically for the "exit" of the bride and groom. Originated when the bride and groom would leave for their honeymoon after the cake was cut, leaving their guests to finish out the party without them. The guests would all participate in a send-off with rice/birdseed/flower petals/bubbles/etc.

Nowadays, couples often stay to the very end of the reception (we were among the last to leave ours, if we had done the send-off at the end of the reception, it would have consisted of maybe 10 people), so the "send-off" often takes place after the ceremony as the couple exits the church. Our ceremony was outdoors so we had our guests blow bubbles during our recessional.