Entire school pitches in for wedding
21-year tradition of friendship, fun and family
It’s a day filled with friendship, happy tears, hugs and much mugging for the camera.
The Kindergarten Wedding has been a joyous occasion for Mary Niedrach’s students for 21 years. While the wedding is actually part of Niedrach’s Letters of the Week lesson plans, it has evolved into a schoolwide event at Berry College Elementary and Middle School.
“It’s ‘W’ week,” Niedrach said. “The children bring in their parents’ wedding albums and talk about their parents and how they met and got married. We also talk about wedding traditions around the world.”
The ceremony itself involves the whole kindergarten class declaring faithful friendship to one
another. The boys dress in tuxedos and plastic top hats and the girls wear fancy dresses and flowers in their hair.
Each “job” in the wedding party is meted out by picking names out of a
hat, to keep it all fair, Niedrach explained.
“I do ask them if they want to be a certain part, for instance, one child may be nervous about the idea of playing the ‘bride’ and we always ask if anyone wants to perform a song or be a reader,” she said. “But we put all the names in a hat and draw for the different roles such as flower girl, bride, groom, ring bearer.”
The school, situated on Berry’s Mountain Campus, is perfectly placed, she added.
“We are right across from Frost Chapel, which is beautiful, so we hold it there and invite family and friends,” she said.
The other elementary school students — including first-graders, who are considered honored guests, since they completed this friendship ceremony last year — walk from the school, up the hill to Frost to watch the ceremony. Then, they return to the school for the reception.
The reception must include a chocolate fountain, by the way. It’s a tradition.
“We not only have a unique place to hold the friendship ceremony, but we have a lot of parents who jump in and help and we have a nice mix of faiths so different traditions can be discussed,” Niedrach said.
Katie Edwards, one of the room mothers who spearheaded the reception for the Kindergarten Wedding, said the undertaking of a mini wedding can be daunting, but a lot of fun, as well.
“When you look at the end result, it’s all worth it,” she said. “It’s really sweet and you watch the joy in their faces as they have fun.”
Edwards’ daughter AviKate was a reader in the wedding Friday and her
son participated just a few years ago, she said.
“We went back and looked at the photos from that day and I got tearyeyed,” she admitted. “I loved watching Avi-Kate read from Winnie the Pooh, during today’s ceremony.”
Avi-Kate also made mom teary-eyed first thing Friday morning.
“She got in the car this morning and said, ‘Today is my wedding day,’” laughed Edwards. “I got teary-eyed because I thought, ‘Wow, 20 years from now, this could be happening for real.’”
A special guest showed up for the wedding and reception as well, Niedrach explained.
“One of my students, Sebastian White, told me he wanted to send an invitation to Peter Parker,” she said. “He’s a big SpiderMan fan. So we found a
college student who was willing to wear the Spider-Man suit under his regular clothes and show up, wanting to meet his fan at the reception.”
Bryce Wiseman was the Berry College student who found himself portraying the man who does whatever a spider can.
“I found out about this Tuesday night,” Wiseman laughed. “I thought I have to do this because I love Spider-Man too. So I went searching for a costume and here I am.”
Wiseman and White danced together to the Spider-Man theme song and hugged before Wiseman left to “fight crime.”
“If you come to watch the Kindergarten Wedding, it is always heartwarming,” Niedrach said. “It sometimes confuses people who don’t see it happen, but if you do, it’s wonderful.”