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You've decided to honor your heritage by wearing a kilt at your wedding. Problem is, it's the very first time in your life you've ever worn a skirt a kilt something that's not pants, and you're just not sure how to proceed. With a kilt, it's not a simple matter of pulling it up over your hips. You could ask the salesman for pointers, but you'd really rather not. (You probably don't stop to ask for directions when you're lost, either, do you?)

Not to worry. Click on the following link, which, with pictures and everything, gives you step-by-step instructions for getting that kilt to go on -- and stay there! If you're going full-on with tradition, scroll down the page for further instructions for dealing with the sporran, socks, straps, and brogues. (If you have no idea what any of those are, you really need this page!)

When you're done, no one will know you're not a native. Until you open your mouth.

Why are brides and grooms flocking to the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts? It's because now through September 14, 2008, the museum is hosting a special exhibit called Wedded Bliss, The Marriage of Art and Ceremony.

The exhibition explores the wedding as artistic inspiration, and features the work of Pablo Picasso, Marc Chagall, Winslow Homer, Benjamin West, William Hogarth, Cecily Brown, Claes Oldenburg and Jacob Lawrence, as well as items used in various cultures' wedding ceremonies around the world.

You'll find historical and contemporary wedding gowns and rare jewelry at the Wedded Bliss exhibit. If you can make it to the museum, it's a great place to find inspiration for your own wedding, or just soak up the celebration of love. A visit to the exhibit would be a great girls' day out for the bride and her bridesmaids.

If you can't make it to see the exhibit in person, view a slideshow here.

A beautiful and practical way to wrap a gift within a gift! Furoshiki are simply pieces of fabric, slightly more rectangle than square, generally with a pattern on each side. They come in any number of sizes, depending on their use -- which can be anything from carrying home some groceries to elegant wrapping for a wedding gift. In fact, we've written about the idea of wrapping gifts in fabric before, but we didn't know we were tapping into an old Japanese tradition that's coming to life again in these waste-conscious days.

No one article is going to come anywhere near to describing "the African wedding", because there is no such thing. Africa is a continent of 53 countries (or so) many religions, and over a thousand ethnic groups, each with its own wedding traditions. Thus, a "typical African wedding" could be one of over a thousand different forms, all of them "typical" to their area and culture.

In Africa, a wedding is not, as it is here, the joining of two individuals (who have chosen each other for love). Depending on their cultural group, the African bride and groom may be utter strangers to each other, or they may have known each other for years. They may have chosen each other, or had their partner chosen for them. However they come together, though, in Africa a wedding is about joining families.

Polygamy (one husband, more than one wife) is not the norm, but it's far from unusual, and is perfectly legal is quite a few areas. A "bride price" is also reasonably common, whereby the groom's family pays some amount to the bride's to compensate for the loss of their daughter -- because in almost every instance the bride will go live with the groom's family, or become part of his tribe or village, after the wedding.

African weddings are full of color and music. Song and dance is integral. Sometimes the bride dances to her husband's hut; sometimes the groom dances to prove his worth as a husband; sometimes the families dance to honor the bridal couple, and almost everywhere, groups of people -- men with men, women with women, or all together -- dance to celebrate the union of the couple.

In larger cities, it is increasingly considered "modern" to have a western-style wedding, complete with white gown. What a shame that such a rich history and heritage of tradition should be discarded as "old-fashioned" -- in favor of some other culture's (old-fashioned?) traditions.

Of the many wedding traditions we discovered, those of the !Kung, who inhabit the Kalahari Desert, are among our favorites. (Curious about the spelling? The !Kung language is a "Click Language", one of several which includes clicks of the tongue in their speech, which are indicated with exclamation marks. If you're curious about the language, here's a YouTube clip of Xhosa, a different Click Language.)

The !Kung are an egalitarian society -- a rarity in male-dominated Africa. The marriages are arranged by the parents, who will exchange gifts in celebration of their upcoming family union for a good decade before the event. When the bride-to-be has had her first period (which, in a society where the people are uniformly slim-to-undernourished, occurs somewhere between 12 and 17), she is ready to marry. The man will be ten years or so older, because he needs time to prove himself a capable hunter and provider.

The wedding starts when the bride and groom's family join together to build a hut for the couple, a little apart from the rest of the village. The groom walks to the new hut and sits by the door to await his bride, who is brought by her parents from her family's hut to the new one. Sounds sort of reminiscent of our tradition where the father of the bride walks his daughter down the aisle to where her groom awaits, doesn't it? Except for the !Kung, everybody escorts the bride!

Each family brings coals to create new fire in front of the new hut. It's symbolic and practical: two families are being joined together. And then the festivities really start: everyone singing and dancing to celebrate the couple, who watches the festivities, and much laughter and joking, shared by all.

In the morning, after the couple has spent their first night together, their mothers return to anoint them with oil before heading home again.

Because the bride is considered too young to leave her home yet, the groom comes to live in the bride's village for a few years. Only after they have had a few children will the young family move to the groom's village to live permanently.

This is only one of very, very many African wedding traditions, but it has elements shared by all: the focus on the joining of families and on the tribe/village, the singing, the dancing. And the general rejoicing? That's a features of weddings everywhere, in every country and culture!

Here in North America, we have decided that it's tacky to ask for money at your wedding. This is a little ironic since by the standards of some other cultures, the whole North American Big White Wedding Industry is itself an exercise in the very tacky. All this proves is that "tacky" is relative. What would have horrified etiquette mavens of another time is perfectly acceptable today; what seems awful to us is fine to another culture. And you know what? No one's right, no one's wrong. It is what it is.

Enter the "Buy our Honeymoon" website. Now, even those among us who actually did ask her guests to contribute to her honeymoon (there's at least on one staff here) found this name a bit, well, tacky. But when we investigated a little further, we were pleasantly surprised.

We've written about how the state of California granted the right to marry to all its citizens a couple of weeks ago. We're not so sure, however, that dashing over there to get married (and thus blessing the state with all the revenues generated by your festivities) is such a good idea. There has been more back-and-forth-ing on this issue in California than there has been in any state in the union, and it's not over yet.

In November, California voters get to vote on an amendment to their state constitution which would render gay marriage illegal. Again. And if this happens, no one knows whether any marriages which occurred between June and November will still be legal. While polls indicate that Californian citizens are increasingly in support of gay marriage, you simply can't predict these things. Who knows which way the vote will go?

So, if you and your same-sex sweetie are having California dreams of a Big White Wedding, perhaps you'd best hold off until after November.

Reality television strikes again! The producers of Top Chef and Project Greenlight are teaming up with Lifetime for a new reality television show about marriage -- but this one has a twist. A big one.

The new show. Lifetime's Arranged Marriage, will feature men and women who have agreed to let their loved ones choose a spouse for them. Does anyone really trust their friends and family that much?

Arranged marriages are very common and successful in some cultures, but didn't we learn anything from Who Wants To Marry A Millionaire? It seems the lesson was that even if the marriage is a disaster, it's a good way to hook millions of viewers and get your 15 minutes of fame...

If you think you could spend the rest of your life with a partner your family chooses for you, you can apply now to be on the show. In addition to filling out the application for the show, please, please tell us in the comments why you think this is a good idea.

Despite reports that Nicole Richie and Joel Madden have plans in place for a wedding extravaganza at the end of this month, the National Enquirer is claiming that Joel won't marry Nicole until she converts to Christianity.

She has a colorful past, filled with drug use and "Hollywood" behavior. Joel grew up attending church and wants Nicole to find God and ask forgiveness for her past sins so that they can raise baby Harlow in a Christian family. And, according to the article, Nicole seems quite ready to appease him.

We're not sure if we buy it -- largely because it's coming from the National Enquirer, but also because forcing someone to convert is pretty major, especially when that person has given birth to your child. If she doesn't find God, then what? Will he leave her? We think it's more likely that, if anything, he's encouraging her to find faith, but we certainly hope he's not forcing her into it. That can't lead to anything but trouble.

Kids at the wedding. Do you, don't you? The biggest concern, beyond the cost of feeding them if they will be present at the reception, is behavior. Some children will be thrilled by the wedding, and sit quietly for the duration. (Yes, they really will!) Others, however, will soon be bored and restless, and some of those will not be content to fidget a bit, but will be downright disruptive.

Babies and toddlers, in particular, are notorious for being unpredictable and loud. Babies and toddlers are also the very ones that parents find hardest to leave behind.

Whether love children and want to be welcoming, or would rather not have them there at all but have been manipulated by family politics into having them present, against your preferences, you share the same dilemma: how to ensure a quiet, uninterrupted ceremony?

We are all familiar with a shawl, that pretty and comforting accessory that not only warms but adds an element of grace and style to an outfit. We've seen wedding versions made of organdy or knit from fine wool -- but did you know that their origins are much, much older than that?

The word shawl comes from the Persian 'shal', simply a loose, wrapping garment meant for warmth, and they are traditional throughout the east, for men as well as women. Beyond simple warmth, though, they can have decorative, symbolic, and even religious purposes. And they are certainly worn at weddings.

Islamic men seeking a divorce from their wives should take note -- the Islamic practice of talaq has been ruled invalid in the United States, as it deprives women of their right to due process.

Wondering what talaq is and what the big deal about it is? Well, it's an Islamic practice in which men can divorce their wives by saying "I divorce thee" three times. And, in 2003, when an Islamic woman living with her husband and their family in Maryland filed for divorce, the husband went to the Pakistani embassy, performed the talaq, and left the country, leaving her with only a $2500 divorce settlement to which she had agreed (under Pakistani law) at the age of 18 in 1980.

Recently, the Maryland courts ruled in her favor, and she'll receive half the proceeds from the sale of their home and she will likely receive half his pension.

What's the mystique of French women and their scarves? The carefully-chosen square of silk, folded just so, twisted like this, knotted like that -- and, voilà! Perfectly casual, utterly sophisticated fashion.

If you want a French look to your wedding, put your bridesmaid in simple and sophisticated sheath dresses, and accessorize with a beautiful silk scarf. Each woman can choose her own scarf, each tied the same, or all tied differently. If you haven't the first clue how to tie a scarf, this site has several options. Experiment a bit! There's no one right way to wear a scarf. See what you come up with!

We took a peek at super-luxury weddings to create this inspiration board: From record-breaking bouquets to Indian weddings that are truly over the top, we found that you don't have to be an LVMH heiress to add a few luxurious touches to your real life wedding.

However, it doesn't hurt to dream, does it? So let's get to it!

When an Indian-born billionaire steel tycoon's only daughter marries, you can expect nothing but the best. And then some. Vanisha Mittal, daughter of tycoon Lakshmi Mittal, married Amit Bhatia, an investment banker, in a lavish ceremony in Paris.

Like most Indian weddings, nearly a week of festivities and parties preceded the wedding. A modest thousand guests -- the weddings of Indian mega-rich are usually 10,000 -- were flown in to Paris from India on 12 Boeing jets, where they were put up at a 5-star hotel in Paris. Sources weren't clear on which hotel, but since the George Cinq was one of the party venues, we suspect that's where they were housed. Not too shabby...

Here, a wedding is a day. Sure, there might be showers, but as far as extended wedding partying goes, we're small potatoes. You want wild wedding partying? Head to India.

Indian tradition dictates that in the days leading up to a wedding, there be parties for the bride, the groom, the families and friends. A family might throw five parties in a week, each of them as opulent as the family can afford. Or more. Families have been known to go bankrupt financing a wedding. Tens of thousands of dollars are spent, more if you have them -- and that's before the wedding even happens!

Many Indian wedding are planned according to the bride and groom's astrological signs. There will be auspicious and inauspicious days. Add to that India's super-hot summer weather, and what you get are quite literally thousands of wedding happening on an auspicious day at a cool time of year. In Delhi, a city of 14 million, there can be as many as 15,000 weddings happening on certain days, causing "dusk-to-dawn gridlock". Fifteen THOUSAND weddings in one city on one day? Now that's over-the-top wedding mayhem!