Most couples planning a wedding consider the question of how best to honor cherished wedding rituals. Many brides and grooms find themselves torn, wishing to include traditional customs but less certain about the element of formality that rigid adherence can bring to the festivities.

For a truly personal celebration, adapt wedding traditions as you please, in a style that feels natural and meaningful to you.

Tossing the bouquet

It's a suspenseful moment when the single women gather behind the bride for the bouquet toss, since tradition holds that the one who catches it will be the next to get married.

Breaking tradition: Save your bridal bouquet and throw a special "fortune bouquet" composed of a dozen or so small clusters of flowers bound together with a ribbon that you untie before the toss. Each mini-bouquet can be bundled with a different romantic fortune.

For tips on how to make these bouquets yourself, go to marthastewart.com/weddings and search for "fortune bouquet."

Or try this custom popular in Finland: The bride is blindfolded, and the unmarried women form a circle around her. While music plays, the bride slowly turns in place in one direction and the women walk, arms linked, the other way. Everyone stops when the music ends, and the bride walks forward to hand off her flowers to the person directly in front of her.

Cutting the cake

Dessert is a high point of any party, but at a wedding, it literally takes the cake. This is a guest favorite.

After the dinner plates are cleared, the couple takes center stage before the guests. The bride places her hand on the cake knife, and the groom places his hand over hers. They cut a slice and feed each other from it — a gesture symbolic of their promise to always provide for one another — with encouragement from guests.

Breaking tradition: These days, many couples offer a dessert buffet instead of cake, with an array of pastries and bite-size sweets; or they may create a cakelike arrangement of frosted cupcakes on tiers.

It can be hard to cut such small confections gracefully, so instead of trying to slice one of them, offer your partner a bite from a whole one. Don't worry about making a mess — some say the amount of frosting you leave on each other's lips is an indication of how sweet your married life will be.

Throwing rice

Tossing rice is a custom from the ancient world that has long been popular in the United States. Everyone, even young children, can gleefully participate in the post-ceremony practice that symbolizes the showering of abundance and fertility on the bride and groom.

If you don't want to use rice, you can borrow other ideas from around the world. In France people throw wheat, a symbol of bounty, after the ceremony. Italians rain couples with candy and sugared nuts, for sweetness in marriage.

Breaking tradition: For a less conventional display, give your guests flower petals or paper airplanes made of lightweight patterned papers. Or hand out biodegradable confetti, which is even easier to clean up.

If you prefer that guests not toss anything, use decorative paper to make banners attached to long, thin dowels, for waving in the breeze. Guests can also blow bubbles, or serenade you with little bells or other noisemakers.

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