The wedding cake takes center stage in the traditional cake cutting ceremony, symbolically the first task that bride and groom perform jointly as husband and wife. This is one tradition that most of us have witnessed many times. The first piece of wedding cake is cut by the bride with the "help" of the groom. This task originally was delegated exclusively to the bride. It was she who cut the wedding cake for sharing with her guests. Distributing pieces of wedding cake to one's guests is a part of that tradition from the Roman Empire when guests clamored for the crumbs. But, as numbers of wedding party guests grew, so did the size of the wedding cake, making the distribution process impossible for the bride to undertake on her own. Wedding cake cutting became more difficult with early multi-tiered cakes, because the icing had to be hard enough to support the wedding cake's own weight. This made cutting the wedding cake a joint project. After the cake cutting ceremony, the couple proceed to feed one other from first slice. This provides another lovely piece of symbolism, the mutual commitment of bride and groom to provide for one another.

Now fast forward to modern times and the cake cutting tradition is still with us. Sometimes though, it is fraught with peril and the cake ends up getting mushed in your face. This is fine if it's what you want. But please discuss this as a couple beforehand so that there are no surprises. I have personally seen this end in an upset bride (she spent hours on makeup and hair).

A sexy alternative may be simply dabbing a little on her chin or lips and then kissing it off. Now that would be a photo opportunity.

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