AIBU - the ultimate in wedding gifts.....we know MN loves a good wedding thread!!

[holidaysarenice]

This made me laugh.
It starts off well, very funny.
The end is a little less believable tho.

m.thespec.com/news-story/3845206-have-your-say-about-the-firestorm-over-a-wedding-gift/

[FeckOffCup]

The brides sound awful, it is beyond belief they would message someone to say their gift was too cheap and they "lost" $200 on the wedding meals, the point of a wedding meal is to provide hospitality to your guests not guilt trip them into wringing out their wallets for you. Horrible women.

[curryeater]

I know, right?
Totally ungraciously, and not in the spirit at all, this is what I see when he describes the hamper:

wicker box with a hinged lid, - big bulky object that may or may not be to their taste and will now full up most of the cupboard under the stairs. Not useful for actual picnics, for which you need a nice coolbag / rucksack thing which is nice and light for carrying while holding children's hands.


filled with food items, most of them PC Black Label, - don't know what PC Black Label is, but not interested, as if it is a big brand is just licensed anyway, so has no bearing on whether the content is good

including: tri-color pasta, - seriously? A bag of pasta? of PASTA?

salsas, - ok may be interesting / flavourful. Judging from the rest of the stuff, probably just gimmicky and with fake starch filler. you can't beat a fresh salsa, which costs about £1.50 to make

Balsamic vinegar and Olive, - don't like balsamic vinegar, it is sugary, olive oil admittedly never goes amiss

Gourmet croutons, - TOAST? TOAST is a GIFT now?

Panko Breading, - no idea what this is but it sounds vile, and more junk carbs

Pesto, - yup probably useable but unthrilling

some baking ingredients, - like what, yet more cheap white flour?

Biscuits from Godiva - sugar, don't eat

and a few 'Fun' items like Marshmallow Fluff, Sour Patch Kids and Butterscotch sauce. - whatever the hell they are they sound utterly vile. Sitting in the cupboard till you move house and bin them vile.



If someone gave me that I would not complain but I would be looking in the local paper for an organisation that needs donations for a fete soon.

Finally - the only junk carb that I am interested in is totally missing - WOT NO BOOZE?

[drudgewithagrudge]

What is 'fluffy whip'? It sounds rather interesting.

[curryeater]

No, the hamper is not the point, the point is the brides' horrible behaviour. I just wanted to moan about the hamper because I don't like sugar and if I got given a hamper, it had better be in a beautiful teak box that is a 4-poster bed or something (like the Finnish baby box) because if you don't eat sugar, the contents are usually junk. Biscuits, chutneys, jams, preserves - all junk sugar

[josephinebruce]

Who the hell bothers to research wedding etiquette???

[Picturepuncture]

I don't think the hamper is that unusual for a wedding present, all sounds nice to me!

The brides behaviour is though!

I'm not a 'be grateful they deemed your wedding worthy of coming too' type person. I'm happy with a good gift list, don't mind a vouchers request and had a gift list at my wedding. But everyone know you don't complain... To someone's face about their gifts? Don't they? Blimey..

[chocoluvva]

The hamper isn't the point, but it's quite an unusual gift for a wedding.

I think it's a lovely present.

[olidusUrsus]

Can't believe people are slagging off the hamper completely not the point!

[whiteandyellowiris]

we thought a hamper would be a nice romantic gift, it was a lovely wicker one with all the plates glasses cutlery etc in too aswell as all the English themed food gifts

[FairPhyllis]

The couple are grabby and awful.

But the letter writer is not much better - he has that super precious anal American writing style ('actually I have done a lot of research on wedding etiquette') and made nasty swipes at the fact it was a civil partnership.

Hamper is an OK thing for a wedding, but I wouldn't have included the 'fun' items.

[fedupofnamechanging]

I think a hamper is a great present.

I think the brides are awful - the idea that people get married in order to make money is abhorrent and complaining about a gift, even if they hate it, is so rude.

They have also lied about one of them being gluten intolerant, if they were eating non gluten free food in the restaurant, earlier. So they are both rude, and liars, who just wanted to claw back some money by returning the hamper.

The guest shouldn't have said what he did , but he was angry and people often say the most offensive thing they can think of, in anger, even though they don't mean what they have said.

[whiteandyellowiris]

we made a hamper once, we made it really nice and put loads of thought into it, went down like a lead balloon, not even a thankyou or any comment made about it

it was fro Italian relatives, who love food and we thought they would like an English themed hamper....

how wrong we where!

[chocoluvva]

Nobody comes out of that story well. - guilty pleasure reading it - thanks for sharing OP.

[curryeater]

As bad as each other.

1. horrible gift
   
2. horrible grabby response
   
3. stupidly engaging in text-battle
   

2 is really the worst, but 1 and 3 almost add up to as bad

[josephinebruce]

Is this real?

When I got married my ex and I had everything we needed so wanted to just ask people for donations to a charity of our choice (we were quite smugly virtuous in those days!). There was an almighty uproar amongst parents/relatives/friends so we gave in, spent a Saturday traipsing around Debenhams to find items for a wedding list. And then people gave us money :-)

Wish I'd kept it though instead of donating it to charity - would have helped towards the cost of the divorce lol.

That hamper sounded lovely. Much better than yet another toilet roll holder.....

[MackerelOfFact]

Ooops. This is what Wikipedia had to say...

[MackerelOfFact]

Just Googled 'doe party' and is what Wiki has to say en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stag_and_doe...

"In the United States, Stag and drag is held before the wedding of a couple as a big party so that they can collect money for wedding or honeymoon. Guests typically have to purchase a ticket. Unlike wedding reception or engagement, a stag and drag is not expected to be attended only by invited guest list. Anyone can attend - the more guests, the better."

Do your worst, MN!

[sweetsummerlove]

im so making a hamper for the wedding im attending next month! !

[LilacPeony]

Good article and i would have liked the hamper, but yes it was spoilt by "you should just be happy your sham of a marriage is legal dude! "

[Ujjayi]

hate not "have"

[Ujjayi]

Wow....how grabby & vile.

A friend of mine got married a couple of months after us, roughly 10 years ago. She had a "no boxed gifts" message on the invite. When I questioned WTF that actually meant I was told they basically expected cash in envelopes. Swiftly followed by "you soon find out what your friends think of you by how much they give" . I couldn't bring myself to ask her if that was why she had spent £12.50 on our gift!! Let me say that I couldn't give a fig whether we received gifts or not - it is the fact that she was saying a friendship is marked by how much people will spend on you that irked me!

I have giving money as a gift. Last year we attended a wedding of a close friend who also asked for money to help pay for the honeymoon. Instead, we found out the destination and paid for a candlelight dinner on the beach. I just felt better doing it that way.

My DNeice (28) got married recently and when I asked her if they had a gift list she replied "not at all. We don't expect anything when people are paying to travel and stay over to celebrate with us". That is the attitude people should take.

[tungthai]

I really hope that story isn't true.

People are so entitled these days. I remember my ante natal acquaintances having a moan about the baby clothes they received from relatives as gifts.

I haven't been to a wedding in the last 15 years that hasn't included the crass naff poem asking for money.

People are so greedy.

[cornyblend37]

how rude!

[neunundneunzigluftballons]

We tend to do money where I am from and no gifts but like my 3 year says 'you get what you get and you don't get upset'. I would have loved that hamper though. I think the brides sending the texts were BvvvvvU.

[HighInterestRat]

I think the hamper is an odd thing to gift for a wedding. Grandparents at Christmas maybe but not a wedding.

All of them sound rude and entitled and just horrible tbh, the writer included.