Requests for gifts with the fucking wedding invite.

[intothenever]

HOW is this socially acceptable? How? Family and friends, Please join us as we celebrate our love and commit to spend our lives together. Enclosed is a list of things we would like you to buy us. 1000 times worse when the demand for gifts is in rhyming couplets.

With you on this Livid.

I have no issue buying a small thoughtful gift for a wedding but in recent years some of the wedding lists I have seen really smack of a more cynical move to get some high end luxuries with scant thought as to whether some guests would be in a position to purchase anything from it. Long gone are the days when marrying at 18 and moving straight from the family home into an empty marital home is the norm, these days couples have been living together for years and generally have all the essentials. Wedding lists just seem like an opportunity to ‘upgrade’ things. None of my sisters, nor my brother had wedding lists, they felt awkward asking for guests who have already forked out a decent sum on hotels/transport/outfits to dig again into their pockets for things that were ‘nice to have’ items but certainly not needed. I am getting married next year and the thought of a wedding list has not even crossed our minds. We know we might get the odd auntie insisting that she gets something for us in which case we would ask them to make a donation to a charity of our choice. There seems to be a certain whiff of ‘present entitlement’ on these type of threads, ‘its not fair, they got to have a list so why can’t I’. Surely the greatest gift is having all your family, friends and loved ones there to celebrate you marriage, not wondering what express machine or dinner set you can get

These threads always bring out the "I wouldn't dream..."-ers....people whose posts appear like their sole purpose is to prove to the rest of MN how incredibly classy, well-bred and superior they are to the ghastly oiks who mainly inhabit today's dreadful society.

compared to

This will out me but I'm getting married in March and am putting this in the 'info' bit with the invite:

"Gifts – (awkward part)

We appreciate that weddings can be very costly and the fact that you will be at our wedding (we hope) means so much to us. If you do wish to give us a gift of some sort, we have to be honest and say the most useful thing for us would be a contribution towards our married life or honeymoon. There will be an area at the reception where cards and gifts can be placed."

I know my guests well and am sure that no-one will be at all offended by it - I don't really have uptight friends.

I would think that would be absolutely fine. Please don't take to heart some of the reactions it might invoke on here on MN though.

Hope you have a lovely day :)

Thanks Hester - I am prepared for a flaming but I genuinely do not understand the fuss!

Sheeesh....there are SO many more annoying aspects to everyday life!

CuChullain nobody has said that.

I love a list. I prefer it in the invitation. I prefer buying a few pieces for an expensive tableware set. I love to think of the couple having a dinner party and thinking of us.

I clearly don't belong on MN

Yes Coconutty but I'm pretty certain only by mumsnet and not my wedding guests!

How would you feel if someone made a charity donation in your name to the charity of their choice instead?

That's a bit shit as "gifts" go, winky. If it's to a charity of the B&G's choice, that would be ok - but the "giver" might support a charity that the B&G have issues with. It's not really any kind of gift then, is it. It's just putting 2 fingers up to the B&G and saying "I'd rather spend my money on people I think more worthy than YOU."

How would you feel if someone made a charity donation in your name to the charity of their choice instead?

As a gift to the bride and groom? If prompted, I'd do it. If not promoted, I think it's not on.

For the bride and groom to do instead of favours? Not for me.

I'm generally not keen on people foisting charity choices on others.

The whole charity gift list/request thing opens up an entire other can of worms. I love gift lists and have no problems with them. I'm also very happy with requests for charity donations in lieu of presents and have done so in the past. But recently we went to a wedding where the couple requested donations for a charity I have specific knowledge of and therefore severe problems with, as regards their ethics and operations. We decided not to donate to that charity but to donate to another instead. We mentioned this to the B&G because we didn't want them to think we'd ignored the request altogether or decided not to 'gift' at all, but they weren't happy to put it mildly. It was all very awkward.

Cluecu - that's what most of our friends have done, in my world that's the norm.

I went to one wedding recently where they used a website where they had listed lots of trips they c wanted to take on their honey moon and a few 'round of drinks friday night' or 'coffee out Friday' type things. There were some more expensive 'experiences' but these were divided into 20 pound bits so you could put towards them.

I thought it was a really nice way b of giving money, it was done online but you knew what 'bit' of the holiday you'd contributed to. I much preferred it to giving cash, it still felt like choosing from a list.

TheMuppetsSingChristmas That's a perfect illustration of the issues surrounding charity giving on behalf of others.

I know! We weren't happy with their choice of charity, they weren't happy with ours, it's sods law I suppose. We like this couple a great deal but I just couldn't give to their charity, I couldn't. We did what we thought was the next best thing, and chose another charity working in the same field, but that wasn't okay for them. The whole business has soured the friendship sadly.