What's your timeline for throwing away wedding invitations?

[sockmuncher]

A relative dropped off her wedding invitation on Saturday morning.

I complimented the beautiful invitation. Then I copied the important details into my calendar and set the invitation on the side with the recycling.

We chatted on for a few hours & had a lovely catch up.

She has text me today to say she's been wondering whether to say anything or not but shes hurt the invitation was 'dumped' so quickly. It's got my back up, I appreciated the invitation and how beautiful it was but how long should I keep it for so it's been appreciated enough?

I'm not going to send anything back other than to apologise for hurting her feelings, but i have done this with every wedding / party invitation. Am I in the minority?

🤣

They stay on the fridge until the wedding

Reported it for what? Throwing a piece of cardboard away???

Even if you weren't going to keep it is a bit much to bin it in front of her 😂

It's rude to discard it in front of her. But I think she was unreasonable to tell you that she was upset about it. Once you'd received and got have the information, it's served it's purpose.

I would have put an invitation in the recycling fairly quickly too but I would have had the common sense to wait until the person left the house!
C'mon seriously, what is wrong with you!

Yes because your baby is important to you. You were basically saying her wedding isn’t important to you.

I can’t tell if you are ND and genuinely couldn’t see this was rude or are weirdly competitive with this relative and subconsciously meant to be rude / dismissive.

I really can’t see how you didn’t think it rude at the time.

Enough people have joined in to say how very rude it was to throw it away in front of her, and to her credit the OP seems to have taken the feedback on board and won't make the same mistake again.

But I have to ask, why on earth would you take the invitation with you to the wedding? It's not a ticket! If there was pertinent information like directions on it I would probably take a photo on my phone to refer to.

Woah! Brutal! Id text her back and say something like - 'Oh my goodness! I've been asking around and have just discovered that other people keep invitations. I had no idea!!! It was a beautiful invitation and we very much appreciate you thinking of us, and I am so sorry that I have managed to get to the age of X without realizing this. Lots of love . . . '

The fact you even need to ask this question speaks volumes about you

when you think you have read it all on here 😂

fancy not waiting until they had left the house, how very rude really!

As I do not go to that many weddings, I usually keep the invitations and orders of service as mementos.

In the pocket on the back of the calendar until after the event. I always worry I noted the details down wrong otherwise.
Certainly wouldn't throw it away in front of her! I would apologize if I were you.

I never feel comfortable in the sort of homes where a birthday card is deemed "ugly clutter". They always have an uncanny "Silent Witness" vibe. Unwelcoming.

Wedding stationary is expensive and if they’ve gone to the trouble to do printed invites, it is with the expectation that you would treat it as a keepsake rather than just a mode of passing on information. Whether you choose to keep that keepsake for a day, week, month etc is entirely down to you, but to put it aside for recycling as soon as she gave it to you, I can understand why your family member is upset.

Im curious- would you have preferred she sent you an invitation digitally, or just told you the details with no written invite at all? Or do you expect to receive a formal invite for a wedding? Can you appreciate the difference between a digital invite sent for purely information purposes vs a physical, hand written card? The point I’m trying to make is that for you it seems it was purely a transmission of information, but for her it had meaning attached.

Similarly, do you send and receive birthday cards? If you literally read them and throw them away, it’s rather a waste of money for the sender. Would you feel upset if you didn’t receive a card at all for any occasion (if you didn’t receive a Mother’s Day card in the future, for example?)

This.

It's up to you if/how long you keep them however I think its really weird that you seemed to be if the opinion what you do is
' normal' and you seem to be a bit surprised that she's upset! Wedding invitations cost a fortune and you were really quite dismissive.

It's interesting to read how long some people keep cards, invitations etc ... I am currently helping my DM to 'downsize' ... today we sorted through a huge box of cards ... some dating back to the 1960s , it was lovely looking at them together and talking over old memories, but I did manage to persuade her to recycle the vast majority of them!

I have done and I get far less than I used to. I suppose some people just really like cards.

Sockmuncher, Can I give you an etiquette tip for when you have your baby? Some people who love you and care for you are going to give you congratulations cards saying things like "New Baby". It is good manners to keep these and display them for a few weeks. Good manners and normal behaviour fyi.

When a friend game me her wedding invite I was sorry to break the seal even

I keep invites on the mantle piece tucked behind an ornament.

Also ok you wrote down all the details but these always something mentioned on the invite and it's just easier to write the date on the calendar but everything else I refer to the invite

I certainly wouldn't have binned it in front of her

Do you buy your friend's birthday cards? It would be a bit like them opening the card in front of you and putting straight into recycling. Why bother buying the card if its not going to hang around for a while to be admired?

I have taken an invitation with me to the event before.

Especially if the event is at a destination like a hotel or a sports club or some such.
If there's staff at the place, like a receptionist or some such, you have something you can show them to ask where you need to go.or for proof of invitation etc.
I once took one to Derbyshire with me because some tit was having a shit party at some hovel in the middle of fuck only knows and I needed the information to ask in the local villages where to find the back roads that lead to it. I was slightly fucking apoplectic by the time I got there and we weren't the only ones that couldn't find it..
"But we put a sign up..."
"Yes, yes you did .. a crayon written sign on cardboard... IN THE FUCKING RAIN.."
I was not popular at that engagement celebration party..

No I wouldn't have binned it. Not surprised she's hurt.

Are you autistic op? If you did that in front of her, I’d say yes, you were tremendously rude and insensitive.