I think I have just about seen it all now regarding wedding gifts.

[Fimbo]

A friend of a friend was going to the Maldives and instead of gifts they asked for donations to the honeymoon to make it "as spectacular as possible".

That in itself is bad enough imvho. But then I saw the website...... A whole lot of trash about themselves and the honeymoon and a list of all these "experiences" you could buy them. Special people to carry the luggage, speedboat to get them to their villa, day trips to various places etc etc. Oh and you could paypal the money directly to them....

Grr what's wrong with a towel bale or a toaster.

"no gifts just cash" Jeeezuz!

We did a list because people kept asking what we wanted!!! Some bought from it, some didnt. I was very grateful to those who did as it meant we got what we really need - i.e. iron, microwave, ironing board etc etc.

Everyone got thank you card with our new address and contact details.

Trouble is, most people live together now before marriage and therefore dont need anything for the home which is of course what wedding gifts are meant to be for.

I love the idea of setting up a charity linked website. I read somewhere recently that the average wedding now costs over £20k.....how is that possible???? To spend so much?

I got married 11 years ago and it was a large wedding (we had over 100 people for the meal and 150 at night) but it cost a fraction of that!! In fact the only thing we really spent money on was the reception and the photos, everything else was done cheaply. I just dont get it.

Ditto, pag.

One of my first cousins married last year. No list. No tacky demands.

But she'd just finished univerity a few months before, was living at home with her parents whilst doing her student teaching and her fiance was deployed in Afghanistan.

I gave them £100. I know my dad, her uncle, gave them at least $1000.

Because they weren't tacky and greedy, there were tons of envelopes on the table!

They did honeymoon in Italy, as that was were they were posted after the wedding :o.

Butterpie I'm with your mum on this one. As a guest it's awful when you just get a card saying "Janet & John thank you for your wedding gift". You've got no idea whether they have any clue what you actually got them or if it is a voucher how they spent it. We wrote to everyone and explained what we were doing with their gift and why we had asked for it. We know from what was said to our parents how much our guests appreciated it. If someone hadn't sent a gift we thanked them for coming and mentioned something about the day personal to them (a joke we'd shared or how nice it had been to see a group of our friends reunited on the day). If friends and family have made an effort (and often spent a lot of money) to be with you I think it's the least you can do.

I happy to get what the B&G would like but those dreadful poems do make me cringe and asking for loads of expensive presents when guests are already forking out a lot to attend is greedy (Uneprune sums it up very well and you don't always know what financial situation your guests are in)

Going back to the 60s and 70s and probably before, wedding lists were traditional as were trousseaux for very posh people. Sending people a slice of wedding cake along with the thank you letter was also the 'done thing'

A friend's elder sister had a trousseau - and they had 2 cars in the 60s, so very posh. Sad thing was, her sister called off the wedding just before the banns were read. I can remember seeing all the clothes hung up in one of the spare bedrooms.

She later married someone else, but don't know if she used the same trousseau (or dress)

We didn't have a wedding list, just didn't like the idea of asking for things.

I would donate money to charity on their behalf....perhaps a project that helps poverty in the maldives .

Pretty rude to link to someone's actual wedding site though....

I won't get upset if people don't buy me a present, I know attending a wedding is expensive enough, but if they want to, then lovely.

Now, it's a tradition to give gifts to a couple getting married. This costs you money. How is it different to contribute to a honeymoon fund than to buy them some bowls? It won't cost you extra and you know that your friends or loved ones will enjoy it.. if you're going to a ranomers wedding then fine get annoyed, but why care that someone you love would prefer to go on holiday than get more cups, if they already have cups?

I'm having a normal gift list but in Ireland (where half the family are from) it's traditional to give cash in the wedding card on the day rather than a present. They think gift lists are rude!

I think honeymoon sponsorships etc is a good idea, most people already have everything they need!

The best I've seen was my best friend who went to a member of the Syrian royal families wedding.

Emailed out before the wedding was the present wish list. All 25 pages of it.

The cheapest thing was a £165 gravy boat stand. You can only imagine how much the rest of the matching china cost, along with all these fancy rugs.

I wanted cheques to pay for honeymoon, but my mum hated the idea, and thought we should pay for own honeymoon.

I personally dont like no wedding gift poems.