How to avoid 15 photo frames without a guest list?

[StrongInside]

Hi,

I resent guest lists because it sounds completely stupid to me to say, ‘It’s your presence, not your presents.. but oh, look, we happen to have compiled a list of things we like. But no, don’t look at it, we don’t want you to buy us anything’. Eh?! And if we don’t specify what sort of things we like/could need, we will absolutely positively end up with 15 photo frames that we won’t ever use or pointless ornaments to gather dust or something like body cream/shower gel sets (and I already have a collection of those from Christmas that I never open because I choose specific products for my skin).

With money or gift cards, I feel that people wouldn’t want to seem cheap and would feel pressured to give more than I would ever spend as a guest myself (£20-25). At least with gifts, you would never know if it was an unwanted regifted gift or bought on sale. But I seriously don’t want to be compiling a list!

What do we do?🤷🏻‍♀️

GIFT list, GIFT not guest!!🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️

Why is Mumsnet the only forum out there that doesn’t let you edit posts??

You make an Amazon/John Lewis gift registry. If people ask you give them the number. You don’t mention it on invitations.

Write a list but don't put it in the invitation, instead inform dp, in laws, bridesmaids, best man where the list is but only pass this info if asked for it. Also make sure there is plenty of low value items on it, we got plate set but put on as individual plates, bowls cups etc.

Ps I'd rather have a list to make my life a hell a lot easier as a guest than trying to work out what to get

BogglesGoggles, I suppose that’s one way out of this tricky situation. How do we decide on the number of items on the list- one per couple/family unit in case all of them ask?

If they don’t ask, do we just brace ourselves for the 15 photo frames that will be going straight to charity?

Write a list but don't put it in the invitation, instead inform dp, in laws, bridesmaids, best man where the list is but only pass this info if asked for it.

I think this advice is quite impractical for modern life. Loads of people who came to our wedding knew none of those people and would have had no idea how to contact them.

I have always taken a wedding invitation that came without a gift list to mean 'cash please' (and given it happily because I don't have the weird hangup about it that most of MN has) and I suspect most people do the same.

Byebyefriend, hidden list it is then. I am shocked to see that some couples put items up to £500 on their list! I wouldn’t even think of anything over £25-30 max. With us not having bridesmaids or groomsmen and a group of friends who mostly all know each other as guests, would passing the registry list link to one friend not mean all of them get it? And we are back to the issue of asking people for gifts. Am I overthinking?

Pick a china pattern you both really like (do Argos still do Eternal Beau? ).

Tell them that this is Your Wedding China which you will use on special occasions - or every day if that's how you roll - for the rest of your lives.

If you're really laissez-faire (or prepared to buy some yourselves later) you could leave it at that. Otherwise suggest they contact best man / parent / similar so that you get more than one plate and fewer than seven soup tureens.

John Lewis or Fenwick's etc would probably hold such a list for you, but that ties people in to a particular supplier.

My husband's parents bought a six-set of various-sized plates and bowls; my sister gave me a Christmas present of a cup and saucer.

Twenty-seven years later it's still in regular use (and we both still really like it).

Merryhouse, nice idea, will maybe think of something similar. Good going 27 years without breaking it all!
We just a) have no spare space in our kitchen cupboards for new plates, and b) knowing my partner, he will be too worried about breaking it to actually use the set (always does this with sentimental gifts).

LisaSimpsonsbff, that’s true, we will have several people who don’t know others. Maybe it’ll all be ok and people will make the same assumption as you do re: cash. I always hate giving cash for birthdays or other occassions because it feels like I went to the cash machine on my way to see the person without putting any thought into it, BUT cash would come in handy on holiday, if we go one.

*go on one

I actually get really annoyed when people don’t specify what they want; because of course i’m Going to get them something, and i’d Rather it be something they actually want than something they’ll stick in a cupboard gathering dust before charity shopping it years later. That extends to the friends who just provided a bank account details to transfer some cash over - fine, brilliant, here’s what I was happy to spend anyway, i was happy it was going towards something expensive that they actually wanted.

Be clear about it - it’s a wedding, weddings = presents. In this day and age of couples usually having lived together beforehand they don’t need to traditional house setting up gifts; so makes more sense to be clear about what you do need (which might be experiences or cash) I don’t get the angst! Some people appear to really not actually like the people they attend the weddings of!

Options:
Request no gifts at all
Contribution to charity
Contribution to honeymoon

Mostly people asked my mum as we still live very near each other so most of our friends know her even if just as my mum.

Others asked us directly what we wanted or if we wanted cash. We then gave them list details ourselves.

There was also gift vouchers available for the shop we had the list in so there was always the option to get a £5/£10 gift voucher on the list if other thing went. The most expensive item we had was a set of 4 wine glasses. We then used these vouchers to get anything left on the list.

Dyrne, I just find asking for cash a bit rude, because everyone has bills to pay and/or kids to raise, or debt, or just part-time income etc. We are throwing a party and by asking them to be our guests we are effectively making them buy us something or give us their money. I don’t know why, but I’m struggling with it all.

Thedevilinablackdress, thanks for the suggestions. Even if we say nothing about gifts or explicitly say no gifts, people will still not come empty handed. And if we are getting gifts, we would like useful ones😊 I can just see things like bottles of alcohol gifted (and we don’t drink unless it’s cocktails on holiday). People just assume everyone likes prosecco or wine, but we have had bottles in our cupboard for over a year or gave them to our parents.

I’m on the fence about the honeymoon fund- if people have the money, they would spend it on their own holiday (some haven’t gone abroad in years), and I wouldn’t want anyone to feel like I did when invited to contribute to a friend’s honeymoon in New Zealand. I felt like £20 wouldn’t put a dent in the long haul flight cost and accommodation and would look silly, so I gave more than I would have liked.

Byebyefriend, if you don’t mind me asking, how much was the most expensive thing on your list? Just to get an idea.

See StrongInside I find it more rude to have a ridiculous runaround where you have to call people you may not even know (and how do you get hold of them in the first place?) to find out what the score is, only to be told that there is a gift registry / cash request after all!

And also rude and difficult to have an event which you know people usually give gifts, but give them no guidance as to what you want, ending up with people spending their hard earned money on something which you never wanted and will never use.

It’s part of the social contract at weddings - it’s not grabby. It’s pretty the only event where you could be receiving 100+ gifts; so it’s expected there’s a bit of organisation and guidance. Unless you have very extravagant birthday parties it can’t be compared against usual bog standard party etiquette.

Some of my friends have used websites where you “buy” them experiences on their honeymoon - ranging from £5 towards drinks, to a £50 dinner, or more expensive outings/experiences.

In reality, the couple just gets all the cash to spend as they wish, but it ends up being a bit nicer and the couple can thank people for the lovely meal/cocktail. That also stops people feeling obliged to give more than they’d have wanted.

Dyrne, I can see now how it can be annoying for guests. Experiences sound nice, although I am not sure we’ll go on a proper honeymoon now that we have a baby. But nice idea that I will look into more.

I still think we won’t mention anything on our invites and will let people know what we could appreciate as a gift if they ask us directly. No need to contact our parents. It’ll be better than the unoriginal ‘it’s your presence, not your presents’.

If you do a gift list then people can look on it and decide to buy or not from it, but it gives them an idea of the sort of style you have at home - ie country rustic or modern shiny sleek bling - at least then if you do get 15 photo frames there is a chance they will be of your style.

We didn’t do a gift list but then the majority of our guests were friends and just asked us.

I’d put a simple line on the invites saying a donation to x charity would be appreciated, there will be a post box where all money given will be donated to our Chosen charity.

Or if you would like to give a gift then John Lewis/Amazon/Next/Argos vouchers would be amazing. Let’s you choose how you use it and you can say in your thank you notes their gift helped towards a new dinner set/making Christmas magical/a new tv or whatever.

I'm not planning on doing a gift list, mainly as another PP has said we have already lived together for 8 years and we have all the practical stuff. If anybody asks us about gifts I'm going to suggest gift card / vouchers for a couple of places, mainly because this year (and will go into next spring) we have been doing our garden. Therefore we want new garden furniture, ornaments etc and with the vouchers we can use them towards it. We're also planning on redecorating our bedroom and lounge next year so the vouchers will be useful to us. I don't know yet what colour schemes etc I'm changing to, or what new furniture, picture frames, ornaments etc I want / need so actual gifts wont be practical. However, if nobody asks it doesn't matter as we're doing the work anyway.

I hope guests will just ask us then, because then I can suggest Amazon and maybe meals off Groupon. We don’t have a charity close to our hearts and I feel that our wedding isn’t a fundraiser like a charity run, so if people are going to give us something, I would like to keep it as a keepsake of our special day or get something useful with it. Thanks everyone for your input!

Think of something specific, small and inexpensive that you do want. For example, for our wedding we asked people to give us a postcard of their favourite place in the UK with a message on the back, with the intention that over the course of our marriage we visit them all. We got some lovely ideas we wouldn’t have thought of, people feel like they’ve given “something” (some people still gave us cash or bought us a voucher for somewhere at their favourite place) and it’s a lovely way to spend the occasional weekend and remember both our wedding day and the person who suggested it to us. I also have friends who have requested books, for much the same reason.

Don’t most people give money these days? A few will give gifts but we never mentioned gifts at our wedding and most people gave us money.

We are two weeks married. We specified no gifts unless a small donation to a charity I support. My sister had something handmade for us and another couple wants to take us for dinner - other than that no gifts or people let us know they'd donated. If someone told me no gift I wouldn't get them a gift!

Fortheloveofscience, that’s a nice idea, especially if those places turn out to be as good as the guests have said.

BlackCatSleeping, I have seen a mix at most weddings I have been to.

Northernstars, when people say they don’t want anything for their birthday, Christmas or housewarming, that still means to most people that some gift is needed.

I agree with the suggestions to have a list with (e.g. John Lewis) and just give out the details when people contact you to ask you if you have a list. You can give the details to your parents to pass on too. Don’t mention gifts at all on your invitations.

We had a range of values from about £10-£200 on our list. The more expensive ones were on there because we knew some groups of friends would want to club together to buy a bigger gift.

We didn’t advertise our list. I reckon about 1/3 of our guests asked us for gift list info and bought presents from the list, 1/3 bought a gift of their own choice (not a single photo frame) and 1/3 gave us cash/vouchers. Every single gift we received was very gratefully received.