I try, really try, to be nonjudgmental about the lack of thank you notes - maybe they didn’t know who the gift was from OR maybe the gift wasn’t delivered, etc…but it does bug me.
After all, they made the effort to send out the invitations (not to mention save-the-dates, etc) so really, how hard is it to send a little note to those who made the effort to attend the wedding and/or give gifts?
I have to say my daughter and SIL were very good about their thank you notes after their wedding. I was relieved. Of course, in my family, we get little thank you note cards in the Christmas stockings every year. It was just expected of us to thank people for their gifts when they made the effort to shop and mail or wrap them.
We attended two weddings in the last two years, both daughters of good out-of-town friends. In both cases DH knew the fathers since they were boys, and I met both families decades ago. We sent each of them gifts from the register and never heard from either recipient. We were very surprised, especially the second girl because we’ve visited her family so much more often. We never followed up with either couple but are quite disappointed.
I think it’s mannerless and tacky not to send thank you notes. I don’t buy the “we weren’t taught as children” line either. I was/am a diehard soapbox about this. Someone spends time/takes off work/buys you a present/travels to your well-thought out, usually expensive party/wedding/etc., you owe them a timely, written thank-you note. 3-4 lines will do if you are the succinct sort, but get it done!
I’m curious – do folks think emailed thank you notes are now appropriate? They are certainly less elegant than a handwritten note, but I think they are just fine, and, for some purposes, preferred (such as to say thank you for a dinner party).
Gifts usually start rolling in during the weeks before the wedding, IME so I remember starting to write notes as they came in so as not to fall behind. In fact, I brought the notecards with me on my honeymoon which my husband found slightly disturbing. He was even more disturbed when I handed him a stack with the addresses of some guests from his side of the family. Miss Manners was my bible during the run up to the wedding but even more compelling was the fact that if I didn’t get those notes out in a timely fashion, I’d be hearing from my mother and my mother-in-law which was a great motivator. Clearly some current newlyweds have not been sufficiently intimidated by their parents.
Seriously though, it takes mere minutes to write each note and unlike when I got married, you can preprint the address labels for each envelope and stamp them ahead of time. If the couple just devote 20 minutes per evening after the wedding they can knock every single note out in a few weeks, tops. No excuses.
For birthday gifts, we’ve told our sons that sending an email thank you is better than nothing. While they still lived home, they sent thank you notes through the mail. For weddings, I’d expect them to mail thank yous.
Don’t like emails but it is better than nothing. I’d rather get that than wonder if the couple got the gift. I love beautiful stationery and gave my D engraved stationery to use for thank you notes. She said the paper was so nice that she enjoyed writing the notes. She and my son-in-law split up the task.
I think e-mail notes are fine. Definitely more environmentally-friendly. We got some creative ones, like one with photos of the bride and groom happily enjoying our gift.
“Seriously though, it takes mere minutes to write each note and unlike when I got married, you can preprint the address labels for each envelope and stamp them ahead of time.”
No pre-printed label available back when I was married but… when I did the invitations I also wrote the address on a thank you envelope at the same time. Then I put them in a box in alphabetical order. It made writing the thank you’s so much easier. Half the work was already done.
Regarding thank-you notes from grieving families, etc—my mother made it her practice to offer to help friends/family with writing them. Said she always felt useful at a time when there is so little one can do to help!
I think it’s important to note that rules of manners are somewhat arbitrary–the reason we send hand-written thank-you notes instead of a phone call or e-mail for wedding gifts is because that is what the rules of manners require–no logic is required, and, in fact, attempts to use logic will only get you into trouble because it will cause you to omit some polite action that doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t have to make sense.
That being said, I would like to end the rule of send a thank-you note to somebody who did nothing more than sign a condolence card after a funeral. That one seems beyond pointless.
The funerals I attend generally have those in attendance at least given a token financial contribution, which is the custom in HI services. The thank you notes can be just pre-printed: “The family of the late xxxx thanks you for your remembrance.” I don’t feel this is necessary.
One the other hand, I see no reason why the newly wedded couple can’t jot a few lines down to people who went through the effort of attending and/or sending a gift to their wedding. If they prefer to call each guest to express their thanks, that’s OK as well.
Update!! Guess what came in the mail??? Yup. Got the Thank You for the December Wedding :)>- Both couples really know better, so I was surprised. I guess the Spring one will also find my mailbox.
If we do not get a thank you note within a certain amount of time… 3 months? My wife will call and ask if they received the gift. It happens. But also, I think there were 2 weddings in the past 3 years where we sent a gift before the wedding and received a nice hand written thank you note also before the wedding. My wife was pleased and impressed.
We just got the thank you from the October 2014 wedding - both for the gift and for coming. It’s a relief because we are very good friends with the parents. Still nothing from the 2013 wedding but no hopes there.
