<p>A friend of mine got 20 fans when they got married, and they were graduate students at Cornell.</p>
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<p>I like going onto a website and being able to see the kind of things the B&G like. Even if you don’t buy from the registry, if you see that everything they have registered for is yellow and blue, you get an idea that they are decorating in yellow and blue and then won’t buy a set of red towels.</p>
<p>As a busy woman, I love being able to go online, pick out something and have it delivered.</p>
<p>When a couple gets married in their early 30s, both have lived on their own for over a decade, how do you have a clue of what they need or want if there is no registry?</p>
<p>As for “loot”, I always thought I would rather have a $9 spatula that I needed and registered for than a $90 crystal ice bucket that I’d never use.</p>
<p>Funny gift story when Mom3ToGo and I got married.</p>
<p>I’m at lunch talking to my friends about the wedding plans. Mom3ToGo and I were in our early 30s and had been living together for a few years when we got married so we really didn’t need much … and I was explaining to my friends it’s a shame you can’t ask for a drill, and router, and other household tools for wedding gifts if asked. Fast forward to the wedding and what did we get from my friends from work … basically our whole workroom worth of tools. It was pretty funny when we were opening them … and we have some nice projects completed thanks to those tools.</p>
<p>I don’t have any problem with having it shipped either. I still consider carefully what to give, and I appreciate when the couple anticipate people’s questions by having a registry.
Id rather know it has gotten to a safe location, instead of someone having to stand guard over the presents.
I ve been to receptions where the gifts were opened there, and that is what we did at my own reception, but personally * that* made it seem like “raking in loot” as it took time away from actually talking to people.</p>
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<p>I haven’t seen that in my adult life, but all of the receptions of my 1960s Baptist childhood were like that. (How awkward when there are duplicate gifts!)</p>
<p>Just as a total aside, but on the subject of wedding gifts: it is fascinating what different people consider a “set of towels.” I received <a href=“a”>not having registered for any towels</a> a set of 4 bath towels, 4 hand towels and 4 wash cloths, (b) a set of 2 bath towels, 2 hand towels and 2 wash cloths, (c) a set of two bath towels, one hand towel and two wash cloths, (d) a set of two bath towels and two wash cloths, and (e) a “set” of two bath towels that didn’t match each other. ???</p>
<p>I know that funny wedding gifts could be its own thread, but one of my favorites was a friend who received a set of 4 fondue forks. No fondue pot. She had not registered for forks nor pot. ???</p>
<p>I like registries to see what a couple likes. The closer the couple the more personal the gift. But a registry certainly saves time and angst if you aren’t sure.
The last gift we gave was a gold tree.</p>
<p>One friend of mine gave us a ONE towel set…love her anyways (probably what she could afford at the time_.</p>
<p>I’m very much a traditionalist, I guess, but I think of registries as being designed primarily to let people know what china and silver patterns the couple has picked out. The price point issue would be taken care of in that people can give whatever they can afford: there’s nothing wrong with a teaspoon or a single plate. The expectation would be that one’s family might choose to continue gifting pieces in the early years of one’s marriage. I’m a bit taken aback by the idea that people register for all kinds of other stuff, but I gather that that is common now and that givers like it.</p>
<p>I’m also uncomfortable with the idea that people would be expected to give expensive gifts from the registry at showers, followed by a check at the wedding. Actually, I’m not big on the whole shower thing at all, and particularly not if it turns into yet another gift-extraction extravaganza. It should be possible to have a shower that is more fun for friends than a $$ event. And I still cannot feel comfortable with the idea of giving money at all. I realize that this is increasingly uncommon. :)</p>
<p>When we got married, in our early 30s, I already owned more china than most people, thanks mostly to the Harrods sales, and plenty of kitchen equipment. The only thing I registered for was silver, and if anyone asked me, I said that I would be happy with a salad fork or a teaspoon IF they wanted to give me silver. Some people did, some gave us other stuff. No one gave us money. (Or towels. 
) We were grateful and appreciative, no matter what.</p>
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<p>I’ve been invited to several showers where I wasn’t invited to the in-town wedding. It’s not 100% the fault of the bride or groom or their families…someone will have a shower and invite everyone in the church group, for example, even though not everyone in the church group is invited to the wedding. However, I assume that the honoree has some control over the shower invitation list and should not allow someone to be invited to the shower who isn’t invited to the wedding. (Perhaps an exception might be made for “office” showers, where no one from the office is invited to the wedding but co-workers still want to honor their colleague.)</p>
<p>I got tons of crystal - bowls, vases and candlesticks in every shape and size. So many that even now I can go into a closet and pull out a never used a bowl, vase or candlestick in it’s original box. I will also admit to re-gifting some of these (Orrefors is still selling the exact same ones 23 years later.)</p>
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<p>H and I just celebrated our 23rd anniversary. Last winter, I got some heavy crystal glasses out of the cabinet and just started using them. Yes, they were wedding presents. No we had not registered for them. I guess I was “saving” them but who knows what for.</p>
<p>I, too, am a traditionalist and like the registries. In our extended family, they tend to be used as Consolation describes: china pattern, everyday dishes, crystal, silver, colors. I do think they should include a range of prices, and of course guests are free to choose outside the registry.</p>
<p>Coincidentally, I just bought a gift for a wedding I can’t attend because of my D’s launch! They registered two places-- my choice was between a $150 place setting, $80 goblet, or a $2.69 wooden spatula. Strange.</p>
<p>Back in the 1980’s I had an apartment where I shared a long doorway with another apartment. A couple just got married and hadn’t even moved in yet but they had wedding gifts piling up in the doorway! I shoved them into my apartment after a few days and when the people actually showed up to move in, I gave them their wedding gifts. That was so weird. </p>
<p>My mother told people to send my wedding gifts to her house but then I found out she had opened a few of them before I got there. And she had told them I would like things that I never would have wanted or needed. No one asked me what I wanted. (I had a super Momzilla.)</p>
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<p>I’ve been married 25 years, and our rehearsal dinner absolutely included everyone who was from out of town - probably 75 people, I’m guessing. Ditto for my sister’s wedding, which was about 15 years ago. I don’t consider this a new custom at all. When you have people traveling from out of town, I think you do owe them some food / entertainment.</p>
<p>My wedding was over a Labor Day weekend with many out of towners. We had:
Friday night casual dinner hosted by my parents
Saturday pool party for the young people hosted at my parents’ house
Saturday bridesmaid’s luncheon for female relatives hosted by friends of my mother
Saturday night rehearsal dinner hosted by my IL’s
Sunday morning brunch at the hotel
Sunday evening - the wedding itself</p>
<p>People went to a lot of trouble to come in - we felt it was the right thing to do to feed / entertain them.</p>
<p>When we had a bar / bat mitzvah for our children, with a lot of out of towners, we followed the same principle, with a Friday night / Shabbat dinner for out of towners and relatives, Saturday morning service with reception afterwards, Saturday evening the full party, and Sunday brunch at our house. I just think it’s part of hospitality when people come a long distance.</p>
<p>Have not heard a peep about registries or showers from S and fiancee. Not even sure if S knows what these are! I do know they don’t give two cents about china – fiancee specifically said she didn’t want “flowery bone china” at their reception. OTOH, they have very little in the way of kitchen gear (the only cups they have are freebie swag from companies who recruited them) and no furniture at all, so I would guess they would appreciate the basics and whatever else comes their way. </p>
<p>We appreciated towels, and when a group of our friends got together and got us coordinated kitchen items (canisters, knives, etc.) we were thrilled silly. We still have some of the stuff, almost 29 years later. Every time a glass breaks or a knife handle falls off, DH bemoans the loss and says, “Even if you fall apart, I’m not tossing YOU out…” </p>
<p>We still have our original day-to-day dinnerware. Not sure HOW that happened. Mom got the set at a Sears outlet – we didn’t get to choose the design. I wasn’t crazy about it, but figured I’d smile and nod. Now that I can afford to get new stuff, these dishes have so much sentiment behind them that it is hard to replace them. When I mentioned to the guys that I was thinking about new dishes, they were appalled. “But we’ve had them our entire lives!” Neither of them are particularly sentimental, so their reaction was a bit of a surprise.</p>
<p>jaylinn, the whole concept of buying china place settings so that everything matches is really not very sophisticated. It is probably most common amongst people who “save” their “good” china for some occasion that never arrives, rather than using it daily. I have fond memories of visiting Shreve, Crump and Low in Boston many decades ago with a friend, and receiving an impromptu tutorial on setting a table from a delightful and very elegant elderly lady. She emphasized selecting patterns that harmonize, rather than getting everything to match. So that the dinner plates of one pattern might be used with the salad plates of another. (She also turned me on to the joys of Baccarat Capri Illusion, not that I have any! 
) I prefer to have 12 matching dinner plates of a variety of patterns, with sets of 12 salad/dessert plates that go with several of them, rather than “place settings” with pieces like fruit bowls that I would never use. I admit, I have an addiction to china (Shared by my mother and sister. My mother calls it “the china disease.” I think she must have over 25 patterns. Choosing which plates to use is part of the evening ritual, like a cocktail. :D) It would really make more sense for people to register for 12 dinner plates and 12 salad plates, serving pieces, and so forth, but stores push them into place settings.That would also more easily enable people to pick a price point, too.</p>
<p>I’ve always thought the “traditional” rehearsal dinner did include out-of-town guests.</p>
<p>Our rehearsal dinner included bridal party and out of town guests. That was 21 years ago.</p>