You guys are fulfilling my wildest dreams with this wedding present discussion. It is such a relief to have people to talk about these things with, and it is a relief to Paul, too, I’m sure.
I started writing comments on your comments, but there were too many comments I wanted to comment on and I gave up. But I especially loved the idea some of you mentioned, to take something from the registry and make it more personal: adding recipes to cookware, etc. I LOVE that idea, and I wish I had consulted you creative people before sending off two cake pans in a box. At the very least I could have put in a cake mix! Ooh, or I could have gotten them the little cake-decorating kit I like so much! Well, next time.
The story of the KitchenAid mixer that was fulfilled from the registry but then never showed up–that haunts me. What could have happened to it? Did it just get checked “fulfilled” by total accident? Did someone buy it but then change their mind and keep it themselves? Did they have it shipped and it got lost in the mail and they’re still miffed about not getting a thank-you note? Terrible to think of!
Oh, and I love the idea of registering with a charity! You know how at the end of a lot of registries you can also select a gift card option, with a little pull-down menu so people can specify how expensive a gift card? It would be great to have something similar at the end of a registry, with one or two charities.
All right, so we have discussed registries, now let’s talk about non-registry-related wedding present stuff.
When my parents got married, they got many toasters. Many toasters. I can’t remember how many, that’s why I’m saying “many” twice like that, to communicate that there were more toasters than they could possibly use, but without getting corrected by my parents in the comments section.
When we got married, people joked about how many toasters we’d get, but we didn’t get a single toaster. What we got a lot of were sets of cloth placemats with coordinating cloth napkins and napkin rings. I can’t remember how many we got, but it was lots. So many, it got to be increasingly funny every time we opened another set. They were beautiful, and such a good gift idea, but I’m saying that was our “ha ha toasters.”
So first what I want to know is what was YOUR toasters? What did you get lots of, and what did you get none of?
Next, what did you get that you didn’t expect and wouldn’t have asked for, but it turned out to be awesome? Someone gave us a set of Chicago Cutlery steak knives, and we never eat steak so I thought we wouldn’t use the knives, but they’re perfect for non-steak cutting jobs, and they came in a handy little holder that sits right on the counter, and I use them every single day. They’re one of our very best gifts, and I never would have known I wanted them.
Another surprising and pleasing gift was a big box of Christmas stuff, mostly an assortment of ornaments. Our wedding was a couple of months before Christmas, and we didn’t have much for a Christmas tree, so it was fun to get a “starter set” like that.
Next, what did you get that was a total failure, or really comically bad? Someone gave us an enormous (the size of a poster) cross-stitch with our names and our wedding date and clearly a whole lot of work done on the border–and there were two errors. My name was spelled wrong, and the date of our wedding was wrong. Ha ha ha ha ha! I mean, what do you do with that?
We also received a kit of wedding materials (book, inspirational plaque, daily devotional, etc.) put out by a well-known religious figure of a religion we don’t belong to. Thereafter, we received regular mailings from this religious group, and when I say we strongly disagree with the political and social stances of this group, I am understating to keep things pleasant. I am an expert at writing thank-you notes, but this one was my greatest challenge.
Oh dear, that ends things on a negative note, doesn’t it? Let’s reflect instead on the funny cross-stitch! Ha ha ha! And now tell me all your wedding present stories: your toasters and your cloth napkins, your steak knives and your Christmas ornaments, your cross-stitches and your thank-you-note challenges.
Wine racks – five of ’em. Not that we don’t enjoy a glass of wine, but good grief. We returned the ones we could. We also received lots of wine glasses, but since those are breakable and I am clumsy, we kept them all. Very few of them are with us nine years later.
We also received a huge crystal picture frame engraved with our names, but it had Scott’s first name on it, and he goes by his middle name. Oops.
Our best surprise gifts were two trays from two different people. I never thought I’d use both of them as much as I do.
I’ve got a bridal shower question up on my blog, for those who would like to keep on playing. Thanks.
We got three different comforters. We hadn’t registered for comforters at all so it was odd that we got three. And they were all green or had green accents. So either the people checked out our registry and figured out we liked green or it was just a cosmic coinsidence.
We also got a kitchen tools spinning thingy. We weren’t sure who it came from at first but when we opened the box, there was a card from someone else to someone else. The “to someone else” is who gave it to us. They regifted us with something not even on our registry.
We did not register for extravegant stuff as we are laid back people. But we did get two crystal toasting tumblers from some good friends and a lovely waterford crystal cake knife and server from Ireland from my uncle and his wife. We hardly ever use either gift but they both have so much meaning to us because of the givers and their thoughtfulness.
The cross-stitch with the wrong name and date? OMIGOD. Best story ever.
Our “toaster” item was 3 sets of the same mixing bowls. Not a bad thing to have a duplicate of but 3 sets? That was going a little overboard. :) (Ended up giving a set to my maid of honor who really wanted one too so it was perfect!)
We received some great henkels utility knives that I never would have thought to ask for but we use them every day.
We got, as I mentioned before, three blenders, but NO mixers, not even a handheld, so that sucked. Not that I’m baking all the time or anything, but you still need one every now and again.
Our best surprise gift was knives from Pampered Chef. I wouldn’t have thought of asking for knives, really, but they’re very useful. (It seems like good knives are kind of a recurring theme in the surprise great gift category- does no one ever think to ask for that?)
We got a gazillion pyrex glass measuring cups.
Our funny ha ha was a “love” themed nutcracker. I wanted to make a tradition of taking him on vacations with us (like the traveling gnome) but we had a dog that ate it.
We still got lots of walmart towels, not that there is anything wrong with walmart towels, but we didn’t ask for towels period. We also got a couple soapdish/dispensers from wal-mart. we didn’t even register there.
We received a sterno fondue pot from my then boss (it was totally regifted, i could tell, but really nice so i didn’t mind so much). we didn’t askfor one but it’s fancy and we enjoy it on occasion.
bad gifts? how about the microwave cookbook circa 1972?? i bet the little old lady at j’s church had it in her house for the past 50 years. we also got a set of canisters. that were of the 90s era that even my grandmother doesn’t have anymore. they had peaches on them! yes, peaches on them. and get this…we put them in our garage sale that we had with another newlywed couple. a lady bought them FOR HER GRANDSON AS A WEDDING GIFT!!!!! I almost couldn’t sell them to her because it made me so sad for the grandson. Besides, tight old grandma spent $50 on crap at the garage sale. she should have given grandson a $50 giftcard.
Our “toasters” were glass vases. All different shapes/sizes but WAY too many. I mean, I like flowers, but holy cow! I did so much returning and changing of stuff we got. I appreciated them, but with duplicates and all, that was a great way to “fill the holes”, so to speak. My husband had NEVER returned a gift in his life, so he was amazed/amused at how much of that I did. Kind of became a running joke.
As far as odd gifs…we had several. The Superintendant of the school system I taught at gave me some cheap silverware (we didn’t register for any b/c my MIL gives each of her kids a set as a gift. A NICE set). But he was known as a tightwad, so I wasn’t surprised. I know we got a 1997 Taste of Home cookbook (we got married in 2001) and the card got separated from the gift so I never knew who gave it to us. Oh, and I got a GIANT glass measuring cup, it holds 8 cups. I was going to give it to my mom, thinking “I’ll never need this!” She told me to keep it, I’d be surprised. And she was right, it’s perfect for muffins, cupcakes, etc. I use it all the time!
Re: knives
My mother told us not to register for knives because they’re seen as bad luck (they’ll “cut” your love) and no one will buy them. We did register for them, but no one bought them for us. So, for all of you who did receive nice knives, I have knife envy. :)
We had a really small wedding, with mostly poor starving students as guests (like we were at the time) so our gift haul was not very impressive. We got a lot of thoughtful, artistic-type gifts, but not a lot of mixers or other useful kitchen things.
The worst thing we got was from a friend of my husband’s grandmother. First of all, it’s so sweet that she thought of us. That being said, she gave us one of those 70’s-era-esque fake wooden books on a stand with the painted gold pages? Remember those? It had a very tela-novela Jesus painted on one page and Footprints on the other, with a shiny, elaborate bookmark down the center. You know, to mark the page in the fake book.
Towels. Oh my god, the maroon towels. Here we are 6 years later, and I have so many there are some in the closet with the tags still on them. We had registered for a few, but then somehow it got out of control. I think I even gave several away to family members and I’m still drowning in them!
We also got a ton of useless crystal items, which are just really not my thing at all. Punch bowls, hurricane lamps, candy dishes, cake stands, you name it. They are all collecting dust on top of my kitchen cabinets because I don’t know what else to do with them. I don’t think I have ever actually used one single piece.
We got two identical food processers. My mom re-gifted one of them at a wedding the following month and we kept the other seeing as it was a discontiued model that could not be returned. We quickly found out why the manufacturer discontinued the model and have since bought another.
The best surprise gift we got was a Dutch oven. I never thought we’d use it and we’ve practically worn it out.
I didn’t get anything particularly tacky, but my sister got a homemade toilet paper holder. It was literally a small log with a stick protruding from it. Very phallic, very ugly.
Oh! And I forgot – someone left a used fireplace tool set at our reception. You know, poker, small broom – all covered in ash. Really weird, we still don’t know who gave it to us. There was no card or anything. One of my dad’s friends reported seeing a strange man lurking by the gift table, maybe he left it? ‘Tis a mystery…
I registered for knives (Henckels) and didn’t get them. Muy expensive-o.
We didn’t get too many things that made us go, “huh?” but we did get a “hand-carved candle” with our invitation and a picture of us (a bad picture) glued onto it. (Something along the lines of this: http://www.wicksworks.com/carved-candle04.html)
I thought it was the ugliest thing I’d ever seen.
We got this huge glass vase thing, but it had a lid, so we called it “the urn.” It has actually turned out to be a nice mantle-piece where I put potpourri, but at the time we thought it was useless and odd.
I also got a bunch of towels in my (then) colors. Then moved to a house whose master bath was decorated in a different color, so those became useless. (not really, but you know.)
Some of these stories are so funny!
Oooh, fun topic, Swistle!
I had some doozies.
XL negligee…I’ve never been an XL.
A teacup candle thing from Dollywood (received in April, Dollywood had been closed since December.)
I received MANY sets of dishes that I did not register for.
Best gift that I didn’t expect was a set of Sorrento bowls that I adore to this day. Wish I would have registered for the matching dishes.
I have nothing useful to add to this part of the discussion, but I do have to second what someone said for the first part of the conversation – please do this kind of discussion for baby registries!
Nothing really weird but my husbands cousin did give us a broken glass cube picture frame thing. The same cousin who INSISTED she had to bring all four of her (teenage, SO not into a wedding) kids to our wedding. So six people, at $66+ per person, and they gave us a broken $9.99 picture frame. Thanks.
We got alot of crystal stuff too, that we never registered for and really cant use. From people we dont really know (parents friends, parents co-workers, etc.) but I have been using them as house warming and teacher regifts.
The weird thing is we did get a few big ticket things – a huge Tiffany tray, a big Orrefors bowl, a Steuben bowl that we would never have had the nerve to register for. They are gorgeous but we are afraid to use them. So they sit in their original boxes in our guest room closet.
My favorite gift was a full set of Christmas china from my parents – 16 place settings (we have a huge family). My mother is a black-belt shopper and got a super deal. Its gorgeous and I love it.
The “toaster” – Hand-held “stick” blender thingee. We got 3. My only theory on this is that it was right in the sweet spot as far as price goes ($20ish).
The “steak knives” – A collapsible vinyl rolling cooler. At the time I was thinking totally random and lame, but it ended up being perfect for camping, etc. with just 2 people. And takes up way less space than a regular rolling cooler.
The “cross stitch” (that is hilarious, BTW) – A homemade “decoration” made out of a handpainted ice skate. The skate had birds painted on it, and then the skate was filled with STRAW AND ONE OF THOSE FAKES PLASTIC CRAFT BIRDS. Seriously. What. The. Hell.
Ooooh, our worst was a tacky set of brand-name beer glasses. You know, like the wine glasses you get when you go wine-tasting? Only these were for beer. They were packed and immediately banished to the attic. Already told you about the recalled toaster oven. Um, let’s see – OH! A gift certificate for Crate and Barrel that we never used. It expired *sigh*. THAT I would have loved to use, but we live in Podunk with narry a Crate & Barrel in sight, and this was well before the days of online shopping. WELL before.
Forgot to mention that German tradition states NO KNIVES FOR WEDDING GIFTS. Apparently the bride should not be thusly armed at the onset of her marriage…
bath towels. Dozens. In assorted colors with no gift reciepts. AHHH!
We went through every store in the mall trying to return those things.
We got NO dinner plates. Not one. Weird! we used our gifts cards to buy some though. Gift cards and cash were our MOST favorite gifts. :)
we got a lot of picture frames that we looove to this day. Didn’t register for any.
Weirdest thing? 2 gold metal wall hangings of the last supper. Large wall hangings. (Think at least 3 feet across!)I can’t remember what we did with them, but suffice it to say they aren’t in our house.
Oh yeah, we also got 4 George Foreman grills. Which we already one of and didn’t register for.
And LOTS of crystal crap that we very rarely use but couldn’t take back.
my “toaster” was pot and pan sets. We received 2 identical sets of T-Fal and also a bunch of random pots. We only returned 1 of the T-Fal and the others have come in handy over time. It is nice having 2 big soup pots, the 10 frying pans were a bit much though.
Our surprise gift that we loved was an awesome kitchen knife. We’ve had it for 8 years and a few seconds through the sharpener and it is like new.
Our cross-stitch: A craft project made by a coworker that was a wedding cake made entirely of towels. She decorated it with lace, ribbons, beads and fake flowers. She also made us a candle (think unity candle) decorated much the same. She also made a ring bearer’s pillow (we didn’t have a ring bearer) with our names and wedding date stitched on it. I just placed them all by the guestbook. I really did appreciate the time and effort she went through they just weren’t my “thing”. I couldn’t bring myself to throw them away so they are all stuffed into a box in my garage.
This was fun, what else can we gossip about?
We got at least five ice cream makers. Strange, hu? We did get married in July, so they must have been on sale or something. We returned the ones we could, but I know there are at least a couple still hanging out in my parent’s basement. I still have never used one to make ice cream. I kinda like the store bought stuff myself.
I don’t remember any terrible wedding gifts, but one shower gift stands out.
I got a religious marriage counseling book that was called something like “before you divorce, give it one more try for the Lord’s sake.”
WTF? On the eve of my marriage you’re giving me a book about last-ditch efforts before divorce? An eternal optimist, I see.
We were lucky – most everything was off our registry. But we did end up with two micorwaves off our registry. How that happened, I don’t know. When we checked the registry, it even said “requested=1; received=2”
Whatever. But the good thing was that one was physically given to us and the other was given by a pick-up-slip for us to pick it up, so we were able to return that one easily for credit.
Weirdest things? Definitely the picture frame “ferris wheel” (huge, useless, and definitely NOT registered for) and also the “forever candle” which I suppose was a nice thought but unfortunately very ugly.
Tackiest things? The tissue-paper-wrapped, cardless, unregistered-for, no-gift-receipted, fake-pewter skinny serving tray in the pattern of a herd of elephants (I’ve never been much into animal-themed things and this was so CLEARLY a regift besides). Luckily, I made such a scene at Macy’s trying to get it returned with the thousands of other things during The Big Exchange that they took it back and gave me $30 credit for it.
The elephant platter was seconded only by the king-size pillows that I didn’t really want but were expensinve when I registered for them that I got for my shower. When I tried to exchange them for something I actually did want, I was told they had no monetary value since they had subsequently been added to a Buy-X-Get-Y promotion as the “free gift”. I thought that was rather lame of the person that got them for us, but it serves me right for putting them on the registry in the first place, I suppose.
Oh! And I forgot to add this to the first post about what to give:
I like to go through a registry and buy a bunch of the odds and ends and then gift them all together. You can control your own cost ver well and ensure that all the dregs of the registry like little kitchen implemetns and single glasses/etc. get taken care of since those things are so unappealing as a gift on their own.
This works especially well if the couple has had a smal destination wedding already and then a big reception for the rest of us later.
We got seven 9 x 13 Pyrex casserole dishes. Seven! I mean, I like casseroles as much as the next person, but seven?
The odd gifts were crystal candy dishes. I know no one who actually uses a candy dish, but I own about four of them.
The best surprise gift was a crockpot with a timer thingy. We didn’t ask for one, since between us we had two, but we actually use that one the most. It’s wonderful!
The thank you challenge would have to be a picture frame with our invitation card and a bunch of flowers pressed under the glass. Which would have been okay, except that the flowers had at one time been white daisies. They were brown and icky looking. From my sister in law. It hangs upstairs so it’s not in plain sight, but still out for when she visits. Awkward.
You know, at least for our wedding, everything was off our registry. We did end up with a lot of towels because we registered for colors and whites… what happened was we got the colors and then some girls at work decided to get the whites, but they doubled it, thinking we’d use them, also so they could totally FILL UP a giant wicker hamper that was part of the gift. They also got the washcloths and hand towels, which I didn’t register for, but in retrospect was very nice. I didn’t do hand towels back then but I do now. Then one of my husband’s friends got us a smaller wicker laundry basket full of… towels and washcloths… Then 2 weeks later (seriously) my mother up and decided that her current mishmash of towels NO LONGER MATCHED HER BATHROOM, so she of course had to toss them. Me, I really don’t do display towels and couldn’t care less whether they matched as long as I liked the colors. At last count, we have over 67 towels. I figure even with 3 kids I’ll never have to buy towels again unless I want to!
We got a set of knives. Not the ones I wanted, and probably not “high end” by any means, but I use them all the time. We got a set of dishes I have no use for but feel bad throwing away.
Amusingly, we got a blanket that was on our registry, but the gift-giver informed us if we didn’t like the color, here was the receipt. She acted like she thought the color was perfectly nasty. (it was olive!)
Other than that we got money. I can’t think of anything we got that I don’t use, other than the foreman grill the husband registered for and that I have no use for. Unless someone comes up with a cool use for it :)
And I’d love to talk about baby registries!!
Erica: OK, I just had to comment on your religious book gift, because that is HILARIOUS!!
I’ve made it my new motto:
Before you XXX, give it one more try for the Lord’s sake!
HAHAHAHA!
This is such a fun topic!
We only registered for dishes (not china, just some nice, everyday dishes), flatware and wine glasses. Everything else, I just wanted people to give what they wanted/could afford. Isn’t it funny, then, that I didn’t get all eight place settings of the dishes, the flatware or the wine glasses? I did get different dishes, different flatware and different glasses, not on the registry – probably about 12 place settings altogether, if only they matched! 10 years later, I still don’t have a full set of the things I originally registered for.
My “toaster” and “steak knives” were blankets/throws. We got six of them – 4 of them were off-white embossed with hearts. The other two were really nice with various shades of green. We use the throws all the time, although the white ones are reserved for the kids in the family room.
Nothing too tacky, although we did get a couple of fake wood mantle clocks that were a little ornate for our taste.
No duplicates, oddly enough. Or ones that were useful (pyrex bowls).
The thing we got that we were…surprised, but it turned out to be great? One of those 2 step stepladders for in the kitchen. We still talk about how great a present a decade later. It’s just so useful!
Also, a vacuum cleaner. So thoughtful. We didn’t have one yet! (darn poor college students…)
We got a few odd things, but nothing that was horrendous. A quilt in blue that I would normally hate, but is still the one I go to for couch napping because it’s cozy. A blue bowl that I would have never purchased, but it holds fruit well.
Hmmm…I’m seeing a blue theme. Never in my life have I decorated in blue (my house is orange & red) but we got a lot of blue things. Odd.
We got a billion towels–only one set of which was actually in a color we’d registered for. haha. And we got a bunch of crockpots, two of which I kept and the rest I gave away as wedding presents–it seemed like everyone in the world got married right after we did, so it was nice to already have some presents on hand. :-)
Wine glasses. We got SO MANY wine glasses. I was in grad school when we were engaged, and my husband registered and he registered for a lot of wine glasses and we got all of those PLUS more. I mean, who thinks, “I know, I’ll buy them 8 wine glasses, but not off the registry, just random glasses.”
We didn’t get any duplicates, thankfully. But we did get several more towels than we registered for. And now, 7 years later, I’m not so fond of that colour anymore!
But the hardest thing to write a thank you note for was the smoke detector. We were in grad school at the time, living in an apartment that was equipped with detectors/sprinklers, so the detector was not really something we needed. Weird.
[I know this post is from a lifetime ago, but I had to share my misspelled cross-stitch story!]
My name is not uncommon with only one accepted spelling (Mered1th), but for some reason my aunt has never been able to spell it correctly. Before making me a cross-stitch as a wedding gift, my aunt asked my parents to write down how to spell my name, and how my fiance Christopher spelled his name. The final result is a pair of birds sitting inside a heart-shaped floral wreath with a cutesy saying on it, all above the inscription: Mered1th & Chis.
Chis! As a whole the cross-stitch is completely not my style, so at least the misspelling turned it into a funny story.
But my question is, what did you end up doing with yours? I don’t actually want to display mine (style and misspellings both being considerations), but I haven’t felt justified throwing out, yet!
Mered1th- I can’t remember exactly, but I THINK what we did was “lose it in a move.” Like, I kept it for a number of years in case they asked to see a picture of it hanging up (paranoid anxieties FTW), and then when we moved I thought it would make a good excuse if we couldn’t find it. But I MIGHT still have it in the basement!