Outraged wedding guest - am I wrong to be offended?

Dinah93

I'd expect a personalised email, but I don't send cards for birthdays or Christmas, I think they're terrible since they have no purpose and just get binned or recycled. I'm getting married in September, it's costing me £82 per head for anyone attending the whole day, and thats excluding the money we're paying on entertainment, but I want them there with me, if anyone doesn't want to go I hope they tell me as it's a lot to pay out for someone who goes out of obligation! I appreciate you paid for train tickets and a hotel, but you could have reused a dress and I for one certainly don't expect a present, I just want my friends and family there if they can be.

toejumper

A polite email is better than nothing. cards and stamps could be expensive.

Rosie75

I think it's rude - I plan to send cards to all my day guests (irrespective of whether they buy a gift or not) to thank them for making the day a special one (well, hopefully, it will be - it's not for another two weeks) and to let them have a photograph of us. An email might just cut it, but I don't think this is the occasion for a blanket email.

There have been a couple of occasions recently where OH and I have given gifts and not had thank-yous. It's not that we expect external gratitude, but we were worrying that the people in question hadn't received the gift and it would have been nice to know that it hadn't got lost.

superfran_uk

Re the whole 'Weddings are expensive for the guests' thing, I'd much rather people felt absolutely free to say 'No, I'm not coming' - particularly anyone in my OH's huge extended family who I've never met and he doesn't like but who we are somehow obligated to invite and feed.

If I can save myself a few hundred quid or invite a friend in their place that would be marvellous - I have 11 friends coming compared to FIFTY of his relatives (I only have 15!) - but apparently we couldn't cut them...

How can I make this clear on the invitations? Any tips? I'd rather have NO wedding guests than ones who want me to kiss their rings for turning up!

morg_monster

gosh I guess I'm old fashioned as I am always pretty disappointed if I don't receive a thank you card after giving a wedding gift, whatever it is. Actually having said that I have had thank you cards or letters from every wedding i've been to so I guess my friends share my POV!

I agree that an email is OK but I think that a mass email like that is pretty tacky and it wouldn't have taken that long to add a personal detail to each and send serially instead of all at once.

I don't agree with the point of view of "adding up" how much you spent, how much the guest spent, etc etc and working out who owes who a thankyou card! At the end of the day I was brought up to think that if someone gets you a present, you thank them and if you can't thank them there and then you write them a letter. So I don't care what the present was - I'd write the same length letter to my gran who gave us a pound note at christmas as my godfather who used to buy us game boys and walkmans...

We wrote out thank you cards to all 120 or so people who came to the wedding or bought us gifts, they were more like letters really, yes they did take a while, but it was so worth it as so many people have commented to us or our parents that they really appreciated them.

Also I was impressed with the number of people who wrote to my parents or DH's parents to say thanks for the lovely day. Again, they absolutely loved that. That made me feel bad that I've never done that before so I'm now going to try to do the same next time I'm invited to one! It did remind me that I was also made to write thank you letters after going to birthday parties!!

superfran_uk

morg_monster wrote: »

Also I was impressed with the number of people who wrote to my parents or DH's parents to say thanks for the lovely day. Again, they absolutely loved that. That made me feel bad that I've never done that before so I'm now going to try to do the same next time I'm invited to one! It did remind me that I was also made to write thank you letters after going to birthday parties!!

That would really wind me up - although I'm assuming your parents must have helped organise yours :rotfl:

Rosie75

superfran_uk wrote: »

That would really wind me up - although I'm assuming your parents must have helped organise yours :rotfl:

Oh, gosh, yes. I'd be fuming if anyone wrote to my parents to thank them for a lovely day, as they've shown no interest at all in anything to do with my wedding.

debtdesperado

Interesting - but has anyone ever gone to a wedding without buying a gift (and I'm not talking about a situation where someone says we don't want a gift) but the sort of situation where the extensive john lewis wedding list is included with the invite?

I didn't think that was acceptable?

(isn't it horrible how weddings have become a transaction? I was interested to see above how many brides mentioned the cost that they were incurring per guest, which shows that on the guest/bride sides everyone is totting up the cost...even though I'm a bad guest for begrudging all the expense I have gone to? Surely if we are all begrudging the cost, something has gone wrong with modern weddings?!)

frannyann

superfran_uk wrote: »

That would really wind me up - although I'm assuming your parents must have helped organise yours :rotfl:

Rosie75 wrote: »

Oh, gosh, yes. I'd be fuming if anyone wrote to my parents to thank them for a lovely day, as they've shown no interest at all in anything to do with my wedding.

I'd be annoyed if they wrote to my dad, as he is dead, and if they wrote to my mum I'd be annoyed cos I am paying for the whole bleeding thing

frannyann

debtdesperado wrote: »

Interesting - but has anyone ever gone to a wedding without buying a gift (and I'm not talking about a situation where someone says we don't want a gift) but the sort of situation where the extensive john lewis wedding list is included with the invite?
I did do this once, but that was because the wedding list was bonkers expensive and it was either gift or attend, the bride (close friend) was fine because she said she only did it because her parents made her for their 'loaded' friends :rotfl:

I didn't think that was acceptable?

(isn't it horrible how weddings have become a transaction? I was interested to see above how many brides mentioned the cost that they were incurring per guest, which shows that on the guest/bride sides everyone is totting up the cost...even though I'm a bad guest for begrudging all the expense I have gone to? Surely if we are all begrudging the cost, something has gone wrong with modern weddings?!)

I mentioned it, not because I am 'totting up' but because I know the figure as its all included in the per head price I am paying.

We definitely do NOT want gifts, in fact if we are pressed to ask for anything, we will direct them to our just giving web page to give to our nominated charity.
Just for clarity