Speaking of registries... The registries have been one of our biggest trouble makers in this planning process. And I think that is weird. Shouldn't receiving gifts be easy? We put together a list of what we want...and those who want to give us gifts give us those things. But no. Not quite. Because it just wouldn't be wedding planning without a dash of drama and a healthy dose of indecision!
Its probably because we are running into the common problem of not wanting much STUFF. We've been living in sin for quite a few years now, have a home set up, and don't need (or want) much. (and have very little room to put said stuff in!) But a lot of people don't like giving money - even if its in the awesome form of honeymoon gifts on Traveler's Joy!
We've had family telling us that we don't have enough on our tangible item registries and that we need more. That we should set up another registry all together to give lots of choices. We even had a family member set up a registry for us because they reaaally wanted us to have this extra registry. And people telling us that the stuff on our registry isn't nice enough and that we should take this opportunity to get china or or crystal or other fancy stuff (stuff that would definitely fall into the "don't want or need or have space for" categories). People telling us that the white dishes we picked out are boring (because he wanted super dark dishes and I wanted super bright dishes....so we just went with classic-never-fail-will-always-match-and-never-go-out-of-style white).
Talk about unsolicited advice! Such strong opinions on what we should ask for for gifts!? wtf
Are/did any of you have similar registry problems?
Image from Kol Tregaskes because while some of you are dreaming about babies...I'm dreaming about puppies!
Yes yes yes - same problems! We're both in our early 30s, and at this point have a lot of the "things" we need/want. We also live in a city apartment that has limited storage space. I don't want to register for something that is traditionally registered for just because I may use it in 5 years when we move.
ReplyDeleteWe set up a honeymoon registry because that's what we really want. I don't understand these people who insist on giving "tangible" items or insisting you put something nicer on the list. Isn't it "our" registry?!
But because of that, we set up a small registry for household items, and we scanned a handful of items (more than we even originally planned to) but I know it's not a big list at all and I'm just waiting to hear from people that it needs more items.
Um. And we have white dishes. I figure you can always spice it up with your serving dishes, but like you said - the white goes with everything!
We didn't get a whole lot of flack from our families, but we did get some very unwanted advice from the place where we registered. They kept insisting that we add things like china and silverware to our list. Now, cutlery, we need, but silverware, we do not. And we're 22, what the hell are we going to use china for?
ReplyDeleteHonestly, I say stick to your guns sister. I was second guessing myself after we did our registry because I was concerned people wouldn't have enough to choose from. But looking back, I'm glad we had a small registry because it's stuff we actually needed and wanted. The people who couldn't find something simply gave us money and for those who wanted to buy a gift but didn't want to use our registry... well, we got a bunch of nice, but entirely useless to us, things. If people complain, just tell them when you wrote, you have mostly everything you need and, if like us, you live in an apartment, that you don't have a ton of space to store the stuff you won't use until you purchase a home. Good luck!
I don't know if any of this will help you, but we used alternativeregistry.com so we could put intangible items on the registry too. Our parents have been spreading the word that our house is tiny (like teeny tiny) and we don't need or want lots of 'things'. I also included a little blurb on the registry (that I stole/borrowed from someone on the internets) that says:
ReplyDeleteThe absolute best and most wonderful gift you could possibly give us is your presence at our wedding! We really can't imagine anything better than being surrounded by all of our family and friends on our wedding day.
I don't know. Hopefully they'll all include gift receipts and maybe you can get cash back instead of store credit.
Same story here, to the detail. We went with small Target and Crate&Barrel registries filled with odds and ends, and then put this on our wedding website:
ReplyDelete"Wedding gifts are such a dilemma. We wanted to ignore the registry task altogether since we really don’t need anything, and will share a San-Diego-sized apartment.
We promise, what we want most is simply your presence with us as we celebrate. That’s all.
But we were told that wouldn’t do, so we have a small registry to finish out our kitchen dishes at Crate & Barrel and a few odds and ends at Target.
We’re also saving nickels for our honeymoon trip up the coast to Carmel and Monterey, a new sofa, and someday, someday, a house.
If you would like to contribute any nickels to these larger wishes, we would be honored. You can click the button below or use the mail. But most of all we just want to see you!
(link to Paypal, because I'm not paying 5%+ for some silly honeymoon registry)
Oh my goodness, talk about drama. I would sit down with said family members being pushy about the registry and explain. If they still don't get it after that, tell them that they may not agree, but they should respect your decision.
ReplyDeleteYeah, in a lot of ways the traditional registry is out of date, as people are noting. It's not really the norm anymore (although of course it still happens) for couples to get married and then buy a home and live together in that home for the first time, thus needing all sorts of new stuff.
ReplyDeleteI have a million thoughts about registries that I think I'll save for a blog post, but I wanted to say I totally empathize... and we've barely even gotten started.
I don't think we're going to register, which suits me just fine. There will only be 50 people at the Aussie wedding and they are all very close family and friends, so they'll either know what we like or be comfortable enough to ask us. Registries aren't big in Ireland and we're not carrying gifts back to Oz with us so that's a no-go too :)
ReplyDeleteStick with what you want- you guys are the ones who will be using and storing the stuff!