Let Go of the Spatula: Reconsidering Wedding Registries

Hmm, I disagree. First of all, if you don’t like what’s on the registry, buy something else, for close family and friends especially. You know what they like.

Second, I got married four years ago (after living together for one year) and we still use our carefully-selected registry items every day. They were higher quality than the Target/IKEA crap we had and tended to replace every two years, and so will last us for many more years. You just have to be smart about it – don’t register for the $400 knife set when you only need two $100 knives. Takes up less space, too.

As for honeymoon and other registries – different strokes, I guess. I’m sort of old-fashioned in that I’d rather give household items or cash with no restrictions. Honestly – and perhaps I am a crazy judging meanie – registering for cars, fancy trips, etc makes me question the financial choices of the couple. I want to start them off on their new life together with a good value, not $50 towards an overpriced snorkeling trip. I shudder when I see Xboxes or movies on registries. I think it smacks of entitlement and immaturity.

The people moving to France had a creative solution, but again – asking for cash for every day expenses that should otherwise be budgeted for, like Internet, isn’t the point of a wedding. I’m not donating to a charity and want to know I’m buying 3 oxen. I’m giving a gift out of love and happiness.

I saw the wedding registry as a way to fend off getting 4 toasters, and to that end, it definitely worked. And, not to get too sentimental, but my mother bought us all of our fine china (which we weren’t going to register for, all practical and frugal like, but we got suckered at macy’s) and she died two years later, when I was 26. I’m glad I still have that gift from her and can think of her when I use it. To each their own!

I appreciated the cash most, and I will always give cash for wedding gifts. The gift cards say how much money is on them, so it’s really just cash that has strings attached. I got married almost three years ago, and we still haven’t been able to spend all of our Pier 1 Imports gift card, all they sell is random knick knacks and expensive chairs.

We resisted registering (25 years ago). The result was that people gave us lot’s of things we didn’t want, or duplicates; like 3 identical crock pots. If people are going to feel obligated to give you a gift, it seems sensible to make it as easy as possible and to guide them to things that will make good gifts.

For my part, I always give money. It’s what I really needed when I was married.

We did not live together before marriage, and were married at 29 and 30.

While I get the author’s point that registries can be a bit extreme, I have to disagree about them being a good idea.

I am an avid cook, and until I was married I was using a set of hand-me-down dishware, had 8 forks and 3 spoons and used my mom’s old pots and pans – a nice set, though wearing out at 30 years old.

Trying to find any type of cooking apparatus in my husband’s pre-marriage kitchen was a shot in the dark.

So for us — a wedding registry was much needed. We took my mom with us to register, and she helped us put things on the registry that we would truly use. We did not put sushi plates, an espresso machine or fine china on there.

We ended up receiving most of what was on our registry. Sure, I received some fun things I’ve always wanted (hello, KitchenAid mixer) — but we also were able to replace our worn-out hand-me-downs with things we use every day and will last us for years to come.

I just got married three weeks ago, as a 30 year old professional who’s kept a household for several years and gained many of the ‘basics’ during my grad school years by asking for them as Christmas and birthday gifts (the year I got my complete set of dishes was a GREAT Christmas!).

My husband and I worried about this same thing – what on earth do we register for when we have a complete kitchen and then some, as well as most of the other things needed in a house?

But what we found as we started building registries is that there were many things that were less usual that we’d love to have but may not fit into our budget right now on our own.

This doesn’t have to mean $500 mixers. For us, it meant an air mattress for when the nephew visits, some board games to play with friends, a grill and some fun accessories we would have done without, some ‘smart’ surge protectors that turn off power to accessories automatically, and a bissel ‘little green’ carpet cleaner.

In many, many other areas, we also upgraded. I’d made do with a small tool kit since graduating high school. We used this opportunity to get a real hammer and a measuring tape longer than 12′. We got a heavy-duty extension cord for outdoor use, and a level.

We also passed hand-me-down kitchen utensils (yes, I was still using them at 30) to cousins just moving into their first apartment and got a few new spatulas and ladles and a set of pans that will last us a lifetime instead of the set that was a $60 graduation present.

There were any number of things we loved getting an upgrade to – and most of them were still well under the $200 range (most were well under the $100 point).

We also made a real point to only list things that we /really/ wanted – which meant that our registries were short and easy to skim. We also had a ton of people give us gift cards to the stores where we registered, which I consider them ‘chipping in’ on big-ticket items – I was able to pass one some hand-me-down furniture as well and, for the first time in my life, afford things like real bookshelves.

My point here is that a registry may not have been /necessary/ for us, but it sure has been nice to be able to start married life with things of quality that we would not be able to afford otherwise. Many of these gifts are things I intend to be using 40 years from now. Because of this, writing thank you notes is almost a pleasure – every single thing we received was something I was thrilled to have.

And it’s nice being able to be the person handing down and helping out the just-starting-out folks for a change!

I’m not really sure how I feel about this. My Fiance and I are getting married this summer. We moved in together 7 years ago, from our parents homes. So we essentially had no “2 of everything” and we definitely didn’t have much money at the time. Today we’re still using our $6 pot from Kmart, hand me down dishes from everywhere, pots and pans that were from his grandparents! When we decided to get married I was apprehensive about the whole registry thing, I felt bad about asking for things. At the same time though, we’re using pots that were at least 30 years old, not enough dishes to host dinner with our large families etc etc. The registry was actually built after we had Christmas dinner at our house and realized, there are really essential items we needed. There isn’t anything on there that is “outrageously expensive” or we don’t need.
I get the whole idea and premise but I think people have different circumstances and you can’t exactly lump them all together.