Gift registry lessons learned

Does this look like a wedding gift? Hooray for the modern age!

It's amazing how those gifts keep on coming, post wedding!

We've received several in the past couple weeks. Perhaps people got busy with the holidays, and then started the new year by crossing things off their To Do lists. I know I've always been one to stretch the idea of "a full year to give a wedding gift" to - and beyond - it's breaking point. And you know what they say about birds of a feather...

Those etiquette books that tell you to register for more things than seem reasonable are right - much to my surprise, nearly everything on our registry, except for the $600 set of fancy cooking pots, has been bought! When we were registering, I resisted Eric's efforts to continue adding things. I thought we'd look greedy. Turns out our friends and family are ridiculously generous.

In addition to lovely china, flatware, a bubbly water machine that allows us to forgo plastic bottles, and other home goodies, we ended up with a new climbing rope, bouldering crash pad, and tent!

Lesson learned: register for what you want, at a variety of "price points" as they say - you'll be surprised at what people want to give you for your wedding. And think of those cool little things that you'd love to have, but never get around to buying yourself. Like a set of upgraded tent stakes - or whatever suits your hobby.




We were also honored by several generous donations to our favorite charities. As somewhat established people with our own towels and knife sets (albeit cheapo grad student ones that could use upgrading), we didn't need that much stuff. Along with the gift registry information, we described our favorite causes on our wedding website, with links to the donation pages on the charities' websites. I was surprised, and honored, by the number of people who chose this route.

Another modern wedding gift, here

I was happy that our wedding could raise awareness of some important issues (we are passionate about land conservation and education for girls in the Himalayas), and be of benefit to the larger world. Some people gave both a gift to us, and a donation to one of our charities.

Would it be too much?

... to wear this gorgeous bolero over my dress, which also has a ruffle around the halter neck?

Too many competing ruffles?

What if it were blue?


Though summer has finally come to the Bay, I'm starting to worry about the brisk wind off the ocean...

Dish on dishes

Mr. Barefoot and I spent Sunday in the bowels of Bloomingdale's and Macy's learning about all the things we didn't know we needed. Let me tell you, those Registry Consultants -- and their paper swag -- are very good at upselling. The booklet we got from Bloomingdale's advised us to register for twelve - 12! - place settings!

Blissful Couple: We'll take six of those place settings.
Registry Consultant: Don't you want eight? Or ten? You can never have too many place settings. Now is the time to stock up.
Blissful Couple: uh...
Registry Consultant: What if you host Thanksgiving? Do you come from large families? How many siblings do you have?
Blissful Couple: um... Not that many actually.
Registry Consultant: Ok, I'll put you down for eight place settings.

As we've learned with All Things Wedding, it's best to

• be prepared,
• know what you want ahead of time, and
• go in with a plan.

Also, shop around. Bloomies and Macy's had the same dishes - but they were 25% off at Macy's! Can we get our friends to buy gifts this week?!??!

Maybe it was Mr. Barefoot's lawyerly ways, or the fact that we pre-shopped the department, and made a list, before sitting down with the consultant, but we were able (for the most part) to avoid being talked into too many extras. And I'm already dreaming of the classy dinner parties we can have with these...

For a Beach Wedding: Things I didn't know I needed #3

Since our wedding is here



I guess we'll need these

Laura Negri Photography, via Elizabeth Anne Designs

And probably these

via My Mom's Blog
(no, not my mom's)

Thank goodness there's a whole blogosphere to help me remember the things I would never think of.

Things I Didn't Know I Needed #2

We haven't made a gift registry yet. We haven't even thought about it (much). Though we've both been living on our own for a long time, we've both been students much of that time. When we moved in together, we discovered that we had duplicates of lots of things - but that a lot of those things were pretty crappy. And then there are major gaps: dining room table, anyone?

I imagine our registry will be pretty eclectic, aimed at filling in gaps and upgrading (cookware, especially) to things that will last a lifetime. (wow. I don't think I've ever typed or said that phrase before!)

Here are some current contenders, awesome gadgets that I didn't even know existed until recently.

Apparently, a mandoline makes the slicing of veggies, and therefore food prep, infinitely quicker.



I love, love, love seltzer water, or spark, as the Flower Boy calls it. But I hate, hate, hate the waste generated by oodles of plastic bottles, so I rarely buy it. I mainly drink it overseas, where you can get it in reuseable glass bottles. But if we had a seltzer water maker, I could drink bubbly to my heart's content.

Things I didn't know I needed #1

Since at least 20 of our guests (out of 100-125) will be under the age of 10, activity books, like these adorable one that I just saw at We Met in a Bar, would probably help the kiddos enjoy the proceedings more.

(source)

Ah, that reminds me that we need to track down a babysitter/ entertainer for the cocktail hour!

The Flower Boy will be giving everyone origami lessons, too.