Tips & Advice
Once you’ve invited your guests to your destination wedding, you’ll need to start thinking about how you want to deal with gifts from those you’ve invited. If you’re going to be well away from home, even overseas, you probably won’t want to have to carry a load of gifts back on the airplane any more than your guests want to fly them to you. There are a couple of options to avoid “traveling” gifts, for your and your guests’ convenience.
Add your home address to your registry: One option would be having gifts shipped to your or your parent’s home either before or after the wedding. If you decide this will be how you should handle gifting, let your guests know well ahead of time, so they can choose when and whether to send their gift. If you’re worried about gifts arriving while you’re away for your destination wedding and honeymoon, you can arrange for a trusted family member or friend to stop by your house while you’re gone to check for parcels or delivery notices.
Post-wedding at-home reception: Another option might be to have a post-destination wedding reception once you return home, to allow people who might not have been able to make it to your wedding to come celebrate your union. You can keep the theme of your destination wedding and share your wedding and honeymoon photos and souvenirs, to bring part of your destination locale home with you. Friends and family who couldn’t make it to your wedding will appreciate the opportunity to rejoice with you.
Ship your gifts home: If some of your guests do bring gifts along for your destination wedding, don’t worry. If you don’t want to travel with them, you can have your gifts shipped home after the wedding is over. Most hotels will have arrangements for shipping or find a nearby post office or over-land package transportation service to arrange for your gifts to be sent home. If you’re leaving right away after your destination wedding, arrange for a family member or good friend to ship your packages for you.
Send personalized thank-yous: And, of course, no matter whether you’re having a more traditional destination wedding or getting married on a beach, it’s always important to send personalized thank-yous for any gifts you receive, whether at the wedding reception or at your home. Thank-yous can be formal, engraved notes to match your traditional wedding style or something more fun for the more unique destination wedding. Try something that reflects the theme of your wedding – custom-printed tropical cards or a treasure map thank you for your Caribbean destination wedding, or brown-paper cards printed with red peppers or cactus plants for your Mexico wedding. You can even include a small souvenir like sand, a sand dollar or a small shell from the Caribbean or a piece of paper money or genuine coin from Mexico or other country. Be creative and have fun with your thank-yous.
Thank-yous are a wonderful opportunity to share your theme and send a thoughtful and personal note to your friends who wanted to give you something for your destination wedding. It’s one of the most important duties of the new married couple to send these thank-yous within a reasonable timeframe (less than three months). Your friends will be happy to know how much you appreciate them and the time and effort they took to choose the perfect present for you.
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