buy or make?

heatherbaker10

im making all of my favors and other things for the wedding.

it takes so long to make but i would rather have that personal touch.

i recently made the birdseed bags with circles of Tuelle and a pretty ribbon. 

are you buying or making?

Jenni83

I Bought all my favors i didnt have much time to make them.

CA2MT4EveR

I would rather buy.  I think I would be offended if I spent all that time to make something so personal and people left it behind.  But then I may make jam, so who knows.

Grassieta

I bought white little pots from Ikea and succulents at a local garden store. With my mom, we split the succulents and planted them in the pots. This all happened 4 months before the big day so the plants would have time to grow and get accustomed to their new home. Also, having enough time means that if any of the plants dies, we can replace it easily. We're planning on covering the visible soil with white gravel the day before so it looks more "clean", placing them in small cute kraft bags and tying a wide fabric bow in our wedding colors with a little tag we made through moo.co.uk with John Lennon's quote: "we've got this gift of love, but love is like a precious plant. You can't just accept it and leave it in the cupboard or just think it's going to get on by itself. You've got to keep watering it. You've got to really look after it and nurture it."

It's a very meaningful quote for us because it's what my aunt told us the day we announced we were moving in together.

For the ceremony we bought sandalwood fans (it's going to be hot!) and made moo tags with just our names and the date.

Because the little plants are one for each couple we wanted all of our friends who aren't still living together to also have something to keep, so through Etsy we got 200 custom pins made in our colors saying "I was there" in all the languages we speak (and our names and wedding date on the side, so it's not really visible at first sight) and with a tandem bike, which could be described as our wedding "icon". 

We still need to buy the kraft paper bags for the potted succulents, but the total cost has been less than 2.5€/guest.

SheDiva4

I'm making my favors but then again they're not really time consuming.  We are baking cookies, using a few of my Mom's, FI's mom and my step-daughter favorite recipes.  Since I love to bake as a stress reliever making cookies as favors should not pose added stress. 

I would suggest that if you do decide to make that you are very realistic about the time it takes.  If you don't allot enough time you could get frustrated because you are up against a deadline.

We did a trial run of baking 13 dozen cookies so we knew how long it would take, how much of each ingredient we would need etc.  From that we decided that we would not bake all the cookies in one day next time!

melissamc2

I'm buying mine (Godiva chocolates and Lindor Truffles), other than tying coloured ribbon to the bubble tubes, but I don't really consider them part of the "favors,' so much.  (Just like I wouldn't consider birdseed bags to be "favors," but I adore the hand decorated tulle circles tied up and think they look great!)

Handmade things are time consuming, usually underappreciated when you consider the effort put into them, and often discarded.  Two or three people gushing over them, and loving them, isn't worth the 200 that wouldn't.

Also, I don't eat homemade items that I'm not positive of the people making them, the conditions of their kitchen, and how clean they are.  I feel bad when someone has obviously gone to great effort to homebake a sweets buffet or favor, but I leave it untouched.

Beachy730

Both I guess.  We have a photo booth for the wedding, so we ordered photo strip frames for our favor.  But then we made inserts to stick inside of them until they get their strips saying "thanks and enjoy the photo booth" (obviously in a much nicer way than that).  I totally agree with PPs though, consider the time you have to put into it and the cost compared to how much people will actually appreciate it. 

[Deleted User]

We bought several favor kits from Wal-Mart and putting M&M's inside them in our wedding colors. The kits came complete with the ribbon, tulle, favor tags and everything. When I did the math, it didn't come out to be very much per favor according to what the girls on the June board said was the average to spend per favor.

loop0406

I bought my wedding favors, ordered personalized boxes and putting a cake shaped candle that matches our wedding cake and including a lotto scratch off ticket with a personalized penny....
As for making, we made our own centerpieces and my mom decorated the flower girl basket.

katmstrange

I'm thinking about ordering these favor bags, but having them say "merci" instead of paris.  and ordering chocolate chip cookies from my favorite bakery to put inside

graysquirrel

Buying half, making half. I'm buying fans for all the ladies and am making tile coasters myself. Each family/couple will get a little set of them tied up with ribbon. They are REALLY fun and easy to make. PM me if you want details.

wicked_faery

1/2 & 1/2.

for the ceremony (in june) i'm giving out sandlewood fans w/ added ribbons. & for the reception, boxes with plain M&Ms in. (not wasting money on the specialty ones)