Wedding Etiquette Forum

Buying wedding gift for FI?

I am not engaged but I heard someone mention this in passing recently and it surprised me. Is that a "normal" or common thing to do? Do you exchange wedding presents with your FI/DH? If so, what kind of scale is it normally on - like something you might buy them for their birthday, or bigger than that?

Just curious! :)

Re: Buying wedding gift for FI?

  • It's common in my circle of family/friends. Typically it's something sentimental or special in some way-a little bigger than an ordinary bday or Xmas gift. I'm giving FI a specially bound favorite book of his, for example.
      Several of my friends have given watches or jewelry. it's not required, but I think it's nice.
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  • Its up to you and your FI really. We are planning on exchanging gifts. I really want a new Pandora charm and the one I want is kinda pricey. Ive been throwing hints out there for him. I plan on doing a boudoir shoot & giving him a book of all the pics. He will love it.

    Not every couple exchanges gifts. Some just do notes, which I think is totally sweet. The budget is completely up to the couple.
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  • We did not exchange gifts.  
  • Totally up to you.  I did b-pics and gave him an album of them.  He gave me beautiful earrings that I wore for the wedding. Funny - they were really similar to the costume earrings I'd bought for myself to wear with my dress so swapping the earrings in really didn't change the "look".
  • FI and I agreed to give each other a wedding gift. We have yet to discuss the price, but I'll probably buy him a bottle of his favorite whiskey since he bought a pocket watch for himself already - that was my first idea! I might get a nice cigar too for the both of us to share on our wedding night/honeymoon. FI will more than likely get me jewelry because I love sparklies!
  • H and I did exchange gifts.  We just set a dollar limit of under $50.
  • H and I did.  He got me a beautiful silver frame engraved with the lyrics to our first dance song and a decorative detail from our invitations that one of our GM and I designed.  I got him a super-jumbo slip-n-slide that was set up for our RD.  It was sort of a running joke b/c since before we got engaged he had been asking if we could have a slip-n-slide at our wedding and I had sternly been telling him no (he even joked that he would slide down the aisle in a wet suit and then take it off and have a tux underneath).  Having it at the RD was a total surprise to him.

    Sadly the slip-n-slide got thrown away a few months ago.  It was left out most of last summer (it was a PIA to dry) and some squirrels (I assume) made a snack of it.  The torn up slide had been hanging on our fence to "dry" for months and I finally convinced him it needed to be put to rest.  It was pretty awesome though; 3 of the double-wide slip-n-slides connected end to end.  It was well loved and well used for two summers.
  • edited March 2013
    I would like to think that just being able to know that we're with eachother for forever is a good enough gift.... ?

    I don't really feel like I need my FI (who will be nervous enough and poor after tux rental and my ring) to then go ahead and buy me something material.

    I don't know, this seems not necessary and frankly, quite silly.
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  • DH and me decided not to give gifts.


    We have a family jeweler of sorts and he lent me a bracelet for the wedding day.   On the wedding day DH told me it's actually not on loan, he bought it for me as a gift.






    What differentiates an average host and a great host is anticipating unexpressed needs and wants of their guests.  Just because the want/need is not expressed, doesn't mean it wouldn't be appreciated. 
  • We talked about it, but we decided the rings were our gift - we liked the symbolism of it and felt another gift would be redundant.  From a practical standpoint it also increased our budget for our rings, so we each were able to get what we actually wanted.  Mine actually has rather large diamonds in it - nothing enormous but much larger than most wedding bands you see - because we didn't have to compromise on that. The stones are the same size as the side-diamonds in my engagement ring.  His is gold instead of tungsten or some other metal - it's very heavy and solid, and we wouldn't have been able to afford it with gold prices being what they are these days if we had tried to budget for a nice gift also.  It's really nice that neither of us had to compromise on the items we will look at every day to symbolize our marriage.

    Also, we're about snowed under with wedding gifts, and probably half our guests who are coming haven't shopped yet.  It would have been one of those things that just wasn't as special to us since we're getting 100 other things from other people also. 
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  • We exchanged gifts and decided on a dollar limit together. We both ended up getting each other experiences instead of physical items.
  • rachelm13rachelm13 member
    100 Comments First Anniversary
    edited March 2013
    i bought FI a pair of cufflinks and had them engraved and a 1980s BA Baracus figurine.  we set a budget as well.
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  • FI and I haven't really talked about it.  I'm doing boudoir photos next month and am hoping I can have an album made up for him by the wedding.  If not, his birthday is at the end of July and he'll get the album for that occassion.  So, it might be a wedding gift or it might not, but it was something I was planning to do either way.
  • In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_etiquette_buying-wedding-gift-for-fi?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:9Discussion:b8122578-f64e-4d5d-af7d-c51b8b1ab0d0Post:ebffeaed-37f5-4eaa-ac01-bea194418786">Buying wedding gift for FI?</a>:
    [QUOTE]I am not engaged but I heard someone mention this in passing recently and it surprised me. Is that a "normal" or common thing to do? Do you exchange wedding presents with your FI/DH? If so, what kind of scale is it normally on - like something you might buy them for their birthday, or bigger than that? Just curious! :)
    Posted by kmbirkel[/QUOTE]

    <div>I'm just giving my fiance a handwritten letter. </div>
    "It's always better when we're together." -Jack Johnson
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