Wedding Gifts and Traditions

[tiajuanabible]

I wasn't really aware until reading here that brides and grooms exchanged wedding gifts.

-When and where did this tradition start?
-What are you getting your spouse?

What special traditions or special parts of your culture are you incorporating into your wedding?

Comments

[hahahabye]

I'm not sure where the tradition started, but I'm buying my fiance a 17" MacBook pro... he has had one for six years, but it finally started kicking the bucket... he is trying to justify buying a new one but I keep talking him out of it so I can get it for him ;) lol!

[spiltvinegar]

We exchanged letters as our gift to each other. It was sort of nice to both be able to privately say things you don't necessarily want to include in the vows.

[mercyoverthrown]

We are going to do this as well. :)

[calmcollapse]

I don't know where the tradition started, but my FH and I aren't planning on getting each other gifts - our "mini-moon" will count for that I guess, since we're going to take turns paying for dinner and wine. =)

In my family the tradition is to have the dollar dance be a polka! I'm all kinds of excited for it!

[ipsafictura]

It seems like a fairly recent trend (at least in the US, it may be more traditional in other cultures), very few people I know who were married more than 10-15 years ago did it. My husband and I didn't buy gifts, though we did write cards to each other.

As for traditions, I'm culturally but not religiously Jewish. We incorporated the Ketubah (pretty wedding contract), a secular version of the Seven Blessings (traditional blessing given during the ceremony), and the Yichud (a little private time for the new bride and groom to spend together immediately after the ceremony). Also we were both escorted down the aisle by our parents (I think the more traditional version of this has the bride and groom escorted by their whole family, but that would have been essentially everyone at the wedding).

[roseofjuly]

That's interesting! I like how all the wedding books I've read keep talking about it like it's some ages-old tradition *eyeroll*

[ipsafictura]

People are just way more receptive to stuff that's a Time Honored Tradition, I think, so wedding books tend to talk about everything as though it was carved in stone at the dawn of time. It's pretty funny.

[nyyhoneybee]

We are very thankful for Yichud....I can't imagine not having a few minutes to spend alone with each other right after the ceremony

[lumpyhead]

We decided our 'gift' to each other would be something cool while on our honeymoon. We ended up getting kimonos. I guess technically our first gift to each other was roses during the rose ceremony.