Wedding Invitations

Here’s one wedding etiquette dilemma I don’t run into very often…

“I want people to give money to charities instead of buying me presents, but my mother says that it isn’t fair to force people to donate when they really want to buy things. Is there any way to do both?”

It never ceases to amaze me when people are so caring and want to make sacrifices like this. The most amazing to me was when I attended a Jane Goodall presentation earlier this year. It was announced that there was a nine year old boy in the audience who recently had his 9th birthday. In the birthday invitations they requested donations for the Jane Goodall foundation instead of birthday gifts. He raised $500 and got to give it to her himself. How many nine year olds do you know who would make such a sacrifice? Wow.

Anyhow, going back to the wedding dilemma…

If someone absolutely insists on giving you a gift vs donating to a charity, say thank you and accept it gracefully. If you refuse, you run the risk of insulting them. Is it really worth it to ruin a relationship over?

Apparently there is a web site called the “I Do Foundation”. It lets you donate a percentage of the purchases through your registry to the charities of your choice.

The original etiquette dilemma was found at:

http://manhattan.about.com/od/manhattanweddings/a/weddingetiquett.htm