Favours are not really a common tradition at German weddings. But I loved the idea of giving people little special gifts as a thank you for their attendance on our important day. And in Canada, as in other English speaking countries, favours are an integral part at the reception.
I wanted our favours to be something that would represent us and the wedding, and I thought it would be nice if people could not only keep them as a reminder of the day, but also if they had some kind of practical potential.
Now, I have a serious obsession with canvas bags, up to the point that I am SO close to converting Marco to become a bag lady gentleman, too. I never go shopping without them, and I always carry a little fold-up bag around with me. You never know what you might need it for! Maybe it's the deeply engrained German heritage, as we don't get free plastic bags in supermarkets in Germany and people usually bring their own carrier bags when they go grocery shopping.
So the idea of a canvas bag wedding favour was born. I thought long and hard about where I wanted to go with the idea without spending too much and researched several suppliers. I thought up a slogan for the bag, which I am still mighty proud of. FOREVER AND EVER AFTER! Because that's how long Marco and I are planning to stay together, and also because our guests will be able to use their bag again and again!
I first had the notion of hand-embroidering the slogan on the bags, but when I envisaged how long that might take me, I immediately started thinking of alternatives. Cue The Clever Baggers. This is an online company that will print or heat transfer anything you like on loads of fabric based items.
I send them the wording in the same font that I had used for our stationary, Home Sweet Home, and they sent me a proof bag. I was pretty happy with the result (I went for the heat transfer option) and ordered all the favour bags in sets of different colours. The Clever Baggers offer a quantity discount and I also received a 5% off voucher with the invoice for my proof, so the price per bag was quite reasonable.
I rolled up all the bags and adorned them with a pretty ribbon. We then placed one on each place setting at the reception, it looked a lot like a napkin and had some people confused at first. But I think everybody was happy when they discovered their little gift.
What about you other married or engaged people? What did you have for favours, if you had any? What are you planning to give your guests? Or are you breaking with the tradition altogether? Is there a different tradition in your country? I would love to hear about it!
© All The Live Long Day (unless otherwise stated)
So cute! A theme from our wedding was notebook paper--Colt and I used to write a lot of notes to each other in high school--so we gave out little notebooks and pencils. :)
ReplyDelete