My niece wants help with affordable (but nice) wedding favors

I got an email from my niece who is planning a Michigan wedding though she lives in WI. She needs ideas for nice wedding favors that are still affordable -she plans on having about 180 guests. Does anyone have any ideas? There were no such things as wedding favors when I got married so I am clueless here. We used to just give everyone cake and send them home. Now guests expect favors? The only thing I've heard of is those yucky Jordan Almonds in pastel colors. LOL

Check Martha Stewart's website... she's got great ideas for cheap but yet affordable & nice party favors for weddings.

Course, a candy bar would be awesome, and people just put what they want in a bag. I've always wanted to do that!

What is her wedding theme?

We had packets of wildflower seeds in a personalized package at our wedding. They were cheap and something a bit different.

I think her theme is - hey, I'm finally getting married. Something like that. LOL

Weddings need a theme now, too?

It's an October wedding, though.

Yes, weddings have themes, or color schemes or whatever. Mine was "shotgun wedding"...LOL

We had candles with personalized labels, yankee candle does them I think
My Niece had personalized packages of flower/veggie seeds, had a poem and the date, they were cute and cheap
She could do her own candles, juts print labels on the computer and tape them on Votives.
Hershey bars with personalized labels too, just print them up and tape them on.

I gave everyone BBQ and beer.

I like the wildflower seeds. Of course I'd do blue bonnets..

My colors were hunter green and gold (but we had to switch it to deep bright yellow, cause you cant find anything in gold. ) my flower was a yellow rose.

An easy favor to do is one with Hersey Kisses. You place two kisses in a plastic teaspoon and wrap it with netting, attach a ribbon with a printed note that reads....something like.
We share with you are kisses
As we begin our life as Mr. and Mrs.
Thank you
Joe and Mary Six Pack

...oh hey, where is that six pack emoticon? Rebecca - more work.

M&M ( I think ) will personalize candies too.

but I bet they are 'spensive..

Yep, weddings have themes now! Mine was something like a walk through the garden kind of theme (rose & forest green). I had topiary trees, etc.

Find out the theme, and we can brainstorm some more.

Oh .. I have heard of one wedding favor. Krispy Kreme donuts!! They come in boxes for 2 donuts, and each person left w/ a box. COOL!! I'd rather have that than a picture w/ a frame of the couple.

My cousin did cd's of her favorite music and put a picture of her and her husband as the label.
My brother and his wife just did candles. They poured them themselves and she designed the scent (she works for a fragrance house).

My sister's wedding was in October. Her favors weren't overly expensive, just time consuming. She did apples dipped in caramel then dipped in chocolate. They were so good! It took us a few attempts to get it right tho. The caramel kept sliding off the apples, then once we figured out that problem, the chocolate would slide off the caramel. LOL. Once we got it down pat, it was quite fast.

I thought you came to weddings to see people you love get married. When did it start to be about getting things?

OK, cheap nice stuff. I like the CD idea. Maybe some of the music played at the reception?

oops we also did beer and bbq, lol. The actual wedding theme was court house white I guess.

Dawn, seems like I've been through the caramel sliding off the apples, too.

Good ideas, ladies, I can email these ideas to her and ask for any specifics (theme or colors). I like the CD idea a lot. That could be fun, especially if the bride and groom could record a message to their guests to put on the CD. I'll bet my son could help them with that. CDs are cheap enough and they wouldn't need 180 of them, just one per couple or single.

I agree Karen, I am wondering the same thing.
WE had napkins with our names on them, and a little cowgirl and cowboy
and we fed everyone.
OH and I did make roses that were full of bird seed for folks to throw. well you didnt throw them, you shook them. But I also made bags of rice.

The roses were SOOO cute. I wonder if anyone kept them? I had 6 yellow ones and 6 green ones (made out of the same material as my Bridesmaid dresses) in a beautiful vase that I got my first dozen roses in, in my kitchen. I'll have to find out if anyone has pictures of the wedding or some napkins or the roses stuffed somewhere.. I'd like to have them.

At my cousin's wedding, they decided how much they wanted to spend on favours, then donated that amount to charity. I don't know if they did it in each guest name, as a family, or just as one big donation. They then printed off "Thank You" stating that they made a donation to such and such charity.

I also went to a wedding where they bought a bunch of different charity bracelets and put those down as favors.

We gave out decks of cards

We met thru mutual friends while playing Spades. I was fussing about the hand Fred dealt me.
I said "Normally I at least get flowers before someone screws me."
He said "What's your address?"
I scribbled it down thinking he was just kidding.
Low & behold, the next day my doorbell rang & there was the florist delivery guy with a dozen pink roses.

I found the cards at Dollar Tree-2 packs for a $1.00, then I printed what we wanted to say on large address labels and stuck them on the front of the cards...put them in a bag tied a little ribbon on the top, ta-da!







Because we had an outdoor wedding I also gave out handheld, fold-out, paperfans I got them 10 for $1.00





Check this site, they have the best prices around.


http://www.orientaltrading.com/ui/shared/sharedFlowController.goToBrowseController.do?requestURI=viewEndecaCategory&categoryId=377344&tabId=PartySupplies

What a great story Scarlett!

I love that site

and you can get mypoints for shopping there!

At my friends wedding, she had those little matches made ..... but then we tied them to sparklers with ribbon, and the wedding couple left under a stream of sparklers insted of getting pelted with birdseed.

Was pretty cool, but it was also a night wedding

awww scarlett!! how cute!

Thanks!
Even though we had both been married before we wanted a "wedding" & we wanted to invite our close friends and family. (75-100 guests invited)
Then I was challenged to make it as nice as possible and save as much money as possible.
We had a blast & I really enjoyed making all the little cutesie pootsie stuff that goes along with weddings.

Scar,

That was a really creative idea too! My worst nightmare would be to make all that cute stuff. lol I swear, I used to be organized and creative when I was younger ... now ? I don't think I have the patience.

My admiration to you! (and all of you crafty creative gals!)