Present Tense

As I've mentioned before, Mr. Pudding and I attended three back to back weddings on two different continents last summer.  We were guests at two weddings in Poland (my cousins) and one in Chicago (Mr. P's cousin) in the course of three weeks - exhausting to say the least!

Mr. Pudding and I have a sort of agreement that when there is an event in my family, I take care of figuring out and financing our gift, and vice versa.  We do this with the assumption that it's easier for us to know what type of gift is appropriate for our own family members.  This will change once we are married and share a bank account, but for the time being, it seems more than fair.

Because these events were back to back, they really drew my attention to how different my gift giving is from Mr. P's.  You see, in my community there is only one gift acceptable for a wedding:

Yes. It's Canadian money, and the colours are beautiful! 

Mr. Pudding's community, however, is more partial to these types of presants:

 

(source)  

So, whereas my cousins received cash in their wedding cards, Mr. Pudding's cousin received an amber decorated vase that we bought in Poland.

I have a very strict formula that I adhere to when figuring out the amount of money to give someone as a wedding presant.  It starts with the amount of money that I feel the bride and groom will reasonably spend on me as a guest.  Once I figure out approximately how much it costs for me to attend, I add to that amount based on my closeness to the couple and my financial means at the time.  As far as I know, everyone in my community gives gifts based on this same idea, and a newlywed couple often will get enough "gifts" to cover their wedding expenses and maybe even have a little left over.

In Mr. P's family, however, gifts are more quality over quantity.  The giver puts time and effort into picking out something meaningful that they feel the bride and groom would like and find useful, and hope that in twenty five years the no-longer-newly-weds will remember who gave them that beautiful sugar bowl, vase, etc.

I think that it is extremely interesting that different communities adhere to different rules of gift giving.  I know that gift giving can be a sensitive topic for some, but I would love to hear how you approach this issue.  Do you have a "formula" like I do?  Do you like to give monetary gifts, use registries, or try to pick something unique to the couple?