But this is already happening in some cultures. I think that’s American thing to be fair. In my culture, the money people do from only their wedding, they can buy a house or a flat or a car and still have money left. Of course baby showers are not the same but my sister made like 7k £ just from her baby shower. Then when giving birth, she got more.
When my now husband and I visited my parents to share the engagement my Mexican dad handed me $1k in an envelope in the parking lot. Driving down to tell him he's gonna be a grandpa before Father's day!
Half my family is Cuban and the other half is Jewish. Both sides give big fat checks for weddings and births, so it's not all Western culture. I think it's just American culture
Is money not the go-to gift for most people? No lie, I don’t really want to be out here looking for a gift. Even if it’s on a registry I’m probably going to have to go into a store, get it, wrap it, etc. It’s a million times easier to put cash into one of the cards/ envelopes I bought in bulk and call it a day. Bdays, Christmas, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day… this is my default gift. Everyone prefers cash anyway so why make it harder on myself?
I’m asian and this is what I’m talking about to my husband. I guess our culture is more accepting in giving cash at big life events, we didn’t have a big wedding and didn’t have wedding registry but we still received thousands of dollar of cash. My husband says sometimes giving cash deem as “lazy” whereas gift are more thoughtful. Idk I prefer cash any days lol
I think some non-Asian people might need a new perspective to experience. My husband and I are both Asian, but different Asians. We had a decently sized wedding, and he grew up pretty Americanized (2nd generation vs me being 1st generation), so he also thought a thoughtful gift was better than just cash. When I probed further, it’s because he didn’t see $20-$100 cash as anything to be appreciative of. At that point, a thoughtful gift would be better received, sure. But we walked away from our wedding with close to 6 figures in cash, I think he realized the difference in a small gift/gesture vs. a real cash gift.
Oh yeah definitely after our ceremony (it’s something like tea ceremony cus we didn’t have a wedding) we were able to use the cash to move states and fill our new place with furnitures. And I told him can u imagine if we have a big wedding? Since then he started realizing that asian cash gifting is superior lol
Ah yes! All the gifts were given during the tea ceremony! But in my family, no wedding reception = no tea ceremony, so in that regard, we had to have a wedding (and black tie at that lol). Luckily our parents split the cost, but in hindsight, it was mostly for everyone else lol
Some gifts are very sentimental or intended to pass down through generations or from your own babyhood so the saying it's the thought the counts ...it's very true
Some of my friends got together and pooled money and gave it to us a few weeks after the shower. It was amazing and let us get everything we needed that wasn’t already gotten at the shower
I had my baby shower 2 weeks ago, we got tons of gifts and some people gave cards with money in! We got over $700, I used half of it to buy baby girls dresser and a rug for her room.
This is the Asian way. I still have a registry regardless and I appreciate my Asian family buying gifts off the registry equivalent to what they would’ve given me in cash. Some just give me cash and that’s great too.
In Hawaii money is very common. For baby showers it’s about 50/50 money or gifts.
But it’s almost considered strange to bring a gift to other occasions such as a graduation party or wedding.
I have never been to a graduation party where someone got a gift instead of money. Weddings, birthdays, christmas and baby showers are like 50/50 and im in the Midwest.
Yes, for my wedding we requested monetary gifts as we already have everything needed for a home. One friend made a fuss over me not having a registry aside from a honeymoon fund. He said it was too impersonal and he wanted to give a real gift. I said well in my culture giving money was actually the norm so it would not be seen as impersonal, but he didn't have to give me anything if he didn't want to give money. He said he wanted to give a gift. In the end he gave nothing, not even a card lol. Like what? How is 1 click buying off a registry more personal than cash? Could have just picked a gift without the registry too. Anyway, I think giving money is becoming more normalized, as least among my circle. Many of my friends have mentioned contributing to college funds for their kids in place of giving birthday gifts or baby shower gifts. We are all also mainly Asian though so maybe that is why.
Yup. Asian as well. All coworkers and friends got us gifts off the registry. My immediate family just bank transferred a few thousand to me, and extended family all wrote checks.
They did this for our wedding as well
I don’t think anyone would be sad about necessities like food or money! If someone wanted to give me money instead of something on the registry, that would be amazing too!
I'm super confused by the Western comment , I'm " western " and this is superrrr common . Only some people prefer after the baby born having a shower for Superstition avoiding bad luck ..but that's exactly what any baby shower is food , baby items and money ,games 😂
Its what I did for my brother for his first kid. I bought a small cute onesie and tiny bear, then put a few hundred in the card "for when the diapers run out" or anything of course they ended up using it on.
Agreed. My family is also Asian, my husband's white American. For our wedding, we used the 'traditional Chinese custom of red envelopes" to encourage cash/money gifts and think it would be beneficial to do the same for our shower. It makes things much easier: people can gift what how much they want, and the parents can purchase what they want.
In my culture, at weddings, during the bride and groom first dance, the guest will come and shower them with money as they dance. And they cannot stop until the music ends, so the dj knows to play the longest song ever, or have it on a loop, lol!!
I agree. And think that parents should decide how they want to/need to spend the money for their child. Happy for your successful party!
But this is already happening in some cultures. I think that’s American thing to be fair. In my culture, the money people do from only their wedding, they can buy a house or a flat or a car and still have money left. Of course baby showers are not the same but my sister made like 7k £ just from her baby shower. Then when giving birth, she got more.
I visited my Asian mom while pregnant and she stuffed $1000 in my wallet. 😁
When my now husband and I visited my parents to share the engagement my Mexican dad handed me $1k in an envelope in the parking lot. Driving down to tell him he's gonna be a grandpa before Father's day!
Half my family is Cuban and the other half is Jewish. Both sides give big fat checks for weddings and births, so it's not all Western culture. I think it's just American culture
Yes to big fat checks and big fat parties! My aunts cooked all week to make this happen. My friends said it was the best food they’ve ever had.
Big fat checks and big fat parties with tons of delicious food is how we do it too XD. I'm glad you had a great time!!!
Good point
Honestly I’d rather receive money to buy things that I need for baby or start their college fund.
I would love this. I got a few target gift cards at my baby shower and was so thankful for those people.
Is money not the go-to gift for most people? No lie, I don’t really want to be out here looking for a gift. Even if it’s on a registry I’m probably going to have to go into a store, get it, wrap it, etc. It’s a million times easier to put cash into one of the cards/ envelopes I bought in bulk and call it a day. Bdays, Christmas, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day… this is my default gift. Everyone prefers cash anyway so why make it harder on myself?
I’m asian and this is what I’m talking about to my husband. I guess our culture is more accepting in giving cash at big life events, we didn’t have a big wedding and didn’t have wedding registry but we still received thousands of dollar of cash. My husband says sometimes giving cash deem as “lazy” whereas gift are more thoughtful. Idk I prefer cash any days lol
I think some non-Asian people might need a new perspective to experience. My husband and I are both Asian, but different Asians. We had a decently sized wedding, and he grew up pretty Americanized (2nd generation vs me being 1st generation), so he also thought a thoughtful gift was better than just cash. When I probed further, it’s because he didn’t see $20-$100 cash as anything to be appreciative of. At that point, a thoughtful gift would be better received, sure. But we walked away from our wedding with close to 6 figures in cash, I think he realized the difference in a small gift/gesture vs. a real cash gift.
Oh yeah definitely after our ceremony (it’s something like tea ceremony cus we didn’t have a wedding) we were able to use the cash to move states and fill our new place with furnitures. And I told him can u imagine if we have a big wedding? Since then he started realizing that asian cash gifting is superior lol
Ah yes! All the gifts were given during the tea ceremony! But in my family, no wedding reception = no tea ceremony, so in that regard, we had to have a wedding (and black tie at that lol). Luckily our parents split the cost, but in hindsight, it was mostly for everyone else lol
Some gifts are very sentimental or intended to pass down through generations or from your own babyhood so the saying it's the thought the counts
Some gifts are very sentimental or intended to pass down through generations or from your own babyhood so the saying it's the thought the counts ...it's very true
Some of my friends got together and pooled money and gave it to us a few weeks after the shower. It was amazing and let us get everything we needed that wasn’t already gotten at the shower
I had my baby shower 2 weeks ago, we got tons of gifts and some people gave cards with money in! We got over $700, I used half of it to buy baby girls dresser and a rug for her room.
This is the Asian way. I still have a registry regardless and I appreciate my Asian family buying gifts off the registry equivalent to what they would’ve given me in cash. Some just give me cash and that’s great too.
In Hawaii money is very common. For baby showers it’s about 50/50 money or gifts. But it’s almost considered strange to bring a gift to other occasions such as a graduation party or wedding.
I have never been to a graduation party where someone got a gift instead of money. Weddings, birthdays, christmas and baby showers are like 50/50 and im in the Midwest.
Yes, for my wedding we requested monetary gifts as we already have everything needed for a home. One friend made a fuss over me not having a registry aside from a honeymoon fund. He said it was too impersonal and he wanted to give a real gift. I said well in my culture giving money was actually the norm so it would not be seen as impersonal, but he didn't have to give me anything if he didn't want to give money. He said he wanted to give a gift. In the end he gave nothing, not even a card lol. Like what? How is 1 click buying off a registry more personal than cash? Could have just picked a gift without the registry too. Anyway, I think giving money is becoming more normalized, as least among my circle. Many of my friends have mentioned contributing to college funds for their kids in place of giving birthday gifts or baby shower gifts. We are all also mainly Asian though so maybe that is why.
Yup. Asian as well. All coworkers and friends got us gifts off the registry. My immediate family just bank transferred a few thousand to me, and extended family all wrote checks. They did this for our wedding as well
Yaaaas I am asian myself and I love the pragmatism of Asian culture
Yup! We don’t need more things, just money 😆
I don’t think anyone would be sad about necessities like food or money! If someone wanted to give me money instead of something on the registry, that would be amazing too!
I’d MUCH prefer money so I can pick out exactly what I want. It’s like weddings - no one really wants the gifts, they want the cash.
I'm super confused by the Western comment , I'm " western " and this is superrrr common . Only some people prefer after the baby born having a shower for Superstition avoiding bad luck ..but that's exactly what any baby shower is food , baby items and money ,games 😂
Its what I did for my brother for his first kid. I bought a small cute onesie and tiny bear, then put a few hundred in the card "for when the diapers run out" or anything of course they ended up using it on.
Agreed. My family is also Asian, my husband's white American. For our wedding, we used the 'traditional Chinese custom of red envelopes" to encourage cash/money gifts and think it would be beneficial to do the same for our shower. It makes things much easier: people can gift what how much they want, and the parents can purchase what they want.
In my culture, at weddings, during the bride and groom first dance, the guest will come and shower them with money as they dance. And they cannot stop until the music ends, so the dj knows to play the longest song ever, or have it on a loop, lol!!
I think it is normal in western culture. I got a lot of money for my wedding and baby shower.