While it is hard to believe, this June my husband and I will celebrate our third wedding anniversary. I met Blaine when I was 19 and he 20, and we have been together now for over 11 years.
When I had my bridal shower a few years back, my mom, sister and I agreed that we would shake things up a wee bit and stray from traditional bridal shower antics; I opted for a drop-in shower, meaning people could come and go as they liked, and I decided I wasn’t going to open any of my gifts at my shower.
I ended up begrudgingly opening one or two because a few people had asked me to, but I genuinely did not want to open any during my shower. I am not someone who likes being the centre of attention, and to be entirely honest, it’s always seemed a bit fucking weird to me to have a crowd of people around you watching you unwrap the presents they brought. I feel as though when gifts are opened at a shower, the bride in question doesn’t have the opportunity to truly and fully acknowledge what they were gifted because they’re forced to open so many, so quickly.
I recently went to a bridal shower where gifts were not opened, and it made me very happy to see some of these wedding traditions become modernized. The bride was able to move around and chat with every single person present, and to me, that is more important than being gawked at while you shred through infinite wrapping paper and tissue.
I hope to see more of these rigid wedding traditions altered and modified in the next few years. So many of them could use a refresh, and I think starting with the shower is a great first step.
Photo by Elizabeth Wahab on Unsplash
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