Weddings are such a wild ride. The amount of support you get from friends and family is so humbling, but you know what’s also crazy? The idea of everyone attending your wedding getting you a gift of some kind. That’s not really the case most of the time, but there’s such an outpouring of love and the desire to gift something to help out the newlyweds on wedding days—such a blessing!
The roomie and I were only engaged for 6 months, so we had to make moves quickly in order to give people attending bridal showers time to check out the registries! In doing so, we decided to give two registry options to our loved ones—one traditional one, Crate and Barrel, and one fully online option, Zola.
Having both turned out to be a great option for us. A number of people told me the Zola registry was a little too confusing for them–admittedly, those were older, less tech-savvy folks–and others told me they loved the fully online registry that offered a few more unique gift options. Just so we’re all on the same page, Zola offers the ability to register for A N Y T H I N G sold on the Internet. It’s amazing! Crate and Barrel offers the opportunity for people to buy products online or to go into a store and shop the registry in person.
Our Top 10 Registry Items (+1 for Dog Parents)
These aren’t in any type of order, but these are some of the most unique or most used items that we received from our registries. Don’t worry when you don’t see everyday dishes, glassware, silverware, or new (beautifully shiny) pots and pans. We left the basics off the list! 😉
1. Footed Cake Stand With Dome
This piece is a fixture on our dining room table right now and I stock it with baked goods whenever I can. Later in life, we are so excited for it to be full of cookies and living on a big ole island. The roomie literally just said that this week to me. 😂 We highly recommend one of these.
If you own a home, you desperately need a safe ladder for fun activities like cleaning out gutters, doing maintenance on the roof, hanging things up high, etc. We only had a very short ladder and had to borrow from family members (that don’t live close by) if we ever needed to get up high. This was such an amazing gift to receive that is so helpful!
3. Couples Massage
You know what’s expensive? Couples massages at all-inclusive resorts. Luckily, Zola offers the option to register for experiences like a massage, snorkeling, date night, etc. that loved ones can contribute as much as they want to. Technically, we could use that money for whatever we wanted since it was just funneled into our bank account, but it’s kind of fun for guests to put money toward an experience for the newlyweds. Weddings are so stressful and a massage was SO needed on our honeymoon the week after. Ours even included a hilarious “aquatherapy” experience pre-massage and we had so much fun doing that together! Think plunging into an ice cold pool, then a HOT pool, walking on stones while getting sprayed with cool water, etc. SO fun and then a relaxing massage/treatment after.
4. Combo Espresso and Drip Coffee Machine With Milk Frother
If you follow me on Instagram, you see my lattes regularly and pictures of our machine sometimes! I love this thing. The roomie is my favorite barista, but lately I’ve been making myself a latte every morning. They are so yummy and it’s a fun little morning ritual for me. We were crossing our fingers that someone would snag this off the registry and days before the wedding it was ordered! Pro Tip: Register for things on Amazon Prime to help out procrastinators (like Ryan and I).
5. Ramekins
I am shocked by how much I use these little stark white ramekins. They are so handy for so many things! A little dose of ice cream, melting down butter for popcorn, making little servings of banana pudding, dips, and so much more. We love them! Order a bunch. We registered and received 12.
6. Breville 4-Slice Long Slot Toaster
Our old toaster was so terrible. The bottom tray wouldn’t even stay on so the stray crumbs were so annoying. This toaster looks so high-class (isn’t that what you want in life? 😂 A classy toaster?) and is amazing! Now we can make four slices at once without making a mess.
7. Decanters
I feel like this is a standard registry item for any groom who loves dark liquor. I, personally, don’t care for scotch and bourbon like the roomie, but I love the look of decanters. We registered for a number of different styles and actually use these. This one is Ryan’s favorite followed by this one. They are so pretty and look great in our bonus room on a thrifted mirrored tray. Later in life, these may be tucked away in a fancy cabinet, but in this life stage these are such a hit to use and display!
8. Telescoping Marshmallow Roasting Sticks
We really like s’mores and were getting along fine with our Target dollar section roasting poles, but wanted more compact sticks and more than the four we had. These are great so far! If you enjoy camping, I feel like these would be so great to register for. We love that they are so easy to store and are all different colors. It’s fun to hear our adult friends claim which color they want. Why not make s’mores even more fun?!
9. Nest Cameras
These are generous gifts, but invaluable in our opinion. We had one camera already and were SO happy to receive a couple more off of our registry—an indoor camera and an outdoor camera. Buying someone peace of mind when they’re away from home is such a priceless gift! Thank you, thank you, thank you to the kind souls that got these for us.
10. Handheld Dyson Vacuum
We have a shedding dog and later in life I hope we have cars full of dropped snacks from kiddos. 🤷🏻♀️ Both of those things require a compact and powerful little vacuum like this. Thank God we got it (even though we still need to bust it out)! On a related note, if you’re looking for a great regular vacuum, we love our Shark.
BONUS: 11. Penny’s Pet Teepee
We wanted Penny to be celebrating her parents getting married, too, so we registered for this cute pet tent for her! When it showed up, it was smaller than I thought it would be, but she LOVES it. Girlfriend loves a dark, tight space for napping. I stuck her cooling mat in there, too, so she goes in there all the time. Best part about this gift? A veterinarian and his wife purchased this for us! How perfect is that?!
Top Registry Picks from Our Married Friends
I reached out to some of our married friends–all married within the past three years–to ask what their favorite registry gift was from their own weddings. I love their responses!
“Our hammock! We registered for an extra wide, sturdy hammock. We love it because it’s our little escape at home. Great for reading, relaxing, and putting the cell phones down.” —the Christowski’s
“We didn’t really get anything out of the ordinary, but we do love our everyday dish set that we got and all of our pots and pans!” —the Bundy’s
“The best thing we got from our registry was definitely a gift card to Framebridge for a large format (28”x 38”) custom framed photograph. Right after we got our wedding photos back, we chose a black and white image of the two of us and framed it for $170 (fully covered by the gift card). It hangs on our wall and is a constant reminder of our favorite day and the love that we have for each other! Our second favorite thing was probably a gift card to Artifact Uprising for a custom photo book with all of our wedding photos in it.” —the van der Veen’s
“We love our TV, board games, and yard games. It was nice to have matching towels and pots and pans for the first time, but a 70” TV we never thought we would actually get was a great wedding gift!” —the Busby’s
“Getting a new knife set was really nice. Also, getting fun serving dishes was great since we wouldn’t ordinarily spend money on that.” —the Moffitt’s
If you’re married, what is the best thing you registered for and got? And if you’re engaged and registering, what are you praying you’ll get from a loved one?! Let me know in the comments. Registries can be stressful, but man is it fun to receive things you really want and need. ☺️
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