Hi. Nearly the same thing happened to me. I bought $100 worth of towels from the bride's registry, however I took them along to the out-of-town wedding and delivered them directly. Almost a year went by without a note. Finally I got a pre-printed card saying "thanks for joining us on our special day and for your gift." Huh??? I spent money on the gift, a lot of money traveling to the wedding plus two nights in a resort hotel, gas, tolls, etc. Could you please at least acknowledge that the gift was the towels you wanted and that they were from me? Even a handwritten note on the pre-printed letter saying" we love the towels" would have done it for me.

I don't think this is the custom, I think it's just thoughtless. So much time and energy is put into the wedding that dealing with the drudgery of TY notes after is probably no fun, so it's forgotten or done impersonally.

Okay, something funny. The couple had a new baby boy on June 27th. I got a birth announcement that was postmarked July 19th -- and the announcement said his date of birth is July 27th and that he weighed "six pounss." So, if that were correct, the baby was born eight days after the announcements were mailed. I really snorted when I saw that. I guess attention to detail is not this couple's strength. That's scary, because she is a doctor.

Oh well, watcha gonna do. I'm sure the company that mailed the package could confirm that it was sent.

Just to be fair, I have gotten nice notes for gifts from other brides and for baby gifts, etc. Personal, handwritten and mentioning the item, so manners do still exist.

Manners seem to have gone out the window these days- I never did get a wedding gift thank you from my sister-in-law and they were married ten years and have been divorced for about four. So I'm sure I've missed the boat on that :-).
I can't help but feel your note was one of dozens all identical to each other, possibly even written before the event :-( I was taught that you write something along the lines of "Thank you so much for the franistan, we will think of you every time we go spondulicking with it," or "Thank you so much for your generous gift of $$, we will use it to outfit our new kitchen," so the giver knew her/his gift had been actually received, apart from the obvious thanks.

Me too, colleenoz - I remember receiving a bathroom scale as a gift (don't ask!) and trying to come up with something creative to say about it ;)

I found a shipping confirmation buried in my old emails that shows the gifts were delivered to the correct address, although left at the garage. I thought I had ordered an additional item not listed in the confirmation, but I'm not going to worry about it now.

Is it possible that card and gift became parted from one another? So that the recipients know you sent a gift but do not know which gift it was and don't want to ask?

Yeah, didn't think so. ;)

I even think that "thank you for the lovely gift" notes look lazy and careless from children. Inexcusable from adults. Nothing more clearly says "I couldn't care less about you or connecting your gift with you or expressing any actual gratitude -- this is just an odious chore."

I don't care if 100 packages got separated from their cards. Move heaven and earth to figure out what came from whom. Apologize and ask if you must. Try to pretend that you care, that the gift actually means something to you about the giver, not just a possession you scored.

I know I kn ow.....but some 25 years ago I was part of one of those frantic searches and trying to recreate just what happened and which of 3 cards went with which 3 gifts....even in spite of anal mom writing down every item as it was opened....something happened.
So we decided rather than thank Kay and John for the towels when they were the ones who gave the toaster it was best to send a generic thank you....like "we will think of you mornings when we use your very thoughtful gift."
But I think chances are huge this was just a case of..."send a thank you"...no need to be thoughtful!
And they are probably the same people who won't send an RSVP when you invite them to your daughter's wedding!

Just be glad you got a note at all, very few brides write thank you notes, no matter how their mother pesters them!!

And they are busy - what with jobs, and socializing and such, they hardly have time to sleep, much less actually write a note!!

I have to comment on BRIDES don't write notes. Grooms also receive the gift and unless they are handless can/should write notes. After my husband and I were married we both sat down, wrote and addressed thank yous.

My brother and his wife TOLD us what to get them (said bikes were the only things they wanted and would not consider another gift), barely said thank you when we presented them and did not send out a single thank you note. They married when they were young but I still thought it was thoughtless and rude of them even 20 yrs later!

One of my pet peeves, thank you notes. I told my son and my daughter when they were young that if someone thinks enough of you to buy you a gift, the least you can do is write them a thank you note. Just because you receive an invitation to a graduation, shower or wedding, a gift isn't mandatory! Write a thank you note to thank them for the gift they gave you and for remembering and thinking of you.

I do agree that any thank you is better than nothing, but not much. I helped with a wedding shower a few years ago, the hostesses bought the couple their cookware and had a nice shower for them. A year and a half after they were married I got a form letter, and so did everyone else, I assume, telling us what all they had been doing, how busy they were and "thanks for the gift." I think after that amount of time, I would have just as soon they hadn't bothered.

I'm sorry, but to me not writing a thank you note and thanking the person for what they bought and gave to you is simply bad manners and thoughtless!

Anyone has time to write 10 or 15 notes in the evenings, until you get it done. If not, don't socialize so much!!

My daughter and her husband once got a very prompt note from a couple whose wedding they'd attended. But it asked "weren't you planning on sending us a gift?"!!! DD and DSIL wrote back explaining that they followed Miss Manners in thinking a gift may properly be sent after the wedding as well as before. (That was what they'd been planning,for some reason I forget.)
Can you imagine!!

Oh Karen...Thank You notes are a pet peeve of mine too. I won't go into what it took for me to attend the last wedding I did, but the obligatory note that followed was exactly that. There was nothing of a personal nature to it; it could have been a tweet. I put far more thought into the note that accompanied the gift, which feels like my mistake! It's enough to make me skip the next one.

No one teaches how to write Thank You notes, which is why it's a Lost Art. I try to write the kind of note I'd like to receive, which would include mentioning not only the gift, but a personal mention of something between me and the gift giver, whether it's a story, a memory, or just being grateful someone could attend.

"weren't you planning on sending us a gift?"
My first thought would be, "well I was, but not any more".