In my last post I talked about some ways to do favors, but I left out one major category – the end-of-the-night-cool-experience-or-goodie-treat kinda favor. Yay!! This has become a popular way to go out with a bang, by leaving your guests with some kind of delicious and fun tasty treat that they can take home with them and continue to enjoy your wedding even after they have left. How have I seen this done lately? The Gilchrist wedding on May 16th (see details in a blog post below) gave out cookies and milk in to-go containers as their guests exited the reception. A wedding I have coming up this fall is doing a full candy bar where guests can fill bags with sweets (in the wedding colors, of course) to bring back home with them. And possible my favorite idea so far? An October wedding I’m working on where they are thinking of hiring a team from Cold Stone to mix up ice cream sundaes on the premises at the end of their reception. Bringing a marble slab with them. And their full Cold Stone uniforms. And all the yummy toppings and fillings. How fun is that???

Or if food isn’t your thing, why not go the route of a photobooth? That’s right, the old school seashore carnival kinda thing where you go in and the bulb flashes and your get a strip of funny pics of you and whoever you pulled in there with you. These are not just memories from your past – these photo booths are available locally and can be rented for your reception! Your friends go in and act all silly and they leave with these vintage-feel pictures at the end of your reception. And what they don’t know? Is that you get a whole set of all the pictures taken in the booth so you also walk away with all the silly pictures of everyone you know. How fun is that???

So, like I said in my last post, there is really no right – or wrong – way to do guest favors, but if you’re going to spend the money on something, why not make it something that they’re going to say to their friends, “Hey, I went to a wedding this weekend and you won’t believe the kind of cool stuff they had there…”

Happy planning!

~ Shannon