S.O.P. - Standard Operating Procedure.

1) Do all guests chip in for one present for the kallah (and choson)?
2) Does everyone bring her own gift? (Then, another gift for wedding, right?)
3) You call host and tell her what your bringing?
4) Other?

Anything else?

As a rule, I don't like chip in for collective gifts. I find it impersonal.
Unless it's someone I barely know.

Are you talking about the type of showers you take with your clothes off or another kind?

The kind for a woman who is about to get married.

Showers are nothing more than a shameless ploy to get more gifts out of people.....

wrong. if i brought a (normal, not a $5 chatchka) gift to the shower, then no gift at the wedding. who gives 2 gifts?

i haven't been to a shower in ages, but, for my good friends i got them a separate gift (either asked them what they want and tel the host know i'm getting it, or asked the host what else has to be bought and picked from there). for others i just chipped in.

That doesn't make it clear

true - the title doesn't, but once you read the OP, there can be no mistake

It's a wedding shower. Now is it clear?

I thought wedding showers were a goyishe thing.

They ARE....
But 2000 years in galus has an effect on people.....

you are confusing with baby showers

What kind of a perverse bachelorette party tradition is that!??

My HS class collected $200(?) from each person and when each person gets engaged she gets $200 of presents (and shower party supplies and food) back from the pot. This way the first girl engaged doesn't get a huge party, while no one chips in for the later engagements.

Sometimes you have to bring a $5 home item too.

I don't know. I was unable to attend. I had to be on public television at the moment.

Well, next time check it out. See if the shower is hot or cold. How many people go in together. Do the mirrors get fogged up. That kind of thing.

HAHAHA

I thought this ws going to b a thread about how NOT to forget to wash your hair, or some such ...

Dove usually, sometimes Irish Spring...

having fun with men doing striptease is a better tradition?



fancy

how does that work?
was this mandatory by the school or someone came up iwth the idea?
who keeps the collected money? what if some girls didn't have $200 at the time? or what if it's 10 years down the line and some girls still didn't get married?

(FYI, i think it would be less confusing if you changed the title to Bridal Showers)

I would prefer to intentionally leave it as is.

why?

The reason for my initial question was as follows.
I was invited to a shower. I got a gift and had it all wrapped and ready to go. One of the hostesses then calls me and asks if I bought a gift and my reply is 'yes'. She then says 'oh, because we do a thing where people donate money and we get things for the kallah'. There was NO indication of this on the invitation. (I even double-checked after hanging up.) So then she says 'ok, well what did you get?' I say what I got and she says 'ok, good'.

I was a bit dumbfounded and couldn't understand if this is acceptable practice, good, bad, etc.?

Not school policy, but something the girls came up with and some graduating classes do on their own. One or two people were in charge of the bank account. You don't have to join in, but then dont complain if people dont want to buy you presents.....
At the time I was not working and thought it was a lot of money to fork over, but I did it anyways.
I dont know what happens to the money in ten years. I did (jokingly) wanted a statue of limitations on it- if I didnt get married in X years, I wanted the money back to go on vacation....

I see the chipping in ($18-25) a lot, but usually its spelled out on the invite.

PS- be glad you didn't get an invite JUST to chip in money, where there is no party but the friends are expected to pay anyways.

I was just kidding... I do have some bars of Dove my sister left here for me when she left sem... but I use an Israeli brand called Hawaii.

It wasn't spelled out on invite and it was a ladies shower, not a friends shower.
p.s. I actually don't mind those. (but we always did $10)

whats that?

Meaning it wasn't her classmates and friends putting it together, being invited. IT was her mother's friends/acquaintances that were organizing it.

Wouldn't you like to know.

Bridal and baby showers are another of those weird American traditions that until a few years ago we had never heard of in the UK, but are now insinuating themselves into our culture, along with things like obesity and coca cola.