Shruti, my other buddy in the throes of wedding planning, posed this question recently, and its one I posed to the L.A. blogosphere — where could one find vintage (i.e. old) Los Angeles MTA subway/bus tokens? No one has answered me yet, but Shruti has her eye on a set on eBay, which she plans to fashion into cufflinks for one of the groomsmen in her wedding this coming July.

It occurred to me that this is yet another tiny detail that brides attend to — and it may be small in the grand scheme of a large wedding, but I imagine that its definitely something that sticks in the mind of the wedding attendant who receives the gift.

for sale by Etsy's qacreate

Essentially, what Shruti is aiming for is create cufflinks like these, offered by qacreate on Etsy.com. The ones for sale on Etsy are just $30, but when researching these for Shruti, I’ve seen them for as much as $125. Yowza! Shruti believes she can make them for under $20, but I think the fact that they’d be handmade by the bride herself would make them more meaningful. Handmade by the bride, to me, would say, “I really valued your presence on our special day.”

Heheh, and I hate to keep going back to the one wedding I was a bridesmaid in several years ago, but dude — its the only huge wedding I’ve been in recently. Anyway, the bride gave out some major (to me, at least) bridesmaid gifts — a big leather container (I guess you could call it a bag, but not really) holding an embroidered bag with tassels, which held a travel set, including a jewelry bag, travel containers and a makeup bag embroidered with each bridesmaid’s name.

In a way, the real gift of this was that they spelled my name right! Two e’s in the middle, plus one at the end. W00t! Obviously, you can tell this bag is pretty well used, judging from the stain along the bottom.

Anyway, I’m now wondering what other types of personalized gifts brides plan to give to their wedding attendants? And, what else does tradition demand in terms of the bride/groom-bridesmaid/groomsman relationship besides gifts and wedding day service?