Wedding thank-you cards: what to write, and when

Thank-you notes are the last task of a wedding and the one most likely to be abandoned. Two months later the list is still on the kitchen table, and by then writing them feels harder rather than easier.

How long do you have?

Two to three months after the wedding is the widely accepted window, and sooner is better. The old rule of a year was never really a rule, and nobody minds a note that arrives early.

If you are past three months, send them anyway. A late thank-you is warmly received; an absent one is quietly remembered.

What a good note contains

• Their name, spelled correctly, which matters more than the rest of it combined
• The specific gift, by name, rather than “your generous gift”
• What you will do with it, or what it meant
• One line about them at the wedding: something you saw, or that they traveled far
• A sentence that sounds like you rather than like a card

The specific detail is the whole thing. A note that could have been sent to anybody reads as an obligation discharged; a note that mentions the dancing at 1 a.m. reads as being thought about.

For a gift

Dear Sarah and Tom, thank you so much for the copper pans. We have used them almost every evening since we got back, and James has become alarmingly confident about risotto. It meant a great deal having you both there, and we are still laughing about your speech.

For money toward the honeymoon

Dear Aunt Margaret, thank you for your very generous gift. It went straight toward the trip, and we spent a whole day on the water because of you. We thought about you when we were out there.

For somebody who simply came

Dear Michael, thank you for coming all that way. Having you there mattered more than any gift, and we are so glad you stayed until the end of the dancing.

Divide the list and set a pace

Split the names between you, ideally along the lines of who knows whom, and write five a day rather than sixty on a Sunday. Five is fifteen minutes. Sixty is a lost weekend that gets postponed twice and then abandoned.

Digital or handwritten?

Handwritten is lovelier and slower, and for the people who gave significant gifts it is worth the time. For everybody else, a digital card in the style of your invitation, with a personal line written for that person, is genuinely well received, and it exists, which is more than can be said for the notes that never get written.

The one thing that does not work is a single message sent to everyone at once. People can tell, and it undoes the point of thanking them.