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Welcome bags are a nice treat for your out of town wedding guests. Since my husband and I got married in the city we currently live in, almost all of our guest were from out of town. Some of our friends that lived around here also stayed at the hotel that night so they could go out with us after the reception. Welcome bags are appreciated in both cases, especially if you add bottles of water and snacks!
My mom, sister, grandma, and I made the welcome bags during the week prior to the wedding. We even formed somewhat of a convary line to do it (my sister and I are both engineers). They were a lot of fun to put together.
I made a couple of insert for the welcome bag in Microsoft Publisher. Each insert had a different purpose. The first one had a “welcome note” with a timeline of events on the front and a direction/map from the hotel to the church on the back. The second insert was really more for the out of town guests. One side contained a few of our favorite places to eat and drink. The other side contained a list of things to do in the area.
Bottles of water and food are also great for welcome bags. Avery labels actually make a water bottle label. I used them to make personalized water bottles for welcome bags. They were super easy to use and Avery has many templates that you can use as a starting point. All you have to do is modify the template and it saves it as a PDF. I highly recommend these labels. You can also use them for fundraisers, family reunions, or even events at your child’s school.
We included several food items in the bags. We want to provide both sweet and salty items along with something related to the area. Other items are related to my husband and me. Below is a list of items we included
- Bag of Pretzels
- Harry London Buckeye – Since we live in the Buckeye State and I love buckeye candies!
- Twizzlers – My husband’s favorite road trip candy.
- Slim Jim’s Snack Stick
- Peppermint Lifesavers
We also included a fun tag on the bag. The tag had a cutout of the state of Ohio in the middle. This tag said, “Welcome – Canton, OH” along with our names and wedding date. My sister was excited because it was another chance to use the Cricut for a wedding project. The final addition to the bag was a custom door hanging. I created this door hanging in Microsoft Publisher. This was one of my favorite wedding projects. I received many compliments about how cool this door hanging was.
To complete the bags, we put all of the items in a small brown paper gift bag that had different designs in cream on them. We added the tag to the handle using a piece of purple or mint ribbon. We also fluffed some light purple and blue tissue paper on top to complete the bag. And just like that, the bags were ready to go to the front desk at the hotel.
If you liked this tutorial, be sure to check out some of our other wedding related tutorials.
Peace, Love, and Crafts ~ Jamie
