Pre-event Gifts! (shower vs wedding!??)

This whole time I thought shower gifts were wedding gifts. They’re gifts from the same registry list right? Do people take their gifts to the wedding and open them there? I think you’d be fine with getting general thank you cards, they don’t have to be specific for wedding or shower.

Irregardless, you don't need to specify in your "thank-yous" whether its a shower or wedding gift. Just say something along the lines of: We just received the coffee maker you gifted us. Thank you so much! We will think of you whenever we use it. We look forward to celebrating with you on our big day! (Or we are sorry you are not able to attend, but thank you for your generosity and being with us in spirit).

Unless the gift was given to you at the shower physically or the person said “this is my shower gift” make the thank you card a more general one. For any gifts given to you pre-wedding, always send a thank you card within two weeks of receipt. It’s polite and it also serves as a way to let the person know that the gift made it to your possession (if they shipped and did not hand in person).

View Quoted Comment Hmm, I was going to write something about how we missed seeing them at the shower (for the folks invited but couldn’t attend) and then of course thank them for the gift.
My shower was a tea party theme so the cards have a tea cup on the front—so they aren’t really interchangeable with the wedding.

For the wedding I was thinking of doing something like this to utilize one of our wedding pictures (probably picked from the ‘sneak peak’ small batch of photos our photographer edits and sends out within 36 hours of the wedding so we can order them quickly). Or is it tacky to have photos on your thank you cards?
So should I order some basic non-photo, non-tea related basic wedding thank you cards to send to the people mentioned in the original post??
And then if those are wedding gifts and the giver attends-wouldn’t we have to send them another thank you card after the wedding just for attending?
FYI my shower was 1 week ago. My wedding is in August

Sorry forgot to post the pic

View Quoted Comment Yes we bought generic but nice looking floral thank you cards to send to people that bought gifts for us before the wedding. After the wedding, it’s acceptable to send out up to 3 months after, so that’s when you can do ones with a photo on it.

I bought these basic thank you cards right after we got engaged, the colors are basically our color scheme, and I could use them as thank yous for people who sent engagement cards with monetary gifts, shower thank yous, and any gifts that come that we're not sure what the intended event was. We plan on getting photo thank you cards for after the wedding as well.

Thank you Cards - https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07WJX633H/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_5?smid=AYEZ6YZV27L2F&psc=1

Honestly, I would just send whatever thank you card you have. No one cares about the design of the card; what’s important is that they are thanked for the gift. Be generic about how you appreciate them thinking of the two of you and for whatever they sent. I personally wouldn’t wait to send them when you have your wedding thank you cards for two reasons: 1) it’s more to write after the wedding; wouldn’t you rather just knock them off the list? and 2) they may assume you didn’t receive the gift.

I would get a generic set of cards for situations like that. You can't really guess what a gift is meant for so best to do one card that could go either way.

Shower gifts are given at the shower. If a gift is sent to the couple’s home, it is considered a wedding gift. Many families and social circles don’t gift cash so even if they don’t attend the shower or they are not invited, they will give a physical gift from the registry. Some have the gifts mailed to the couple’s home and others take the gifts to wedding. It’s considered polite to keep the gifts as is and don’t use anything from them until after the wedding, because in the rare case that the wedding is called off, all gifts have to be returned to guests intact and original unopened packaging. Send a thank you card immediately as they arrive. Don’t specify the shower if they didn’t attend that, because shower gifts are not mailed to the home.

View Quoted Comment There have been plenty of times I have not been able to attend a shower (wedding or baby) and had the gifts from the registry mailed to the address on file.