SoRaiseYourGlasses

Wedding Guest Books and ones designed for anniversaries, birthdays, engagement and hen night

Wedding Guest books are so often bought but not always best used, so apart from giving you some idea of the range of guest books we offer for all occasions we thought we'd offer a few tips about how to use them and how to ensure that they are the perfect memory keepsake of your wedding or your special occasion.

Guest books come in lots of shapes and sizes and in various constructions. You want your guest book to look just as you want it and this is easily the most important feature of a guest book, but there are a few other features its worth looking for depending on how you plan to use it. So here are our tips:

1. Decide whether you plan to use your guest book purely for guests to write in or whether you want to add the odd piece of memorabilia (like an order of service) or the odd poignant photograph to be included in the book as well. If you want to add a few bits and pieces you may be better off with the type of construction that is usually reserved for albums - in other words there is some ability in the book to accept extra thickness without making it impossible to close the book properly. Many albums are perfect as guest books too if you'd like more of a hybrid. If you just want guests to write messages then the construction isn't so important

2. Protect the cover. However beautiful the cover may look when you get it, it's worth either checking that it can be wiped and marks can easily be removed, or else you need to consider covering it with cellophane or something similar at your event. If you get all your guests to write in it they will all be handling it, and however much you ask people to take care of it, someone will either have grubby hands or they will drop something on it! So take care of it.

3. Check the quality of the paper inside the guest book. You need to avoid paper that is too absorbent - there are guest books around with what looks like lovely paper inside but some papers can "bleed". This means that wet ink spreads slightly when it touches the paper and causes the writing to look indistinct and messy.

4. Make sure that you supply a good quality pen to use for writing in the guest book. The last thing you want in your memory book is ink stains and splodges, so avoid a fountain pen as very few people now know how to use one, and avoid cheap ballpoint pens as they can often get a build up of ink on the nib which then comes off as a small blob. If that smears you'll never get it off. A good quality rollerball with a medium nib is probably the best, but make sure you try it out a fair bit before you let irt be used in your precious guest book.

5. Many guest books at weddings and other events are placed on a table and the hosts announce that a guest book is available for all guests to write in. If this is all you do you will probably be lucky to get the signatures and messages of a quarter of your guests. The only way to be sure of getting most people to write a message is to appoint one person (one of the ushers is a good choice) to go around to every guest with the guest book and the pen and ask them to sign the book.

6. Get your appointed usher to do the guest book job early in the proceedings!! After people have had a few glasses of wine or beer you may not be so pleased with what gets written! Your appointed usher will probably do a better job himself early on. If it's left you may well find that some people have signed it twice and others have been ignored!

Whatever your choice and whatever way you ensure the final resi=ult we are sure that you'll be delighted with our selection and may we wish you a lovely day and a wonderful memory.

Guest Books