What Kind of Gift Do You Give to a Couple That Eloped?

One of my friends had been dating someone for a while, a nice woman who seemed to be a good match for him.  They had known each other about a year, I believe, and seemed really happy together.  I met her a few times, and thought she was nice.

Anyway, recently he notified his friends (including me) via email that on a vacation together, the two of them had eloped.  I had to read the email a couple of times, doing double and triple takes before fully grasping what I had just read.  It’s not everyday that a friend of yours notifies you via email that he just got married!

At first I thought he might have been kidding, and I thought about contacting one of the other folks in the email about it.  But this friend of mine marches to the beat of his own drum, and the more I thought about it, it sunk in that he actually got married.  “Good for them!” I thought.  So, I emailed him congrats, and he wrote back a few lines, and we left it at getting back in touch when their multi-week vacation (honeymoon?) was over.

My next thought was this question: What kind of a gift should I get them, since they eloped?

Here’s the thing: None of my good friends had ever eloped.  Most of us had actual wedding ceremonies, with an evening before (rehearsal) dinner, a formal ceremony, and a wedding reception.  The path of eloping is just something I no familiarity with.  So, I thought about how this should be handled.

What to do? There was no registry, and they never asked for anything.  I was never invited to anything, but that’s okay because neither was anybody else.

Flummoxed, the decision ultimately ended up being this: take them out to a nice dinner.   Which is what happened, and it was actually quite recently that we all went out to dinner.  I nice little Italian place was the venue, the type of place that his new wife would like.  Which, it seemed like she did.  That was the intent, honestly – though I was his friend, I thought it was best to go to a place that would make her happy.  Now they’re friends of ours.

My Questions for You:

Have you ever known any friends who eloped? Did you?

In terms of giving a gift, what do you think would be appropriate – if anything at all?

Do you think that the nice dinner was a good choice, or would something else have been better?