THE BETROTHAL PARTY.

Putaruru Press, Volume VII, Issue 278, 7 March 1929, Page 2

THE BETROTHAL PARTY.

(By Faith Foster) . A charming custom is being revived in the “Betrothal Party,” which is given at the house of the newly engaged girl. The idea is to afford friends of the engaged couple an opportunity of making the acquaintance of one or the other, and of tendering congratulations to both. The affair is usually arranged as an afternoon function, but it is more or less an understood thing that ‘ ‘ intimates” stay on to an informal supper and a small dance. With the gramophone and the wireless, a little dance of this kind can be got up on the spur of the moment —and very often these hastily improvised entertainments are the most pleasurable 1 As a rule, floral offerings arrive in abundance from well-wishers on the morning of the betrothal party,, so that the hostess has plenty of flowers with which to make her rooms beautiful. A pretty device, however, which she makes her personal concern, is a largo heart-shaped frame of laurel leaves, inside which are hung the intertwined initials of the happy couple, carried out in red rosea, or other seasonable flowers.

With short engagements so much in fashion, the party forms a practical method of introduction, in place of the rounds of visits which an engaged pair had previously to pay to relatives and friends. Visiting is out of fashion nowadays, and everyone is glad to discover some more pleasant means of ■“breaking the ice.” I am told also that many a modern betrothal party is made the occasion of fixing up arrangements as to brides maids.'' And the registry office marriage, where there are no bridesmaids, is so often followed by an immediate trek for a -railway station that the betrothal party takes the place of a wedding reception.