Want to thank everyone for all of this input. Please keep it going. As the Advisor with the most strategic planning experience, I was asked to help optimize our gifting. Information from other places helps us with context as well as planning a new approach.

My chapter added to our by-laws a limit on what bigs could spend on littles. I don't remember the amount - maybe $100? - but it definitely wasn't anything outrageous. If you took a little, you knew that you'd have to put up at least a little cash. Comes with the territory.

We also received our paddles and jerseys at initiation (already covered in our new member dues) - the jerseys were a big deal. Even though we could wear letters during our new member period, getting your jersey (and finding out your nickname) was huge. We also made a lot of things in my chapter - lettered shirts, jewelry boxes, etc.

And we had a secret sister program running all year, and each new member class participated as well, so they would give each other little gifts throughout the semester.

All of this combined made even $100 seem like a lot of money to spend.

And here's a great idea that summer_gphib posted about just a couple days ago in the Bid Day Pics thread:

Something like this would help defray some of the costs for the big, ensure that at least some of the gifts for the littles were the same, get the alumnae more involved, and allow the new members to interact with them in a small way.

I like the idea of chapter initiation gifts. A chapter I advised included room in the budget for all initiates to receive letter sweatshirts and some other sorority gifts, like a copy of the crest. At the time I was a collegian, my chapter provided a few things to the big sisters to finish as homemade crafts-- a pin pillow, pin box, diamond board. With the exception of the chapter gifts, my chapter also had a policy that all gifts had to be given off-property. I think this was a way to minimize, "Oh, Susie got TONS of gifts, and all I got was a lavaliere and a stuffed animal." (Which, while appreciated, most normal people can't help but feel jealous if others are being flooded with presents and they get the absolute minimum).

This is why my big is my big! My big was the person I wanted to be in chapter. And I want to be that for a sister too.

Exactly. My favorite family gift, the only one I still have to this day, is our family ring. My mom started it. The ring was a $1.98 ring of peace signs from Claire's. We bought a ton of them to keep the tradition going. :-) We were the only family to have a gift like that so it was a sense of pride...all for $1.98.

For our chapter, we have a cap on what is allowed to be given in front of others, but if you want to go above and beyond that in private, there's nothing we can do to stop it. In addition, the local alumni association tends to 'donate' a small initiation gift package (depending on PC size, could be more or less), and your parents have the option to buy a gift package. The chapter itself buys a set of letters on bid day, and a lavalier on initiation day.

Generally, your little got a paddle, some type of shirt/hoodie/lettered piece of clothing, and a lot of crafted stuff--anything from wine/margarita glasses, wall letters, bulletin boards, candy, Alphies, and miscellaneous items like bar tshirts or beads, etc.

Is the chapter talking about what it means to be a big? Seems the chapter culture may need to change to put the focus on values vice letters. My chapter was small, so we had no extras; it was hard enough to cover chapter expenses andkeep dues reasonable. All our sisters valued the handmade, well-thought giftsover any other

Gifts from your big are the most amazing gifts you will receive, whether they are handmade or purchased from some big website. My big made all of my gifts for revelation, initiation, what have you. I did the same for my little, and she was ecstatic as well! Sure, my chapter was small, but I would not have had it any other way! I don't understand the whole putting a cap on spending or a requirement of how much is to be spent; it's like the saying goes "it's the thought that counts!" And honestly, it is.

The branded items that everyone got in my chapter were:
* jersey (one similar to this: http://somethinggreek.com/shop/shope...y+Jersey&id=99 -- you either got it in your sorority colors, or school colors so you could wear it to the games)
* koozie (yes, I realize this "dates" me)
* hand-painted plastic frames for party pics
* key chain (sometimes, it was a floaty key chain)
* shorts with your letters either on the leg OR ... across the butt (gosh, what were we thinking -- http://www.customgreekthreads.com/Gr.../4822.lscs.htm Sorry, Alpha Phi, this was the example I found)

With my budget, I had to be inventive. Luckily, I can sew and had access to a sandblaster & wood carving/burning machine, so I made my big & little (plus my Sigma Chi big & little brothers) items with Greek letters like:
* frosted glasses (& pretty much anything else you could frost: mugs, coffee cups, pitchers, vases, picture frame glass, etc. -- there was a glass products outlet in town and, let's just say, I WENT to town! Cut letters out of duct tape, put it on the glass item & sand-blast away.)
* anything I could sew letters on: sweatshirts, bath towel wraps (with letters & cute trim), tote bags, jerseys, and duffel bags (until someone called it a "shag bag" & then I stopped)
* things you could burn in an owl or letters: Owl pencil holders (my big, my little & I STILL have these ... after all these years), smoking pipes with the Sigma Chi cross & letters (and I am SURE my fraternity big brother and little brother ONLY used these for pipe tobacco ....), wood picture frames, paddles, etc.

I am still "crafty" (yeah, both ways), so as an Advisor, I make things for the UCLA chapter for a "Must Be Present To Win" raffle at Chapter Dinner/Meeting. The favorite thing I've made is a hockey jersey with our letters on front, owl patch on 1 arm, scull & crossbones patch on the other arm & 1895 (our founding year) on the back.

I know that my chapter split inspiration/initiation week up between three girls per new member. One obviously was the girl's big, but the other two were sailboat sisters/violet sisters. The lesser sisters got smaller gifts, such as flip flops or badge boxes, picture frames, etc. This saved the big gifts for big sisters. Bigs were required to get the first traditional satin stitched shirts for the littles, and we ordered the shirts in bulk as a chapter. This was good in case for some reason you grew out of your old stitch or it got ruined, etc, because we ordered them at least once a year and you could get them cheaper. We didn't have a cost max, but it wasn't really an issue. I didn't get a whole lot from my big, but I knew once I took a little that she did spend around $150 on me based on what I got my little. We never gave our gifts in public, however. We took them to the campus mail center and the gifts were held there with a pick up slip for the NM to pick up.

I do know that after I took my little that we weren't allowed to give paddles. I adore my paddle that my little made me, but after that we had to do sailboats and triangles because of the implications paddles had.

You could list items in a tier system to curb spending. For example, Tier 1 can be afghans, blankets, flags, anything that costs more than $50, and say that bigs can only buy one item max from the tier 1. Tier 2 could be between 30-50 and limit bigs to 2. The lower in cost, the more you could buy from that area. That way it doesn't limit creativity but it does put a curb on spending.

The way we do big-little gifting, there's two major nights for gifts: pledging and pre-initiation night.

The Members-In-Training at our chapter don't get anything major at pledging. They do get letter tote bags, since they don't wear letters till after initiation. The tote bags are made by the VP Membership, and the bigs give a bunch of silly gifts, like lightsaber bubble wands and slinkys.

Pre-I is when MIT's get all their first sets of letters. There's other gifts, like candy or coloring books, but the main gift is letters.

I wish I knew how to post photos on GC because Tallulah just sent me an email with a photo of what her big sister gave her this week. Omigosh! I seriously hope that most of that was hand-me-downs. She made her some gorgeous things too, including a painting of a portion of the Chi O Symphony.

At our big sister reveal (long ago and far away), I think I was given a lavaliere and a bud in a bud vase. I don’t recall anyone receiving much other than that. Times sure have changed!

When my daughter’s chapter did their big sis reveal, it involved many successive nights of gift giving and clues, with the big reveal on the last night. My daughter was just astonished at the gift mountain each night, and would call with “you just won’t believe…!” (she was obviously delighted with the festivity and anticipation).

She received a number of pieces of sportswear (like a hoodie, raincoat/windbreaker, and shirts), a number of other gifts that were purchased, lots and lots of crafted items, and quite a few things that were handed down. All topped with a poem on a poster giving clues about who her big might be (I think the poems may have been her favorite part).

I was really surprised at the sheer amount of ‘things’, and actually felt a little uncomfortable wondering if her big sis spent more than she should.

The next year, when my daughter was the big, the chapter limited the gifts to a set number per night, and even made some suggestions regarding what type of gift (like candy and baked goods one night, for instance). Since these gift piles were left at the chapter house for the littles to retrieve at a specified time, the chapter indicated that this would be enforced by counting in advance of the littles’ arrival. These limitations were instituted just before the big/little week approached, so the girls who had already accumulated more ‘things’ for their little than rules allowed just gave these after the reveal.

Although the rule didn’t specify what one could give their little, or how much one could spend, hopefully it eventually helped curb the excess somewhat. It is true that there is so much more to being a big than just the festivity of that week, as thrilling as it is.

That said, my daughter was super excited about being a big, so she started the summer before crafting items for her little-sis-to-be, and really enjoyed it. I helped some too (made me feel better about the project graveyard in my basement that includes paint and supplies for ex-projects). : )

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Lots of good ideas there -- being able to sew would definitely be a huge plus! No sewing skills in my household, unfortunately, but my mother did sew a few pillows and things for dd's lil-to-be during the summer craft smackdown.

I wonder if your glass idea would work with tape and a paint-on glass etching product? Hmmm... another project maybe.


My daughter was able to make a number of gifts fairly cost-efficiently since the 40 -50% weekly coupons (or sales) at the craft store chains were used for purchasing things like frames, canvases, or photo albums. The dollar store also had some items (like small frames) for decorating.

As I said, she did much of this over the summer – it was fun, but it did take some time. I'm certainly not suggesting that anyone should be concerned about making an excessive number of items -- just posting for the purpose of suggestions.


Some of the items I recall that were fairly cost-efficient to make:


A sepia-toned picture of the house, framed

Creed – hand written with calligraphy-type pen, embellished, and framed

Painted canvas (can search “sorority canvas” on etsy for inspiration)

Iron-on Greek letters ordered from ebay – the double-layered kind – ironed onto pillows (or could use on a tote, for instance)

Fabric-covered cork board (a lot of girls paint the 2 x 2 acoustic ceiling tiles from home supply store)

Painted (with paint pens) acrylic frames w/magnets for dorm refrigerator (used small rare earth magnets ordered from ebay – inexpensive but effective)

A photo album/scrapbook in chapter color (embellished) with a page started (with pics obtained later of little sis)

T-shirts, with custom messages, using fonts from computer traced onto and cut from freezer paper ironed on as a stencil (I was amazed that this actually worked well – could be used to make a stencil or letters to iron onto any fabric to be painted).

Tacks and magnets made from small domed glass cabs (have seen small clear flat-backed pebbles used for this too) – used some google images of symbols/mascots, pasted in word, reduced in size, printed, cut out, and glued to back of cab – then glued on tack w/E6000

Jewelry findings (chapter symbols/mascot) made into thumbtacks and magnets with E6000 (jewelry findings are really inexpensive and can be found in a craft store, or on etsy, for instance, in just about any imaginable symbol, animal, etc.)

A few larger items – like a painted wooden stool and a painted hinged box. I really don’t have any idea what these were used for, but they were cute.


***The sportswear is best purchased from whatever local source the girls are using – when my dd bought for her little, there seemed to be some consensus on what the girls planned to give based on the popularity of particular items.


ETA: I don't know why ebay is hyperlinked in this post. I didn't do it!

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Both of my daughters are very crafty. My eldest made such cute gifts that many of her sisters asked her to help them out! Crafting in the cheap and easy way to go. We found great frames and even a cute mirror (easily painted or modge/podge at IKEA) My eldest gave her little a bunch of hand-me-down tee-shirts and all the mugs, key chains etc. that she had accumulated. My youngest says her house tradition in the big to give the little a blanket (usually in sorority colors or the pnm fave colors) But they also give a lot of hand-me-down shirts.