Ideas for my Big's gift?
 

Hi all.

My Big is graduating this upcoming fall semester and I wanted to make her a paddle for her gift. I am going to surprise her when we take her out to celebrate. In our chapter, we all receive an induction paddle from our bigs, and they are pretty simple and cute, so I want to make one for my big and I want it to be really nice.

Any ideas or suggestions on what I should include? Should I paint it or make it a little more formal by sticking to plain wood without paint?

I was thinking about the format being like this:

[her nickname-arched]
[her pledge class name]
[number]

[letter]

[letter]

[letter]

[university]
[Fall 2011]


And on the back have our poem engraved or etched.

Aside from that, any other ideas?

something related to your family name?

We don't have a family name :(

Is the 87 an indication of your organization?

That sounds like it will fill the paddle up quite nicely. I don't think you need anything else. :)

I personally like plain wood without paint. Paint can either end up looking really nice or really - yuck - not much in between.

lol no. that's my birth year. I couldn't think of anything else when I made my username.

Our founding year was 1992. We're a fairly young sorority :)

My sister suggested I add on there the date that she crossed?

so maybe like this?

[her nickname-arched]
[her pledge class name]
[date she crossed]

[number]

[letter]

[letter]

[letter]

[university]
[Fall 2011]

And on the handle in gold engrave wings to symbolize our mascot.

And on the back have our poem etched in gold.

Oh, I was just curious. I thought you were in another organization. I was going to provide some ideas for that organization.

Good luck though :)

I really liked them too. It looks more formal. I also like the painted paddles, but I figured since she is going to graduate maybe I should make her something a little more formal? I feel the painted paddles are great during your time as an undergrad, but a plain wooden paddle is more ideal for graduation

And it looks like I'm sort of starting a new tradition in my chapter because I have two sisters who are thinking about making their bigs a paddle too lol