Anniversary by year
The traditional list tells you the material. This tells you the size — what the archive actually looks like at year two, ten, twenty and sixty.
- 40th Anniversary Gift IdeasRuby, and a shift nobody mentions: by forty years the gift is half for the grandchildren, who were not there for any of the part being recorded.4 min read
- 45th Anniversary Gift IdeasSapphire, and no event. The forty-fifth is the year to start the fiftieth, because a golden jubilee book is a family project that takes longer than five months.3 min read
- 60th Anniversary Gift IdeasDiamond, and a constraint no other anniversary has: for a marriage that began in the 1960s, the archive may not start until twenty years in.4 min read
- A Last-Minute AnniversaryThe anniversary is on Thursday. We cannot make anything by Thursday, and here is exactly what to do instead — including the version that is better anyway.4 min read
- Fifteenth Anniversary Gift IdeasCrystal, which is a vase. What is actually new at fifteen years is that the children are old enough to make the gift, and that changes who it is from.4 min read
- Fourth Anniversary Gift IdeasYear four is where the archive changes shape — a child, a move, a parent needing care. What to print when the two of you are in fewer of the photographs.3 min read
- Ninth Anniversary Gift IdeasYear nine has one job and it is not year nine. A ten-year book takes months to assemble, which means the ninth anniversary is when it has to start.4 min read
- Second Anniversary Gift IdeasYear one gets photographed because everything is new. Year two is the first one nobody documents, which is exactly what makes it worth printing.3 min read
- Seventh Anniversary Gift IdeasWool, copper, and an itch invented by a 1955 film. The honest answer for year seven is a good dinner and no object, and here is the reasoning.3 min read
- The Anniversary After a Hard YearAn illness, a bereavement, a job lost, a bad stretch between you. What to give when celebrating the year would be dishonest, including giving nothing.4 min read
- Third Anniversary Gift IdeasLeather is the traditional third-year gift and it is the one entry on the list that does not travel to most Indian households. What works instead.3 min read
- Twentieth Anniversary Gift IdeasTwenty years of photographs sit in three incompatible eras — prints, early digital and phone. That, not china, is what makes the twentieth hard.4 min read
- Where a Decade of Photographs Actually IsSix places a decade of photographs is hiding, in the order worth checking. The gathering is the slow part of every milestone book and nobody plans for it.5 min read
- Your First Anniversary With a BabyThe camera roll is now ninety per cent baby and the two of you are in almost none of it. What to do about an anniversary in that year, honestly.3 min read