Anniversary Gifts
Anniversary Gifts
People buy gifts for all kinds of anniversaries. Of course, wedding anniversaries come to mind first, but the anniversary of a first date, or a first home or of moving to a new city, state or country can all be reasons for celebration.
Gift Purpose
The purpose of the anniversary can often be a good way to try to work out a gift. Something that reminds you of that first date or a plant or decorative item for the home. If the person is celebrating the anniversary of their arrival in the city, state or country then perhaps a book or a walking tour or something to help them learn about a new aspect of the location.
Searching for a Gift
Searching for ideas for wedding anniversary gifts can be frustrating. On the one hand, each year has at least one theme which should help you narrow down your choices and can provide ideas that you might not have thought of. On the other hand, there are so many ads about engraved plaques or photo frames and gold-dipped roses that it can be really difficult to spot anything interesting or new.
Theme of the Anniversary
My husband and I really like to try to buy each other gifts that line up with either the traditional theme or the modern theme. There are also flowers, gemstones and colours for each anniversary…which can help if you get stuck.
The third anniversary has a traditional theme of leather and I remember finding a really lovely leather laptop bag for my husband…and it was on sale too! He bought me a leather handbag that I still have and still love, several years later. That year was a pretty easy one for both of us!
Making your search a little more specific can often help. I like to start by finding out the themes for a particular anniversary. For example, the themes for a 6th wedding anniversary are candy or iron.
For our 6th anniversary we certainly bought each other some candy there. We also focused on the other themes…and no, nobody was buying any irons!!
I bought him a set of Iron Man DVDs and since the colour for the 6th anniversary is turquoise, he was able to find me some lovely jewellery.
Sweets Are Great
Candy is always something you can include in a gift. On our wedding anniversary, my husband and I like to spend the day visiting one of our favourite restaurants, perhaps taking in an exhibition at a nearby gallery…and a visit to the British Lolly Shop to stock up on treats.
Stretch the Theme
Sometimes you need to stretch the theme a little bit to make it work.
The 14th wedding anniversary theme is Ivory, and after seeing tips about elephant-themed gifts I found a wonderful retailer in Melbourne making all kind of cufflinks…including elephants. My husband found some ivory-coloured earrings.
Some years are easier for finding gifts than others. The 12th anniversary theme of silk made it pretty easy for me to find a silk tie in colours that he would like, and he contacted an artist friend to commission two silk scarves in my favourite colours of green and purple.
But the Bronze anniversary (8 years)
really had me stumped. I searched IMDB for anything movie with Bronze in the title, trying to repeat the victory of the Iron Man DVDs…but there wasn’t much inspiration. I wish I could remember what I got now…I think I might have found the alternate theme of pottery a bit easier.
It is the thought not the cost
It doesn’t have to be expensive either. For our first anniversary (Paper) my husband bought me a 365-day journal so that we could write about our first year together. Now…I didn’t get very far with documenting that year and I’m not great at keeping a diary…but I loved the idea and we do have a written record of at least part of that year.