Personalize Your Party

The key to making an anniversary party a success it to make it personal. People will attend many parties in their lives, and what really sets one apart from another are the personal touches. Here are some ideas to try.

Photo Timeline

Create a photo timeline to help decorate the party. Not only does it look great, but it also gives your guests a glimpse into little moments of your life they might not have known you for.

To Make

Find twenty to forty or your favorite pictures of you two as a couple as well as you and your spouse growing up.Take them to your local Kinkos or scan them into a photo program like Snapfish and order 8 x 10 prints.

Using a thick ribbon and clear packing tape, tape the 8 x 10 pictures onto the ribbon, evenly spaced apart at 3 to four feet. You can either hang them vertically along the ribbon or horizontally, depending on the space you wish to decorate.

Video Blog (or vlog)

Ask guests to come to the party with a great story to tell about the couple.

Hire a videographer or video booth and ask guests to make a one to three minute video blog for the couple.

When you send thank-you cards after the party, upload the video to a site like YouTube and add the web address for the video in the thank you card so guests can enjoy it.

Picture Favors

Thanks to digital photography, you can hire a photographer that will take pictures of guests as they enter the party. By the end of the night they will be able to print the photos and put them in a frame for guests to take home as the ultimate personalized favor.

For more options, try going to Moo.com where you can make minicards, stickers, postcards and more.

Better yet, through Tabblo.com (an HP-powered site), you can upload several pictures and make a photo cube that you can print out and fold together yourself, for free!

Moo.com works with Facebook photos, and both services work with Flickr also. So if you want to use your pre-uploaded photos of you as a couple on these fabulous photo gifts, go right ahead!