Homemade Anniversary Gift Ideas

By: Amy Cunningham

If you want to give your spouse a more personalized, romantic, unique gift this year for your anniversary, why not try a homemade, hand-crafted gift. Create something as simple as a romantic card or scrapbook or more advanced as advanced projects such as making candles from scratch or designing a photo frame.

Tips for creating homemade anniversary gifts:

Use the traditional anniversary gift list and try to incorporate the traditional anniversary gift into your homemade gift.
If you're not artsy or creative, you could embellish a gift to make it unique rather than creating a gift from scratch.
Don't worry about following instructions completely. Homemade gifts are never perfect and it's the little quirks they have that make them more personal, unique, and loved.
They key to creating homemade anniversary gifts is creativity though. Walk the aisles of your local crafts store. Keep your spouse or the anniversary couple in mind when you're browsing. Think about what they like, what anniversary year they're celebrating, and what level of craft experience you have.

Here are a few basic homemade anniversary gift ideas to get you started.

1st Anniversary: Paper
Create a scrapbook documenting your first year of marriage. Create a romantic and sexy anniversary card. Put together a bouquet of origami paper flowers.

2nd Anniversary: Cotton
Embellish a set of Egyptian cotton towels with their names and wedding date. Embellish his and hers bathrobes with Mr. & Mrs. Create a stuffed bear at Build a Bear if she's a kid at heart.

3rd Anniversary: Leather
Use leather strips to create key chains, lanyards, or even weave them together to create a handbag.

4th Anniversary: Fruit or Flowers
Create a gorgeous bouquet of flowers out of silk flowers. They won't die and you can display them in your home. Use craft supplies to create your own 'sugared' fruit centerpiece display.

5th Anniversary: Wood
Build a birdhouse for your backyard. Build a small box or trunk and hide a gift in there. Technically, paper is made from wood, so any paper crafts could apply to this anniversary as well.

6th Anniversary: Candy or Iron
Put together a candy bouquet. Make homemade candy or fudge in their favorite shapes. You can purchase various candy molds at your local crafts store.

7th Anniversary: Wool or Copper
Paint anything with copper colored paints. Put together a project with copper pennies.

8th Anniversary: Bronze or Pottery
Create a pottery bowl or sculpture. Use bronzing dyes to dye something.

9th Anniversary: Pottery or Willow
Anything created with a pottery wheel works here.

10th Anniversary: Tin of Aluminum
Create a sculpture from tin cans. Create a wall decor using spaghetti noodles, aluminum foil, and rustic paints. Shape the noodles into a design. Gently press foil over the design. Then brush paint over the top. It will create a unique picture for your wall.

11th Anniversary: Steel
Buy stainless steel products and embellish them with paints, beads, etc.

12th Anniversary: Silk or Linen
Embroider linens (tablecloth or bed linens) with their names and wedding date.

13th Anniversary: Lace
Sew a few lace doilies. Use pieces of lace to decorate a photo frame or scrapbook.

14th Anniversary: Ivory
Make your own ivory soaps. Any craft store sells products to make homemade soaps including scents for the soaps.<

15th Anniversary: Crystal
Decoupage a crystal vase, picture frame, or glass. Paint crystal ornaments to use on your holiday tree.

20th Anniversary: China
Purchase a china platter or plate and get the guests that attended the couple's wedding to sign the platter. Paint a white china plate to create a wall hanging.

25th Anniversary: Silver
Embroider a special gift with silver embroidery thread. Paint anything with silver paint.

30th Anniversary: Pearl
Create a pearl chess board with pearl opalescent paint. Use 'faux' pearls from a craft store in a project.

35th Anniversary: Coral
Hand paint coral to create a centerpiece, display piece. You could also use coral colored paints for a project.

40th Anniversary: Ruby
Anything red works here. Create a floral arrangement of only ruby red flowers. Design a mosaic using only ruby red shades of tiles. Your mosaic could be in a design to represent your spouse.

45th Anniversary: Sapphire

Anything blue works here. Create a floral arrangement of only blue shaded flowers. Design a mosaic using only blue shades of tiles. Create anything water/ocean related.

50th Anniversary: Gold
Create a gold throw blanket with gold colored yarns and embroider their names and wedding date into it. Paint anything with gold paint. Create gold colored candles and use them during a candle-lit dinner.

55th Anniversary: Emerald
Anything green works here. Create a floral arrangement of only green shaded flowers. Design a mosaic using only green shades of tiles. Create a project using outdoors items such as grass, leaves, etc.

60th Anniversary: Diamond
Use 'faux' diamonds in any craft project.