Sentimental birthday gift ideas

[kimberlybb]

My mom is turning 60 next month. My original idea was to ask family and friends to write her a letter or share a favorite memory and compile them into a book using Shutterfly or similar service. I love the idea of the book but I’m not sure if I have enough time to pull it together. Any other ideas?

[mommyatty]

What about asking everyone to send you a photo? That might be a little quicker to compile into a book. I love the idea!

[sdlaura]

I read about a service that will collect videos of lots of families and friends talking about the person and compile them. Sounded like a cool idea for a milestone birthday. I think this was it:

www.tribute.co

Also your mom is really young. DH's dad is the oldest of our parents and is almost 80

[erinshelley21]

I did that for my mom for her 50th. I asked 50 people but only got about 30 back and started 2.5 months before I needed the book to be done. She still loved it and I never told her I tried to get 50. That would have just made her feel bad. I just took the letters and stuck them to 12 x 12 scrapbook paper and tied the pages together so I didn't have to mess with a Shutterfly book since that would have limited the time even more. Some were also handwritten and I wanted to keep them that way.

Another gift I've done for her is I recreated old pictures of my brother and me from when we were younger. I put the original on one page and the new one on the next. She really loved that one!

I also got my parents books from Target when I graduated HS that were "100 Reasons a Girl needs her Mom/Dad" and wrote the lyrics to You Can't Lose Me by Faith Hill in my mom's. So if there is a sentimental song you like you could do that.

I like making people cry with gifts so this is my area of exerpertise.

[kimberlybb]

Great ideas, thanks!!

[sudokufan]

I put together a "family cookbook" one year using a lot of the recipes from my mom, her sisters, my grandparents. Every page had a note about who's recipe it was and a memory about the dish, then every couple of pages I put a picture or a scan of a recipe card or a page out of grandma's original cookbook. I just set up a nice template in word, let it do a table of contents, then printed it. For a gift I'd have it bound at staples or somewhere, with a spiral binding and laminated covers.

It was fairly easy to collect the recipes - people emailed them, a few sent me hand written copies, and one or two people took pictures and texted them.

[mae0111]

Aug 4, 2017 14:28:56 GMT -5 sudokufan said:

I put together a "family cookbook" one year using a lot of the recipes from my mom, her sisters, my grandparents. Every page had a note about who's recipe it was and a memory about the dish, then every couple of pages I put a picture or a scan of a recipe card or a page out of grandma's original cookbook. I just set up a nice template in word, let it do a table of contents, then printed it. For a gift I'd have it bound at staples or somewhere, with a spiral binding and laminated covers.

It was fairly easy to collect the recipes - people emailed them, a few sent me hand written copies, and one or two people took pictures and texted them.

This is such a great idea. One of my cousins is organizing a family reunion next year. We haven't had one since I was in high school. My mom has 35 first cousins on that side, so there are 75 in my generation. It would be great to figure out how to get everyone to bring a recipe, then get them into a book. It would be huge!

[mae0111]

Does your mom have any beaches or lakes that are memorable to her? Check out this site: dunejewelry.com

She puts sand in jewelry, Christmas ornaments, etc. She has a pretty diverse sand bank, but you could also send some if it's easy to get. The jewelry is a little pricey, but it's nice. My sister got engaged on a beach this summer, so I'm planning to get her an ornament for Christmas with the sand in it.

[HeartofCheese]

Depending on how many people are on FB, I've heard that they will compile a book of all of your memories/posts/pics for a certain period. My ex-aunt does this every year.

But, in your case, you could start a dummy FB page for your mom where people could post statuses and pics and then print the book before her birthday.

Disclaimer: I have no idea what these books look like...