If you’ve got a significant anniversary coming up, then it makes sense to celebrate the milestone. It’s an opportunity to make your partner feel special, and to remind them of why they’re with you and why they should probably stick with you.
What is it important to make your partner feel special?
What’s romance without that feeling that you’re different from all of the other potential partners out there? Going the extra mile will provide reassurance that the relationship is more than transactional. Love and affection will release a pleasure-regulating hormone called oxytocin, which will give you that all-important feeling of contentment. You can think of your anniversary as a chance to serve up an extra-large serving of this vital chemical.
Best Anniversary Ideas
So, what’s the best way to mark your anniversary? Several ideas stand out as worthwhile.
Scavenger Hunt
All you need to make this one work is a few sticky notes and a collection of smaller gifts. Write clues on the sticky notes and hide them around the house. Make sure that the content of your notes is sentimental, and that the answers will make your other half nostalgic.
Cook a Meal
If you know your way around the kitchen, then an anniversary is an opportunity to pull out all the stops, and prepare a meal that you might not otherwise have bothered with. Go for appetisers, mains and desserts. You can even make the exercise a collaborative one!
Take a Trip
An impromptu visit to an expensive restaurant, or a night in the West End, might be just the thing to demonstrate how much you care. A relationship needs a little bit of spontaneity, after all. If you know exactly what you’re going to do from week to week, and month to month, then things are bound to get a little stale. You needn’t spend all that much; you can find train times to London and pick something affordable for your anniversary.
Make a Scrapbook
This is the sort of gift that requires a great deal of advance preparation, but if you’ve got a sentimental streak, it’s a great way to demonstrate it. Pick out photos from your favourite occasions, and leave notes attached to each of them. You can think of this kind of scrap-book as an extended love letter – except that you get inspiration on each page. Make sure that you get high-quality prints of your photos of choice.
Write a Poem
If you’ve got a creative streak, then you might compose a poem and read it aloud. You don’t need to be clever or elaborate – just write from the heart. You can learn the basics and get some great results, and it needn’t be as awkward as you think.