You say yes first
Recognizing your child's face needs your permission, in plain language, before anything runs.
A photo book of your child's year
The years you
meant to make.
Most of us documented the first few years and then got busy — and the second child never got started at all. Not love, time. The photos are all still there. Point LifeChapters at a year and get a book back for each child.
One free book per account · No card · Nothing to organize first
Born 2009five books, then nothing
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
Born 2015none at all
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
Every empty slot is a year your photos already cover
0 photos to sort
0 layouts to choose
1 book per child
12 chapters, in order
up to 120 pages
Why it's different
Most apps make a book of your photos. We make a book about your child.
The difference
It knows which one is yours
Face matching pulls out the shots your kid is actually in — so the book is about one child, not the whole household.
Your mess is the input
A year's worth, however it's stored. Duplicates, screenshots, nothing in folders. No tagging, no tidying first.
A year you can read
January to December, each month opening on its own page. A story in order, not a grid of greatest hits.
You get the last word
See every page before anything is printed. Change what you want, then send it to print — or keep it as a digital keepsake and come back to it.
How it works
Three steps. One sitting. Then close the laptop.
Point it at a year’s worth of photos — from Google Photos, a Takeout zip, or your computer. It finds your kids, selects both the highlights and the everyday moments that tell the story of the year, and organizes them into a beautiful, ready-to-print book.
Every page is yours to change — swap a photo, rewrite a line, move the cover. But you don’t have to. That’s the point.
Where the work is
Finding them is the easy part. Choosing the 572 that tell the year isn't.
Your phone already knows their face. What it won't do is sit down with 2,222 photos and decide which ones add up to a year worth keeping — covering every month, one frame per moment, the ordinary weeks as well as the big days.
One year, unsortedA whole year of it, however messy. Screenshots and duplicates included.
Found by faceScanned twice, at two resolutions, so they're found even in the back of a wide shot — and their sibling's photos stay in their sibling's book.
Bursts collapsedForty frames of the same birthday candle become one moment. Table stakes — but you still don't have to do it.
The hard partThe ones that tell the yearNot simply the sharpest. Chosen for coverage across all twelve months, one frame per moment, and the expression that makes a photo worth printing.
The book fits the year
Bigger years get bigger books — the length follows how much actually happened, not a fixed page count.
Undated photos still land right
Old scans lose their date. They're placed by matching them to the photos around them.
Sideways photos get straightened
Rotation is detected and corrected before anything is laid out.
Crops never cut anyone in half
Head to feet, every time — no chopped-off legs to make a photo fit its box.
Every month gets a hero
One to three photos are pulled out and printed large to open each chapter.
Scene shots don't pad it out
Photos your kid isn't in don't go in their book. It's theirs, not the household's.
The second-child problem
One of them has albums. The other has a folder.
Because the books are built per child, it runs again for the next one in a click — and the second child gets a book of their own, not a supporting role in someone else's. Their own 572, from the same year, chosen the same way.
Now they both get one
What's inside
Twelve months. Twelve chapters.
Each month opens on its own page with a few words about it, then the photographs of that month — laid out to fit what actually happened, not poured into a template.
One child, one year
Their name, the year, and the photograph the book decided was the one.
The month, in a few words
Two photographs that stood out, and a short written summary of what that month was actually like.
Then the month itself
10-12 to a page, not four
Each page is built around the photographs that landed in it — their number, their shapes. Not a grid with four slots waiting to be filled.
A range of sizes
Layflat, hard or soft cover
190gsm
Up to 120 pages
Compare
Why not just use a photo book app?
You can. They'll give you a book of your household's year, and none of them will give each child their own. Making it yourself is never one job either: thousands to sort, a few hundred to choose, every page to compose more than four at a time — and the stamina to still be at it in March. This one arrives done.
| LifeChapters | Auto photo-book apps | Design-it-yourself sites | Making it yourself | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| A separate book for each child | ✓ One per child, every time | – One book from photos | Build it twice, by hand | Twice the evenings |
| Finds your child by face | ✓ Scanned twice, at two resolutions | – | – | You, scrolling 12,667 photos |
| Bursts collapsed to one frame | ✓ Forty frames become one moment | ✓ | – By hand, forty at a time | By hand, forty at a time |
| Balanced across all twelve months | ✓ Every month, by design | – Weighted to big events | – You decide | If you last past March |
| Chosen for context, not just sharpness | ✓ Coverage, moment and expression | – | – | ✓ You know best — if you get there |
| Works from an unsorted library | ✓ That's the input, not the problem | – Not really | – You choose every photo | That is the work |
| Structure of the book | The year in order, with pages for artwork, milestones and messages | Grouped by event or trip | Whatever you lay out | Whatever you have time for |
| Layouts | Designed per page, done for you | Simple grids of 3–4 photos | You build every page | Every page, by hand |
| What it costs you | One sitting | An evening, per book | A weekend, per book | Many evenings — or the six years it hasn’t happened in |
Photo-book apps and design-it-yourself sites are compared in full on a wider screen.
Auto photo-book apps: services that turn a photo library into a book automatically. Design-it-yourself: online book builders you lay out page by page. Based on their published features, July 2026. “Making it yourself” = a scrapbook or family yearbook assembled by hand.
Why it's called LifeChapters
Every year of childhood is a chapter.
One book a year — and any year, not just this one. Start with last year, go back and fill in 2019, or begin the year they were born. Documenting childhood, one chapter at a time, until the shelf is the whole story.
“The days are long, but the years are short.”
Gretchen Rubin
The photographs for every one of those years are already sitting in the same library, waiting. You’re not behind. You’re just not started.
Pricing
Your first book is free. Genuinely.
Not a trial, not a sample, not watermarked. A whole finished book. Printed copies are coming soon.
Your first book
Free
one per account
- A full year, twelve chapters, in order
- A private link that opens anywhere — send it to grandparents
- Yours to keep and come back to
- No card, no trial clock
Printed copies
Coming soon
not open yet
- Layflat, hard or soft cover, in a range of sizes
- See every page before it prints
Your photographs
These are pictures of your kids.
Yours, not ours
Your photos are used for one thing — making the book — and nothing else.
Delete it whenever you like
Your photos stay in your account so you can make another book. Delete a book, a photo set or everything, any time.
Never sold or shared
Stored encrypted. Not sold, not shared, not handed to anyone.
Questions
The honest answers.
What is LifeChapters?
LifeChapters (lifechapters.ai) makes a photo book of your child's year from your family's own photos. It finds the photos your child is in, chooses the ones that tell the year, and lays them out in twelve monthly chapters. You see every page, keep the book as a private link, and print it only if you want to. Your first book is free.
Where can my photos come from?
Google Photos, a Google Takeout zip, or your computer. They don't need to be sorted or tagged first.
Can I make a book for a past year, or for a second child?
Yes. Any year works, as long as you have the photos. Each child gets their own book, built from the same photos with no new upload.
How much does it cost?
Your first book is free, with no card. Printed copies are coming soon.
How is this different from a photo book app?
A photo book app leaves you to pick the photos and fill the pages, or makes one book from the household's photos. LifeChapters makes a separate book for each child, covers all twelve months, and designs each page around its photos. See how the main services compare.
Do I have to organize anything first?
No — and if you could, you probably would have by now. Send it all: duplicates, screenshots, forty shots of the same birthday candle. That's the normal input, not the hard one.
Is the first book really free?
Yes — one complete book per account. No card, no trial clock, no watermark, and you keep it whether or not you ever buy another. It's the only honest way to show you what this is.
Both my kids are in most of the photos.
Then most photos appear in both books, which is right — they were both there. Each book is built around one child, so each one leads with the kid it belongs to.
My older photos have no dates on them.
Scans and forwarded photos often lose the date. They're placed as accurately as possible from what's around them, and you can move anything before it prints.
Can family overseas see it?
Yes. The digital book is a private link that opens anywhere in the world, with no account to create. Printing and shipping are US-only for now.
How much does printing cost?
It depends on the size and the number of pages, which depends on how much happened that year — a busy year makes a longer book. You'll see the exact price before you order, and the digital book is yours whether you print it or not.
What if I only have a few hundred photos?
Then you get a shorter book, not a padded one. The length follows the year rather than a fixed page count, so a quiet year reads like a quiet year instead of being filled out with photos that didn't deserve to be there.
Who makes LifeChapters?
The team behind Rethink Yearbooks, which makes personalized school yearbooks. LifeChapters is operated by Second Innings LLC.
How long does it take?
Your part is three steps and it's over in one sitting. After that the work happens without you — a tidy year is quick, a very large one takes longer. You don't sit and watch either way: start it, close the laptop, and you'll hear from us when the book is ready to look at.
What if I don't like what it picked?
Swap it. You see every page before anything is printed, and you can pull a photo out or put a different one in.
Any year, any child
That year is already in your photos.
Three steps to start it. Your first book is free, and you'll know within one sitting whether the shelf is worth filling.
Get your free bookWe're in a small closed beta. We pick a few families every day — your first book is free, and we'll email you when it's your turn.
You're on the list. We pick a few families each day and email you when it's your turn.
We'll confirm by email, then write when it's your turn. Nothing else.