One good question can change how you see someone you've known all your life

Once helps you have those conversations with a parent or grandparent, follow where their stories lead, and turn what you discover together into a book.

The Once kit gives you a simple plan, recording equipment, and an app that helps you organize the stories and write the book – one conversation at a time.

Once is something you do together. You meet, ask questions, look through old photographs, and return to stories you thought you already knew.

Along the way, you may discover parts of your parent or grandparent’s life that you have never heard about – and see a familiar person a little differently.

At the end, you will have a book for your family and friends to read. But the conversations that went into it belong to you.

Once can mark a milestone birthday, a wedding anniversary, a retirement, Christmas, or another family occasion.

The box is the gift they unwrap. The conversations and the book come afterwards – made gradually, by the two of you.

Once can also be given by several family members together, with five printed copies of the finished book to share.

The Once kit contains almost everything you need to begin:

• A notebook and pencil for your notes
• A microphone for clear recordings
• An access code for the Once app

You add your time, attention, and curiosity.

Together, these become something that could only be made by your family: a book about one life, as remembered and explored by two people.

More often, nobody thinks to ask. A familiar story gets told for the last time. A name underneath an old photograph remains a mystery. A question is postponed until another visit.

Once helps you begin now – with one conversation, not an enormous family-history project.

How to get started? It’s easy.

Have lunch or take a walk together, and when the time is right, ask your first question. “Remember, you told me about uncle Rudy and how he got completely lost in London and wandered for hours, while he was only two minutes from his hotel? I had a good laugh, tell me this story again!”

It starts with a conversation

Once the conversation is going, don’t simply let the story finish. Be curious, ask questions, learn more about all the people around them, different times, different places. Once helps you follow those threads, remember what still needs to be asked, and gradually shape the conversations into a book.

Once can also be a project for a grandchild and grandparent. Children often ask the questions adults have stopped thinking to ask – and hear familiar family stories without already knowing how they are supposed to end.

A parent can help when needed, but the conversations and the book can belong to the two of them.

With Once, you are making a book together. The important word is together – and that takes time.

The app helps you plan conversations, organize what you have learned, find subjects worth exploring, and turn the material into readable stories. AI can help with the tedious and difficult parts, but it cannot be curious on your behalf.

You will still need to show up, ask questions, make choices, and decide what kind of book you want to create. We think that is what makes the result meaningful.

Kateryna, Founder

When my family gets around the table, parents and grandparents often tell stories. Some stories I’ve already heard a thousand times – although in slightly different variations.

I used to roll my eyes when a familiar story came up. Again.

But one day I thought – what if this time I choose to go deeper? Not to laugh awkwardly and move on, but to ask questions and hear more?

Three of my grandparents are still alive today. I don’t want Once to be about anticipating loss; on the contrary – I want to celebrate the joy of being together, the joy of sharing stories, the joy of life.

I can do it, and so can you.