As my daughter's first birthday approached I became obsessed with trying to devise a way to make it memorable. Not in a 'lavish party with a bouncy-castle' kind of way — more of an overly-sentimental yet heartfelt effort to mark a momentous event. An elaborate scavenger hunt I recently developed for my nieces got me thinking about the thrill of discovery, and that led me to the concept of a time capsule. Since she will not remember anything about her first birthday, I will preserve snapshots of it for her.
Is it naive of me to think my eighteen-year-old daughter will not consider this completely lame? Maybe, but I am nothing if not optimistic and hope that she just might find it sort of cool. I am including photos and a newspaper from the day, an account of how we spent her birthday, the candle from her birthday cupcake and a letter from me and her mom. The contents will be zipped inside a heavy duty plastic freezer bag, which will then be placed into a cookie tin. I will then bury it somewhere in the yard, to be dug up on her eighteenth birthday.
The difficult part for me will be to stifle my nerdy love of maps and treasure hunts and not make her go through a clue-infested map and compass course to find it. That could definitely push it into the 'lame' category.
There is plenty more room in the tin. I would love to hear more ideas for things to include. What would you put in there?
(Image: Richard Popovic)
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I would put in a lock of her hair and maybe the outfit she wore? Then I would write her a letter and describe what her personality was like at age 1 and your predictions for her future! Really cute idea
List of the top songs from the year she was born.
Fashion pages of magazines showing the "in" clothing and hair styles.
I made time capsule on my daughter's first birthday. I included copies of: The New York TImes; Rolling Stone; Martha Stewart Living; small decorations and favors from her party; pictures; etc.
Anything that would add to the collage of her first year. (She didn't have enough hair to add a "lock" lol. I hope I included pics!)
It's still a secret! She's 16 now.
How about the birthdays cards she receives that year?
If you're having a party or a few friends over, you could ask them to write a funny thing she has done recently, something they love about her, something fun going on in their world, etc. and drop those in their too.
While researching time capsules I discovered most sites advise against burying the capsule, as moisture can still get in and destroy the contents, even if they're in a plastic bag. Most people say to hide it in the back of a closet with a note saying "Do not open until 'date'"
Awww, that's an adorable idea!
The idea is very sweet - but what if you move in the next 18 years? Life is unpredictable. I like someone's suggestion to bury in the back of a closet instead. If you're set on burying something in the ground, maybe plant a seed for a tree on the day of her birthday so you can watch it grow along with her over the years? Video tape her helping you plant it (digging the dirt, pouring water over it) and include that video in the time capsule as well.
Great idea! And yes, 18 yr old her, will totally think it's lame. But 28 yr old her will think fondly of it and say "remember when we opened my time capsule a few years ago?" or when her child is celebrating their first birthday, then she will totally get it and love you all the more. absolutely love this idea!
I love the idea (and just wrote my son a 6-month birthday card for him to open later - I couldn't wait until a year!) I do agree with the burying in closet option though. My sister, best friend and I made a time capsule in grade school and buried it in the backyard. At 18 we were moving so we went outside to dig it up and couldn't find it anywhere! Granted, as grade schoolers our measuring techniques might have been off, but we also realized that burying it near a few trees was problematic because as the trees grew the roots may have shifted the capsule's location underground. We never found it, but that is probably ok, as we had intended its audience to be some future, coincidental stranger anyway. Since this is something you will want to find later I recommend burying it in the closet or maybe at Grandma's house or something.
My stepdaughter was VERY nostalgic as a teen, she may absolutely love it even at 18. If you have any video clips of her and the family over the past year, they make for great non-memories (things and events she wont remember first hand, but will value and remember once she's seen them). Like Dad before he lost his hair, Grandma playing board games, that pet you have...
I think including prices of everyday items is surprising: loaf of bread, gallon of milk, gallon of gasoline, can of soda (or a Big Gulp), price of a movie, subway ticket (if you live somewhere where public transportation is common), price of a CD (or mp3). You could even include the price of an average home or car.
My parents have a map of the city I was born in from when I was 2. My how the city had changed by the time I was 18 and even more since. You could print out a Google map image of your neighborhood to see how it changes, too.
I could see doing this every year IN SECRET and giving them all to the child when they are older. But I totally agree with not burying them, at least maybe until shortly before the Big Day, simply for security. (Maybe a locked cabinet or trunk could be a hiding place in the meantime.)
We have a time capsule for my daughter's birthday and I was impressed at how creative my family and friends were contributing things for the capsule - a piece of family jewelry, a handkerchief, collectible toy from a current movie, forever stamps, a cell phone (used at the hospital to declare her birth), coins from year of birth, maps, people wrote letters and prayers and the little kids colored special pictures for her. I included her hairbrush and the recipe for the cupcakes I made for her first birthday.
If you still want the "thrill of the hunt" for the time capsule on her 18th birthday without risking the loss of the box, you could also bury it closer to the date or even better, make it into a geo-caching adventure in some nearby nature preserve or other really cool location.
If you do want the romance of burying it, make sure you do multiple redundant layers! Acidic soil can eat right through a cookie tin, so you might want to consider multiple layers of protection.
If you're handy and sure you won't forget where it is, you can also "bury" the box inside your house! When we made repairs to our house we found a cookie tin of love letters sealed behind a few boards underneath the stairs. Imagine how crazy your daughter might think you are handing her a crowbar on her 18th birthday, and how cool it would be to discover that she'd been walking over a secret stash of her 1st birthday memories for years without knowing it!
I think that a child is also very interested in what his/her parents were like "way back then." Including some snapshots of the parents their close friends and some information about their daily lives/routine could be fun too.
I plan on doing something similar at my son's first birthday...I plan on having party attendees "predict his future" so he can read when he is older!
Seeing how teens are these days, she may be a bit blah about the whole thing. If she seems like she won't appreciate it when she is 18, maybe you could present it to her on HER baby's first birthday?