A time capsule letter to your child is a letter you write now and keep sealed until they’re grown, usually until their eighteenth birthday. In it you tell them who they are at this age, what an ordinary day in your house looks like, who was around them, and what you hope for them. A page or two is plenty. Make it specific enough that they recognise themselves, and keep it somewhere that will survive eighteen years of moving house.
Choose the day it opens
Pick the date before you write a word, because a letter for a twelve-year-old reads very differently from one for a twenty-one-year-old.
- Their eighteenth birthday is the usual choice. They’re grown, but still close enough to childhood to remember some of what you describe.
- Their twenty-first, for a letter that’s partly about letting go.
- Their first birthday is a good place to start. Each guest writes a short letter at the party, and the bundle is sealed until eighteen.
- A letter on every birthday, all opening together at eighteen, so they read themselves growing up in one sitting.
Think about the moment as well as the date. Some parents want to be in the room when it’s opened; others think a letter like this is better read alone first, and talked about over tea afterwards.
What to write about
Write down the things nobody else will remember. They’ll have photos of every birthday; nobody keeps a record of a wet Tuesday.
- Who they are right now. The words they get wrong, the toy that goes everywhere, what makes them laugh, what frightens them.
- An ordinary day. Breakfast, the walk to nursery or school, bath time, the song they insist on at bedtime.
- Who’s around them. Grandparents, the neighbour who waves, the friend they talk about at tea. Some of those people won’t be there at eighteen, and your letter is where they’ll get to meet them.
- The world, for the record. What a loaf of bread costs, the phone in your pocket, what everyone’s arguing about.
- Who you are. Your job, your worries, what you think you’re getting wrong. It will surprise them that you were ever this age.
- What you hope for them. Keep it to things they can choose, like kindness, curiosity and ringing home. Not grades, and not a career.
What to leave out
- Instructions for their life. A list of what they ought to have done by eighteen turns a love letter into a school report.
- Comparisons. Not with a brother or sister, and not with you at their age.
- Grown-up worries they can’t do anything about. Money trouble, a marriage under strain, a fall-out with family. If something hard truly needs saying, say it gently, and ask yourself whether a conversation would do it better than a letter.
- Guilt. An apology for working too much is a heavy thing to hand someone on their eighteenth birthday. Tell them what you were working for instead.
If you wouldn’t want it read aloud at their birthday dinner, it probably belongs in a different letter.
A template to fill in
If the blank page is the problem, fill in these lines in order, then cross out anything that sounds like a form.
- Dear ___, I’m writing this on ___, and you are ___ old.
- Right now you ___, and it makes everyone laugh.
- You won’t go anywhere without ___, and your favourite food is ___.
- An ordinary day for us goes like this: ___.
- The people you see most at the moment are ___.
- For the record, the world today: ___ costs ___, and everyone is talking about ___.
- Here’s something about me at this age that might surprise you: ___.
- What I hope for you is ___.
- Whoever you are when you read this, ___.
- Love, ___
Time capsule letter examples
Eight letters to borrow from. Take the shape, then fill it with your own house, your own child and your own slightly embarrassing details.
To a baby who hasn’t arrived yet
Dear little one, you’re due in three weeks and you kick hardest the minute I lie down. The cot came flat-packed and took your dad two evenings and one small swear. We still haven’t agreed on a name. Your grandma has knitted four hats in four sizes, just in case. I don’t know what you’ll look like, or who you’ll be at eighteen, but I know this: before anyone met you, you were wanted, waited for, and talked about every single day. Love, Mum
To a newborn, to open at eighteen
Dear Ollie, you’re eleven days old and you’ve worked out exactly one trick: falling asleep the second someone puts the kettle on. It’s February, the heating’s broken, and we’re all wearing two jumpers. Your sister wants to know when you’ll be able to play football. So do I. By the time you read this you’ll be taller than me, which is hard to picture while you fit along my forearm. Whoever you’ve become, we loved you first, at three in the morning, in two jumpers. Dad
For a first birthday
Dear Ava, today you turned one, and you spent most of your party eating the wrapping paper. You can say “dog”, “more” and something that might be “Grandad”, which he is taking as a yes. You walk if someone holds one finger, and only one. Seventeen people squeezed into our front room to sing to you, and every one of them wrote you a letter like this. Read them all, and count how many people turned up for you when you were one. Love, Mummy and Daddy
On their first day of school
Dear Isla, this morning you wore a jumper two sizes too big, because “you’ll grow into it”, and a book bag nearly as tall as you. You told your teacher your name, your age and that we have a cat called Pickle, in that order. I cried in the car, which you’ll never know about unless you’re reading this. You’re four and a half and the world is enormous. When you open this, I hope it’s still a bit enormous, in the good way. Mum
To a daughter, for her eighteenth
Dear Maya, you’re six, and you’ve decided to be a vet, a ballerina and the prime minister, on alternate days. You read under the covers with a torch and think I don’t know. I know. You’re fierce about fairness and terrible at losing at Uno. At eighteen you might be none of those three things, and that’s fine. I’d just like you to keep the torch, the fairness and the fierceness. I’m proud of you already, and I’m guessing that hasn’t changed. Love, Mum
To a son, for his eighteenth
Dear Sam, you’re eight. You support a football team that loses most weekends, and you take it personally every time. You’ve built a den in the garden out of the old fence panels and asked if you can sleep in it. (No.) Last week you gave your pocket money to the boy at school whose dog died, and you didn’t tell anyone; his mum told me. That’s who you are, and I want you to know it at eighteen. Everything else is details. Dad
To a granddaughter, from her nana
Dear Rosie, your grandad and I had you for the whole of half-term, and the house is far too quiet now. You’re five. You call the greenhouse “the hot room”, and you ate every strawberry in it before they were ripe. You asked how old I was and then said “wow” in a way I’m choosing to take kindly. I don’t know if I’ll be here when you open this, so I want it written down: you made two old people very happy, often, and you were always worth the strawberries. All my love, Nana
One for every birthday
Dear Arlo, letter number three. This year you learnt to ride a balance bike, refused to wear anything but your dinosaur wellies, and asked the bus driver if he sleeps on the bus. You’re frightened of hand dryers. You love the moon. There are fifteen more of these to come before you read them all, so I’ll keep this one short: you were a very good three. Love, Dad
Add photos, a video and their own words
The letter does most of the work; the rest is what goes in beside it.
- A photo of them, and one of you. If you take the photos, you’re in very few of them. At eighteen they’ll want to see what you looked like, at roughly the age they’re heading for.
- Something in their own words. A photo of a drawing, or what they told you about where the moon goes in the daytime, written down exactly as they said it.
- A minute of video. You, talking to them, in the kitchen as it is now. Your voice is the one thing a letter can’t carry, and it’s the thing they’ll play twice.
- A letter from someone else. A grandparent, a godparent, an older brother or sister, each in their own words.
- Keepsakes, if you’re keeping a box as well. The hospital band, a newspaper from the week they were born, a coin from that year, the ticket from their first trip to the cinema.
Where to keep it for eighteen years
This is the part that decides whether the letter is ever read. Here’s how the usual ways of keeping one compare.
| Kept safe by | What can go wrong | What it holds | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Paper, in a box | You, through every house move | Lost in a move, opened early, or left in a damp loft | The letter, prints, a drawing, a lock of hair |
| A scheduled email | An email service, on the date | The address you send it to has to still exist, and still be read, years from now | Words, and sometimes attachments |
| An app | The app and your account in it | The account, the phone and the app all have to last the distance | Whatever that app allows |
| A sealed envelope link | A link you keep, and the email you paid with | Losing the link (signing in finds it), or the service closing, with at least 60 days’ notice by email | A letter, photos and a video of up to 1 GB, up to ten pieces |
We make one of these, so weigh this accordingly, but our advice is to do two things. Seal the letter somewhere it can hold photos and your voice and stays shut until the day. Then print a copy, seal it in an envelope marked with the date, and keep it with the birth certificate. The printout covers the unlikely; the sealed link covers the likelier thing, a shoebox lost somewhere around the fourth house move.
Seal it until the day
In a Stampgoose envelope you write the letter, add the photos and the video, and set the date and time it opens: their eighteenth birthday, at breakfast, say. It’s $3.99 for letters and photos, or $6.49 with a video, paid once, not once a year while it waits. Until the day, the link shows their name on a sealed envelope with a countdown, and nothing else, however often anyone looks. When they open it, you get an email to say so.
Your receipt email has the link. Keep a copy with your important papers, and if it goes missing, sign in with the email you paid with to find it. If they already have an email address they’ll keep, Stampgoose can send them the link when it opens instead. You can add to it until it’s opened, up to ten pieces in all; after that, start a second envelope. Decide about the video at the start, as one can’t be added later to an envelope paid for as letters and photos. Once it’s opened, the video is kept for a year, with a button for them to save their own copy.
The letter to a child page has the time capsule envelope and more first lines, and writing a letter to your future self works the same way, if you’d like one waiting for you too.
Questions people ask
How long should a time capsule letter to a child be?
Anything from a few lines to two pages. The examples on this page are each under a hundred words; a longer letter has room for more of an ordinary day. If you have more to say, write another one next year.
What age should my child open it?
Eighteen is the most common, because they’re grown but can still half-remember the years you’re describing. Twenty-one works too, or the summer they finish school. Choose before you start writing, as the age changes what you say.
Can grandparents or godparents write one?
Yes. A grandparent’s letter keeps people a grown child may only dimly remember, in their own words. A grandparent can seal one of their own, or the parents can add it to theirs as a separate letter.
Should I tell my child the letter exists?
That’s up to you. Some families keep it a surprise; others tell the child there’s a letter waiting at eighteen, and the wait becomes part of growing up. Sealed online with a date, it can’t be opened early either way.
What if I’m not around when it opens?
Keep the link with your important papers, with the passphrase if you set one, and tell one person you trust where they are. The envelope opens on its date for whoever has the link. Letters and photos are kept for as long as Stampgoose runs, with at least 60 days’ notice by email if that ever changes.
