Cost – $5.00 – $10.00 depending on what you choose to include in your time capsule.

Creating a time capsule is a great way to reflect on the good things from the past, and prepare for the future. We put together a time capsule for less than $5 by mostly using things around the house. If you’re looking for something to do without spending much money, this might be just what you’re looking for.

____________________________________________________________________________________

SHE SAID:

From time to time it’s fun to imagine what the future might hold. When I was 16 and tried to think of where my life would be in 10 years I probably couldn’t think of much more than having a university degree and being married. There’s a lot of talk when you’re graduating and going to university about your future, but once you hit your late 20’s there’s not so much of that.

Creating a time capsule was a great motivational tool to keep us thinking about what we want for our future and how we’re going to get there. Now that I’m 26 and look ahead another 10 years I feel like I know what I want for my family and myself better than when I was 16. I used to have a tendency to think that once I reached 25 that life’s excitement was over and there were no more huge milestones to reach, but now I realize that was crazy talk. When I think ahead 10 years at the thoughts of being 36 I don’t feel as panicked as I used to. Instead, I think of all the things we have to look forward to like trips, children, and other new experiences.

Though the thoughts of creating a time capsule may be appealing, it’s not something you can easily put together in a short time span. If you want to make it good and worth opening in 10 years, you’ll have to put in lots of thought and preparation. It might be useful to spend one afternoon just brainstorming ideas and then another afternoon cold be spent gathering materials and assembling the actual time capsule. You could probably even stretch it into 3 dates if you wanted to put more thought into the appearance of your time capsule than just a cardboard box like ours.

HE SAID:

We recently spent some time purging our basement. It’s an unfinished basement, so we’ve been using it mainly for storage. At first it was just a few items sitting down there in the dark, but over the past few years it has grown a little messier than we like.

In the process of this cleaning spree we came across a lot of things that we put in boxes 3 and a half years ago when we left our separate homes and got married. I found old pictures from my childhood, old school books, awards from piano recitals, etc. It was a lot of fun to look through everything, so I can’t wait to break open our time capsule in ten years and look through it.

We started by adding things about our culture that might make us laugh in ten years like a magazine that showcases how people dress in 2010, some flyers with the current gadgets and gizmos, a list of current gas prices, among other things.

We also added some more personal items. We both made a “Favourites” list of our top 5 movies, tv shows, and musicians that we like right now. I can’t wait to see how my taste in movies and music changes over the course of ten years. We then made up separate ten year plans. We wrote down where we want to be in 2020, what our hopes and dreams are, you get the idea.

One fun item we threw into the time capsule is a USB thumb drive. It wasn’t included because we think it’s cutting edge technology or anything. Instead we filled it with pictures. I threw in screen shots from various websites like CNN, CBC, the current Billboard music charts, movies that are playing at Empire Theatres, as well as pictures of the car we drive and the house we live in. I’m sure those will be fun to look back on in ten years. Here’s hoping I’ll actually be able to use a USB device in ten years.

Once everything was together, we put it all in a cardboard box. We then labelled it and sealed it tight with packing tape. Since we just purged out our basement, we have a nice little empty spot underneath the stairs, so that’s where the box will sit until we move.

Of course if you make your own time capsule it doesn’t have to be set aside for ten years. We simply decided to wait that long to make the impact bigger when we open it. If you do decide to make one, make sure to include things that showcase current technology, trends, and costs of living. Don’t forget to include a few personal items as well. We included a funny pen that Susan bought when she first started teaching, my little Batman and Batmobile toys, and a souvenir from a trip to PEI where we held hands and got them dipped in wax.

I think we did a good mix of things that will make us remember this time period, as well as things that will bring back good personal memories. Making a time capsule can be a lot of fun. Don’t be afraid to take your time with it. Everyone’s time capsule will be different, so don’t feel too pressured to include anything that we did. If you’ve ever put a time capsule together before we’d love to hear about it. If you haven’t, go ahead and give it a try!

SHE SAID:

For our first anniversary, we tried to give each other gifts in keeping with the traditional gift giving guide. Since your first year anniversary gift is supposed to be related to paper somehow, Brad made me a photo book from Apple of our first year together. It had pictures of our wedding, of course, but also different places we went and all of our “firsts” like Christmas, Valentine’s, etc.

Since everything is digital now, we’re less apt to take pictures off of the computer, get them printed and then put them in a photo album (seriously, when did people have time for that?). The great thing about photo books is their simplicity. All you basically have to do is upload your photos and wait for it to arrive in the mail.

As you know, we just came home from our winter escape from Florida. Coming home from trips can sometimes be a downer, especially when you go from bikini weather to parka weather. A fun way to relive all of the fun memories while you were away is to spend an evening together documenting it all. We put on a pot of tea we purchased from Disney World and created a timeline of our trip together. It was a nice way to transition from vacation euphoria to reality.

Photo books are a great gift to give and receive. You can have a lot of fun creating story lines to go along with your pictures and they look a whole lot better on a coffee table or shelf than those massive binders with plastic inserts.

HE SAID:

One of my favourite things to do when I visit my grandparents is to look through old photo albums. I like the ones that have pictures of things I remember as a kid, but I especially enjoy the really old black and white ones that give me a glimpse of my family’s history. After I’ve gone through a heavy pile of photo albums, I realize that it is far from a perfect system for storing pictures. The plastic pages stick together, the pictures are sometimes falling out of the slots, and all of the newspaper clippings and other random things being kept in the book make it quite difficult to browse the photos.

The best solution to the problem that I’ve found (unless you want to spend a small fortune on an iPad to look through your photos) is photo books where the pictures are actually printed on to the pages in the book. I used Apple’s service when I created one for Susan, but there are plenty of options out there. For Mac users, it’s as simple as opening iPhoto, selecting the photos you want included in your book, click on the book button in the menu at the bottom of iPhoto, then you just pick a template and fill it with photos. It’s very easy.

The prices for the books range from $5.00 to $50.00 depending on if you choose hard or soft cover, and the size of the book. The one I made Susan for our first anniversary was a large hard cover book, so it only cost about $30.00. The quality ended up being great. The hard cover was nice, and the photos (which were taken with our aging point and shoot camera) looked quite nice printed on the glossy paper.

Even if you don’t have a paper anniversary coming up, a photo book would make a great Valentine’s Day gift. It takes thought and effort to pick out all the photos and arrange them nicely. It’s a great way to share or relive fun memories.

For those of you who won’t be using iPhoto to make your photo book, don’t despair. There are plenty of options online to choose from. Check out these links and see which one works best for you. Black’s, Better Homes and Gardens, Costco, Carsand Mosher

This is the second of a three part series where we go down memory lane together. The idea behind memory lane is that one person takes the other to one or more places that hold special meaning from their past. It can be anything from an old hang out spot, a school, or anything else. The idea is to learn something new about the person you’re with and to get a new perspective on their life.

SHE SAID:

I never realized how in the country I lived until I met Brad. The first time he drove out to my parent’s place he thought he had crossed a continent to get there. I thought as time passed he would get used to the drive, but he still acts like it’s a day trip, when really it takes 45 minutes to get there. Even though I grew up, as some might say “in the middle of nowhere,” I loved it and wouldn’t trade it for the world. Little did Brad know when he signed up for my memory lane experience, that he would be going even further into the middle of nowhere.

I hadn’t been back to my old high school since I graduated and heard they had built a new one, so I decided to take Brad to see my old school. As we drove I could remember where the bus stopped and pointed out different friends’ houses. My biggest surprise came when we rounded the corner to my old high school and there was no sign it had ever existed. I drove up the driveway to where my school used to sit atop a big hill and found a soccer field in its place. I knew they had built a new one, but I didn’t know the other one had been completely annihilated! All at once I felt sad because my school now only exists in my memories, and old because I’ve lived long enough for this to happen.

I feel like my memory lane experience was a bit of a disaster because it’s hard enough to explain how things used to be when you have an actual physical building to show someone, but it’s near impossible to try to get them to imagine what existed. I tried to make up for the lack of physical artifacts to show Brad by driving him down some back roads but they only served to creep him out even more. If I do this again I’ll be sure to scout out the area beforehand and make sure everything still exists.

If you don’t have time to actually go somewhere like your old high school, grab an old yearbook and experience it that way. It may even be more fun and will definitely save money on gas. You can laugh at all the crazy fashions and quotes people signed on the inside covers and then be thankful you found the person who loves you despite it all.

HE SAID:

I’d like to make a personal admission right off the top. Although I have an appreciation for nature, one of my biggest failings as a husband is my inability to relate to Susan’s connection with the country. We’re not talking about 10 minutes out of the city kind of country. We’re talking about middle of nowhere, complete isolation, no high speed internet (gasp!) type of country. To be clear, I don’t look down my nose at the country or the people who live there, I simply can’t relate. I’m a city boy through and through. I will admit that the first time I drove out to the house Susan grew up in I could not believe how far it was, but I’d like to think I’ve gotten used to it. I enjoy going out there to get away from the noise of the city.

For Susan’s memory lane she decided to take me even further into the country to where she went to school. Despite what she would have you believe, I really did have a fun time. There were some similarities to our days in junior high and high school that we were able to relate with which was nice. I think we both felt a bit of a loss as her school got torn down and mine is now a creepy condemned house of horrors.

She pointed out some of the homes that her friends and schoolmates grew up in, as well as other little memorable spots along the way which was nice. Over the years I’ve become familiar with some of the names of her high school friends so that made it a lot easier to follow along.

I really like the fact that we come from such different backgrounds. I think a lot of people marry someone who they have a lot in common with, but Susan and I couldn’t be any more different if we tried, and I like that. I enjoyed this glimpse into her past even if I won’t ever truly understand what it was like. I think taking each other down memory lane has been a great experience and I would recommend you give it a try.

This is the first of a three part series where we go down memory lane together. The idea behind memory lane is that one person takes the other to one or more places that hold special meaning from their past. It can be anything from an old hang out spot, a school, or anything else. The idea is to learn something new about the person you’re with and to get a new perspective on their life.

HE SAID:

We decided to start this whole memory lane thing with me because experiencing anything from Susan’s childhood would require at least an hour of driving. We didn’t have that kind of time on this particular day, so I went first.

Susan is pretty familiar with most of the spots that hold any kind of meaning to me as a kid. My parents still live in the house I grew up in, so she has seen all the neighbourhood spots where I used to play and go to school. I didn’t always go to school down the street though. From grade 4 to 10 I went to a school that was quite a good distance from home. So I thought it would be fun to take her to the school I went to and tell her some stories about what it was like.

If you’re looking for a way to feel older than you are (note the sarcasm…) then take some time to go somewhere you haven’t been in years. Driving to my old school made me feel both like I had been there yesterday, and that it had been 100 years at the same time. I remembered almost every turn in the road, every corner store, and even the smells in the air. However, the area has developed quite a bit which made certain parts of the drive almost unrecognizable.

It’s kind of sad to see a place you spent a lot of time at as a kid all run down. I remember that particular school building as always being pretty creepy, but it was always kept up nicely. Now the windows are boarded up (well, most of them), the playground is overgrown, and the walls are covered in spray paint. Just pulling in the parking lot brought back vivid memories of lining up outside the side door waiting to go into the school, or playing outside during recess.

Since taking Susan to my old school brought back so many memories, I was able to share a lot of details about my childhood that I would likely have otherwise forgotten. I am sad that the building has essentially fallen apart, but I’ll always remember that place in a positive light. Of course, now whenever I think of it I’ll always remember us screaming in fear as we drove around the back of the building and saw an open window.

If you have a spot that meant something to you growing up, take a little trip and share it with someone. You’ll be surprised at the detail of your memories, and maybe even create some new ones along the way.

SHE SAID:

I didn’t meet Brad until the year he graduated high school, so I haven’t visited many of the places he frequented on a daily basis as a child. Oddly enough, I have visited more places in New Brunswick, where he lived until he was six. Of the places I have revisited with him, I quite enjoyed seeing the various landmarks from his life before me. That is, until our most recent walk down memory lane.

Brad decided it would be fun if we took a drive to his old elementary school, which has since been closed. I knew in advance that the school was no longer in operation, but I didn’t realize the building was pretty much condemned. Since Brad went to a private school for a large portion of his education, I had images of driving up to a slightly aged and neglected, but otherwise stately building, something reminiscent of Roman architecture. What we drove up to was more like the ruins of Hiroshima.

Considering how much my heart rate rose just from the creepy overgrown playground and being in such an isolated location, I’m not sure how the drive around back didn’t send me into cardiac arrest. Initially, it sounded like an innocent enough suggestion. Why not get the grand tour, right? However, as we turned the corner onto the remains of what used to be a paved driveway, I knew I was in for it.

Picture a dark and narrow pathway with the actual building on your left and creepy pine trees next to a cliff on your right. As we were nearing the end of this pathway, to our left, next to the former teacher parking area, was a pitch-dark open basement window. Its glass had long since been kicked out and plastic flapped along its wooden frame. We both screamed in horror as I locked the doors and Brad motioned for me to take a picture. Take a picture?! The worst part was that in order to get out of there we had to turn around and drive past it again. Thankfully we managed to escape any axe murders or fire-breathing dragons that may have been lurking in the basement.

For those of you considering taking your significant other for a walk down memory lane, be sure your location isn’t the perfect setting for a Stephen King novel. That being said, I will admit it was kind of fun to scare ourselves into a feverish sweat. It was scary at the time, but I can look back on it now and chuckle.