Walls that open years from now

A wall does not have to open this week. It can wait for an eighteenth birthday, a tenth anniversary, the day someone retires. Everyone adds now; the person opens it then.

Setting the time

In the last step of making a wall, pick the time it opens. Pick any date, however far out: the day a baby turns eighteen, or a wedding's tenth year. The countdown on their link counts the days.

Once the date is more than a year away, the same step asks how to reach them on the day: their email or phone. Leave it blank if you would rather send it yourself.

While it waits

The wall gathers like any other. People add as they would for a birthday next week: a letter, a photo of today, a voice note in the voice they have now. Their names go up on the face-down wall.

You can change the time whenever you need to, from your page for the wall. Change the time moves the day and keeps everything on it.

On the day

When the time comes and you gave their email, their link goes to them by itself. With a phone number, or nothing, you hear first: it's time, with the message to send already written and their link in it. Send it as it is, or say something of your own.

Letters to a child

A wall for a new baby works well this way. Ask grandparents, godparents and friends to write what they would want the child to know at eighteen. Each square stays exactly as it was made, in that year's photos and voices.