Dave, the Christmas Pirate
Making presents more about the experience.
Less about the things.
Plunder their presents and turn them into hidden treasure, leaving maps and clues kids can use to track down the location of the buried treasure* and reclaim their gifts.
Dave can help.
*(treasure not actually buried. unless you really want to. that’s on you.)
What Dave Does:
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Once the time is right, Dave plunders the gifts and items that catch his eye.
This is usually (at least for Christmas), done after Santa has been there.
This gives Dave a wider selection of things to plunder.
It’s also just more efficient this way.
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Dave leaves a treasure map or clue in place of the plundered items that shows the next segment or next step in the route to finding the final buried* treasure.
This map segment may show:
The path to the location of a real life hidden pirate treasure (unlikely)
The path to another:
map
clue
gift or other items of plunder
any combination of the above (more likely)
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There may be dangers, obstacles, puzzles, or other challenges to overcome on the path to the location of the hidden treasure.
Alternatively, sometimes just getting a child to the end treasure location can be challenge enough for everyone involved, which is fine.
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Which is a joke, as children are notoriously unreasonable creatures.
Have coffee ready.
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It can be easy to make this more complex than need be.
All Dave really needs is:
a start
a middle
an end with a treasure, map, or treasure and a map.
That’s it.
Classic “Enjoy the Journey” Advice
Don’t let Dave get in the way of Dave having a great time.
It’s easy to forget this is all extra and the goal is to put forth a fun experience, not stress out over making it a perfect treasure hunt experience. Think about how when deciding to go for a walk you have two main goals to select from:
Do the walk to have done a walk; taking that first step out the door with a mindset to get back to the door.
Take a walk to be on a walk; taking that first step to be out on a walk. This can be a mindset for living life.
Each has their place; just be aware the treasure hunt is the goal, not getting the treasure. Unless it’s -20 degrees with a windchill of -35. Perspectives change when the air can murder you and your fingers have stop working.
Pause and review the map with the people that are going to be using the map.
A quick once over with the treasure hunter before they embark on their journey can really mitigate misunderstandings and help them:
slow their roll
re-engage some of the higher cognitive functions or processes that may have been momentarily suspended by the excitement of the event.
proceed according to either the plan or a close approximation of it.
or plan a treasure hunt to start thinking about putting on your own treasure hunt.