Working on My Bucket List. What’s on Yours?

I found a notepad the other day. It was a white, narrow-ruled letter-sized pad. Full. No empty pages. Every square inch of every page was filled with writing. The corners of the pad were curled up. Pages were somewhat frayed. What had I written on the pad?

On closer inspection, I saw immediately what was on this pad. We had our house built in 1994. The process for building our home was short…less than six months in total from signing the contract through closing, but so time-consuming and stressful. I was working full time and so was my husband. We had no kids back then. I don’t know how we would have had a house built with kids in tow.

I was the point person for the home build. My husband was a teacher back then with limited access to the phone. It was pre-cell phones…we didn’t have cell phones until the Baby Phone of ’95. My husband and I shared a cell phone…I’ll let that sink in…that’s right only the person going out carried the phone. I made call after call to the builder and other contractors about details minor and major. The calls were so detailed that I needed to use a pad to keep track of decisions made.

I’m a passionate list maker…then and now. I like crossing items off my list. Knowing how much I love lists, I’m puzzled why I haven’t written a bucket list. I have goals, tasks, and stuff that needs to get done, so I’ve decided to write a Bucket List. I want to create a list of goals for myself and my family…both personally and professionally. I want this list to be for 2013, but a few or possibly more items may spill in to 2014…especially travel since we are both time and money poor! I want to keep track of which goals I accomplish, but I don’t want to stress myself out if I don’t accomplish everything on the list.

You’ll have to bear with me as this is new territory for me. Here’s my 2013 Bucket list:

Travel…to the Grand Canyon, Mount Rushmore, Yellowstone. I’ve lived in the U.S. for many years and I’m ashamed to say I have never visited any natural landmarks.
Travel…to college towns and cities with my teen.
Work with my teen on driving (and my husband will work with her, too)…she’s doing very well and will take her test very soon.
Keep track of family events, school events, sports, and other activities. Ongoing goal. In other words, stay organized as best I can with our very crazy schedule.
Replace downstairs toilet, hardwood floors on the ground floor, kitchen remodel, ground floor office, replace upstairs carpet. Definitely won’t do all of these in 2013, but I would like to get a couple accomplished.
Add lighting to family room and living room. Three lamps per room is not conducive for reading. We’ve made the lack of integrated lighting “work” with table and floor lamps, but both rooms are still very poorly lit.
Look for and buy a new front door with glass panels to let in some much-needed light.
Buy deck furniture.
Take the family to the ropes course at Sandy Spring Adventure Park.
Book a Breakfast with Santa or at least make a note of dates for local fire station events. We missed going to a Breakfast with Santa in December 2012, and don’t want to miss in December 2013.
Go to the Winter Lights at Adventure Park USA in New Market.
Visit places that we visited when the kids were younger…Williamsburg, VA; Niagara Falls, Canada; and Disney World.
Go back to Great Wolf Lodge…in VA or PA.
Exercise! With three kids in sports, I am constantly on the road. Exercising gets pushed to the back burner. I want to change my habits in 2013.
Meal planning. I’m no gourmet cook, that’s for sure. But if I plan meals even a little bit in advance I make healthier meals.
Finish two scrapbooks started in 2007? 2006? One is for my teen and one for our 2006 Disney World trip. I have a couple of other scrapbooks, but may not get to them.
Keep going with the yearly Shutterfly scrapbooks. I love scrapbooking, have a ton of supplies, but zero time to do the scrapbooks. I’m in the process of purging and organizing my scrapbook area.
Go skiing.
Purge stuff from the house, garage, and shed.
Build or buy shelving to hold all the outside Christmas decorations.
Park at least one car, and hopefully two in the garage.
Use Groupons for Visionary Arts Museum, Baltimore Museum of Industry, and that restaurant in Columbia, MD.
Visit NYC, especially Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty.
See a Broadway show.
Keep blogging daily!
Start that second blog that I have been talking about for months.
Attend two conferences…tickets purchased for BlogHer in July and TypeA in September.