Ignite Your Summer: Crafting a Bucket List for a Life That Lights You Up
Summer vibes ahead! But it’s hard to have fun when you are a stressed out, busy mom. Read how to create your own personal bucket list and download the free summer bucket list template printable. Make this summer one that replenishes your soul and gives you that summer glow!
Splash! It’s the unofficial start of summer! Even if the weather isn’t fully on board, mentally and physically we are approaching summer mode. In our house, school's out, the local pool opens and our summertime time clock has begun!
This stretch of summer is yawning out in front of us and we’re starting to make plans for what we want to do with our days ahead. With the current state of the world, it feels extra important to make each day count and as empaths and HSP be more intentional about how we use our energy.
Summer starts off feeling so abundant, with so many amazing weeks before we go back into school. So let’s identify what would make it the best kind of summer.
Name Your Summer Magic
Naming the things that we want to have on our personal bucket list is key to making sure that we fill the time with what makes summer fulfilling and restorative and plan them in. The big camping trip, family reunion or trip to the shore might already be on the calendar, but the best moments of summer are really the smaller ones that get woven into the days.
What makes it feel like it was the juiciest, bestest few months? It’s the time you spent together, that you saw the sunset, the conversation around the campfire, the hike that you took, the watermelon eating contest that you had.
I’m going through my camera roll and making note of what we loved last summer and adding it to the list for this year. It's nice to reflect and know what makes it meaningful and memorable.
Make It A Sensory Experience
And because life is a full sensory experience, ask yourself, what does summer feel like to you? What does it taste like? Smell like?
For me, summer feels like-
Days where the air is thick with humidity and getting alternate between jumping into the pool and relaxing in the shade with a good book
Getting up early for a run and feeling refreshed after clearing my head over a few miles and having a sheen of sweat to wash off
Days that stretch into night, when sitting in front of the campfire brings out the stars and stories
Summer tastes like a cold drink with the smell of chlorine in the air and the sun on my face
Create Your Summer Bucket List
Your memorable summer is made up of those moments filled with sometimes surprising juicy goodness that drips and sticks all over you, long after the sun filled days are over.
Is it-
Living large on a small scale, getting the superduper ice cream cone?
Doing the unexpected, having snow cones for breakfast?
Connecting with nature, picking blueberries, strawberries or peaches from a local farm?
Maximizing the day, spending the day in swimsuits, from daybreak till dusk in the pool?
Enjoying some quiet, reading a book in the hammock?
Creating a ritual, making a weekend campfire or s'mores with the neighbors?
Ready to start making your personal summer bucket list? Download the free summer bucket list template printable with ideas to get you started. Create a personal bucket list for yourself and one for the family!
Make The Plan
To help ensure that we have our fill of summer fun, as my family contributes their lists, we start to make a plan for some of the fun. Because as great as spontaneity is, make sure you plan in some specific things and leave space for the others happen.
You have a lot of stuff going on and things don’t always go as expected. But if you know that the big family water balloon fight is on the list, you can surprise the kids with it or feel inspired to enjoy impromptu ice cream before dinner. Or just other ways that you can be fun.
It's so easy to think you have the whole the whole summer ahead of you and then you get to the end and you're scrambling; you didn't even do those favorite things! Somehow it feels like you wasted so much of the time, just lulled into thinking the magic will just happen. And it feels like even more of a waste when you can’t even name what it is you didn’t do or get enough of. The missed opportunities haunting you as you sip on pumpkin spice.
So, as lame as it sounds to schedule the fun, by starting with a plan you’re setting the bar and elevating the fun right from the start. And then it makes it easier for the spontaneous fun to magically happen, because you’re already experiencing each day with the mindset of enjoying it so much, of magic sprinkled throughout.
Spread Summer Everywhere
Plan in those fun things and make sure you’re like spreading them into all parts of your days, slathering them on like sunscreen. What are some summer rituals you can start to really feel like you are experiencing summer every day?
Ideas like-
having a signature lemonade using mint from the garden
summer meal plan that incorporates farmer’s market, CSA or garden goodness
signature scent that you wear or discover in a candle or essential oil blend
developing a practice to greet and appreciate the sun each morning
curating a summer days playlist to dance it out
Who says you can only do some of them just one time? Like why not once a week, once a month, whatever it is and make it happen for you.
Let’s Go!
To get you started, I created a free summer bucket list printable, inspired by our Summer Bucket List and a blank version for you to fill out your own. I'd love to see you as you check them off!
Let’s Grow!
While we have ideas for a fun summer, I also have some big goals to grow because summer is prime growing season, and I’m not talking just in the garden. I'm also using this as a time to work on my personal growth bucket list; things that I want to make sure I'm doing for myself this summer.
Ways to make sure that I'm paying extra attention to things that lights me up, making space to try new things. And to feel that sense of expansion while Mother Nature is just making it so easy to believe that it’s possible. Mother Nature is expanding and growing and blossoming and giving us all this juicy goodness. I want you to feel the same for yourself.
For inspiration, I’ve created a Personal Summer Bucket List of things that I wanted to do for myself to refuel my inner glow.
Some of mine include-
Making a dent in my To Be Read stack
Playing with watercolors outdoors
Trying a new recipe
Finishing a couple of art projects
Do a solo trip or excursion
For inspiration, I’m sharing a copy of it for you to print and use for inspiration to come up with your own list. And again, I'd love to see what you come up with what is on your juicy bucket list to refill your soul.
Keep It Fun
For both of these Summer Bucket Lists, remember that these are the things you think you will enjoy and feel personally meaningful. This is not the place for the stuff you “should” do.
Start experimenting with them, put it out there and just see what happens. But it can be hard to measure the joy, the fun expansion and all the memories if you don’t have some sort of measuring stick to compare it to. Use the Bucket Lists as a way to guide the fun and give yourself some accountability. Give yourself some ideas and not feel the pressure to call up the spontaneous fun. Use the lists to help your future self tap into the magic and be a little bit lighter in these long days of sunshine and beautiful nights with the fireflies.
The Real Reason for Summer Bucket Lists
When I was younger, going on trips it wasn’t just the going on the trip, it was the countdown to it, the buildup. My middle sister and I had this bit, when either of us had a trip with friends or fun event coming up, we would ask each other “hey, did you want to do something next Saturday?” and the other would respond with “Oh, you know I would but I’ll be flying to California that day.” And then we’d laugh and feel the extra rush of excitement at the upcoming fun.
I know I don’t do that enough anymore. I think it’s the adulty-ness stepping in. Buffering expectations and doing my best to fend off the fear that something won’t go as planned, or that something will happen and force us to cancel or pivot, or feel the weight of a wet blanket when we get doused with another dose of bad news.
But the best antidote I can think of to all that is to bravely be excited anyway. To hold space for joy. Because even if it doesn’t go as planned, we didn’t let the fear of disappointment get to us. Anticipating all that we’re going to do and getting excited ahead of time. Build some anticipation into our lives, build some excitement for what we’ve got coming up ahead and to keep that going.
Follow and Be the Inspiration
Summer is the perfect time to really stretch yourself to enjoy all that this season has to offer and build the anticipation, build the excitement because I think that’s half of the pleasure. It’s preparing and being excited for the goodness ahead, inspired by the abundance Mother Nature shows us.
I think we can do it for ourselves and we can inspire it for our family and community. Keep it from being a summer that was just fine to one that will be full of memories and maybe the start of new traditions or celebrations. Let it be a catalyst to living a life that lights you up.
Let’s commit to enjoying the summer magic of this abundant season. Kick off your summer and grab the download your copies of the list here, and I can't wait to hear how your bucket list turns out!
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Stephanie Rose is a mom, wife, business owner and a forever student in finding ways to know herself better. She acts as guide for your own journey, sharing insights, tools and practices to help you remember your magic and live a life that lights you up. Sign up for her newsletter and check out her free resources.
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